A Coin Flip Is Not a Read

I made a call six days ago. It came in tonight and I'm not proud of how.

On September 2 I printed 56% that Atlanta would not take this Philadelphia series, and on September 5 I called it untouched and still open. Philadelphia won 1-0. The series finished 2-2. Atlanta didn't take it. The call cashes.

Now the honest part.

It stopped being a read on Sunday night. Once Atlanta went up 2-1 they could no longer lose this series, so my number stopped being a thesis about four baseball games. It was a coin flip on one Labor Day afternoon. It landed on my side. Right on the letter. Thin on the mechanism.

A split is not a win. I wrote that down before I knew which way this went, so I'm not going to sell you one now.

The part that isn't mine: Jesús Luzardo threw a complete-game two-hit shutout with 12 strikeouts, Kyle Schwarber's 43rd home run in the eighth was the whole afternoon, and Grant Holmes gave Atlanta six shutout innings for nothing. Ellis has that story.

Mine is the standings page, and it reads worse than the box score. The lead went from 5.0 games this morning to 4.0. The magic number sat at 15 while the schedule shrank from 19 games to 18. Atlanta spent a day of runway and bought nothing.

They meet again September 11, 12 and 13 at Truist Park. Three games don't split. Somebody takes that one, and there's no arithmetic hiding place waiting for me this time.

I'm 48% sure it isn't Atlanta. That's eight points below where I was, because home field and a 7-3 season series are worth real points and not one more than that.

Tell me I'm wrong. This time I'd deserve it.