It’s been a somewhat bumpy road of late for the Los Angeles Dodgers, who saw their shot at the NL’s top seed take a big hit in a humbling series loss to the Braves at the start of September and have had their starting pitcher depth seriously tested for a number of reasons. And yet, with weeks to go in the 2023 regular season, there L.A. stands, once again poised to be crowned kings of the NL West. With a second straight division title (and a remarkable 10th in the last 11 years) in sight, we’ll be keeping track of the Dodgers’ magic number to win the West, with updates every morning.
(As we near the playoffs and divisions are decided, teams are given “magic numbers” to clinch their division. This is just a fun term for the number of wins needed to secure a division so that no matter what else happens, that team will win the division come the last day of the season.)
Dodgers magic number: 5
9/13 update: A Dodgers win over San Diego on Tuesday night, combined with Arizona’s loss to the Mets, means that L.A.’s magic number has shrunk from seven to five. Los Angeles will look to add another win against Blake Snell on Wednesday night, while the D-backs look to get back on track in game two of three at Citi Field.
While the Arizona Diamondbacks gave them a run in the first half, Los Angeles has flexed its muscle of late, with a 24-5 record in August that more or less put this division race to bed. The Dodgers enter play on Tuesday with a 12-game lead over Arizona in the West, 13 games up in the loss column. Any combination of seven Los Angeles wins and D-backs losses hands the division to the Dodgers, meaning this race is all but wrapped up. They still likely won’t catch the Braves for the top seed in the NL — they’re six games back of Atlanta as of this writing — but once again this team is going to be an awfully tough out come October (you know, presuming they have at least a couple healthy starters left by then).