Whose losses count toward the wildcard spot, the Marlins and Diamondbacks?

It's down to 17 for the top wild card, 14 for the third.

Meanwhile, Braves' magic number for the division is four. They can clinch it tomorrow night on our turf if they win the next two.

Heading into this month, many envisioned a sprint to the Postseason with a Postseason berth clinched by the penultimate weekend and first wildcard clinched by midweek thereafter. More likely it will be a slog andwe wrap up a berth against the Pirates and, if we get the top WC, we'll get it at CitiField.

That certainly appears to be true that the competition--the Cubs, Giants, Diamondbacks, Reds and Marlins--also has issues. The Phillies have gone 4-6 in their last ten but have lost only one game in the standings to all of them over that span (each is 5-5 in the last ten). The Phillies September schedule has been tough but gets a little easier starting this weekend then gets real easy the rest of the way. Cubs and Diamondbacks play each other this weekend.

Of course, we're not talking about last year.

Diamonbacks swept the Cubs. Have moved into the #2 wild card spot. 3 games behind the Phillies.

Cubs and Marlins are tied for the final spot.

Cubs might be fading, Diamondbacks and Marlins might be surging.

Meanwhile, the Braves--who were routed in Miami this weekend by a combined 36-13 score in a Marlins three-game sweep--may need to be more concerned about losing WS homefield advantage to the Orioles or Rays than NL Postseason homefield advantage to the Dodgers.

If you want s real dark horse, be afraid of the Padres. They are 6 out, but they are clearly the best team of the WC teams other than the Phillies, just look at run differential. They have won 4 in a row, basically they need to almost run the table at this point (no more than 2-3 losses), which of course is very unlikely. If they win 4-5 more in a row they might suddenly become a threat.

Very dark horse, it is probably too late, but if they keep winning they might become a very ugly team to meet in the postseason

Yeah, the Padres record despite their run differential is perplexing. But, at this point, they would pretty much need to turn into the 2007 Rockies (19-1 run until the WS) or 2019 Nationals (24-5 run culminating with a WS win) which, yes, would make them an October threat just by being a hot team.

Imagine how their fans feel about Schwarber, Turner and Harper in the last 6 weeks​

The way this team hit in August and surged in the playoffs last year nobody wants anything to do with us

I think custom is to celebrate clinching the playoffs.

Teams and players celebrate events during a game when they are losing by 8 runs (HR celebrations in the dugout ie) I can't imagine some at least small type of celebration for clinching a spot. I would hope they do enough to acknowledge the achievement but don't go overboard as there are more steps to be taken. Also for a number of the players this is new grounds, it will be the first playoff experience so they deserve a chance to celebrate the accomplishmnet.

Just my opinion, but doing clubhouse celebrations following wildcard and divisional rounds is overdoing it.

I agree... with the exception of last year... with the Phillies long absence from the playoffs.. I think the phan base wanted and needed to see those celebrations.

If it was up for me to decide...

Clinch a Postseason berth or division: Pop the corks and celebrate (but not for both)
Clinch Postseason homefield advantage; No.
Win wildcard round: No.
Win divisional round: No.
Win LCS: Pop the corks and celebrate
Win WS: Of course, pop the corks and celebrate.

There's a bit of a divergence with the above sites. Playoffstatus.com says our magic numbers are 7 and 6 while playoffmagic.com says they are 8 and 7.

Magic numbers this morning...

Using the below thingy, I get...

6 over the Diamondbacks--manually applying the tiebreaker
5 over the Marlins
4 over the Cubs--manually applying the tiebreaker
3 over the Reds--manually applying the tiebreaker
2 over the Giants
1 over the Padres

I am assuming this is calculating outright "finish ahead of" and not ties. Therefore, where we win the tiebreaker, you can chop of a game.

It is really hard to say what our clinch a berth or clinch homefield advantage number is since much depends on what happens with the other teams. We need to see some of the teams toward the bottom of the above list fall off it. We could conceivably clinch a berth by the end of this Mets series (be it Sunday or Monday, due to the weather) if we win at least two of those games, the Padres and Giants lose at least one and the Cubs lose two.

Diamondbacks play at the Yankees...who may be playing hard to avoid the Yanks' first losing season since 1992 but who still stink
Cubs host the moribund Rockies
Marlins host the Brewers whose magic number to clinch the division is down to two.
Reds host the Pirates who have played moderately well lately
Giants play at the Dodgers who still have a very outside chance of reeling in the Braves (that magic number is down to six)
Padres visit the Cardinals

If the magic number with Miami is 5, then that means we finish ahead of them with those 5 (not tied). This would mean you would not add 1 to the magic number. You are only subtracting 1 from the magic number of teams we have tiebreaker with because we have to tie them not have a better record.

Correct. The magic numbers I put up above are for the Phillies to finish ahead of, not tied with each of those teams. Since the Philies have the tiebreakers against the Diamondbacks, Cubs and Reds, the magic number that the calculator spits out is reduced by one since a tie with the Phillies isn't going to help any of those teams. The Phillies clinching a tie with any of those teams is clinching a higher seeding. Any combination of Phillies wins and Marlins losses totaling five means the Phillies finish ahead of Miami and their tiebreaker over us will be irrelevant.