Spring - What's it all mean?

ARIZONA & FLORIDA - Spring training games are about to break out all over Arizona and Florida. What does it matter? How predictable are spring records to regular season records?

Let's look at SPRING 2008. Of the eight eventual division/wildcard winners, only three had winning records in the spring:

AL East Tampa Bay Rays................18-8
AL Central Chicago White Sox........11-19
AL West L.A. Angels........................19-10
AL Wildcard Boston Red Sox...........8-13
NL East Philadelphia Phillies..........12-18
NL Central Chicago Cubs................15-15
NL West L.A. Dodgers.....................11-18
NL Wildcard Milwaukee Brewers....18-11

The Phillies of course won it all, so their spring record wasn't very predictable. Tampa Bay's spring, however was quite prescient. It tied for the best spring winning percentage in all of baseball, and made it to the World Series. The team it tied for the best record in spring didn't fair so well. The Oakland Athletics finished 3rd in the American League West eleven games under .500

How about SPRING 2007? Seven of the eight playoff teams had winning records, but only the Diamondbacks had a winning percentage over .600.

AL East New York Yankees 14-13
AL Central Cleveland Indians 16-14
AL West L.A. Angels 19-14
AL Wildcard Boston Red Sox 15-12
NL East Philadelphia Phillies 11-18
NL Central Chicago Cubs 17-13
NL West Arizona Diamondbacks 20-12
NL Wildcard Colorado Rockies 13-12

The team with the best record in spring training in '07, the Detroit Tigers (21-10/.677), didn't make the postseason.

Contributing sources
Spring Training Schedules
Pennant Races
2007 Spring Training