Chicago Cubs: Playoff odds continue to fall for World Champions

The first two months of the Major League Baseball season brought plenty of surprises, including a disappointing performance by the reigning World Series champion Chicago Cubs.

Coming off their first title in over a century, the Chicago Cubs were supposed to steamroll their way to a second-straight National League pennant in 2017. Instead, the team enters the month of June two games below .500 in the midst of a six-game losing streak.

That skid, the worst of the Joe Maddon era, has reignited fear and panic amongst Cubs fans, just a week after a 7-2 homestand erased it (for the most part). Needless to say, the team’s current pace isn’t an option. Either turn it around or face an unthinkable proposition: risk missing the postseason.

Thankfully, Chicago enjoys playing in one of the weakest divisions in the game. Just a handful of games back, even after the losing streak, the Cubs are very much in the hunt for a second-straight division title.

Outside the National League Central, there have been plenty of surprises – as well as disappointments. Out west, the Colorado Rockies and Arizona Diamondbacks are white-hot. In the American League, the Houston Astros appear poised to win the franchise’s first ever championship.

Let’s take a look at how postseason odds have changed over the first two months of the 2017 campaign.