The 2015 MLB Season Trivia Quiz

Answer: NL Central

The St, Louis Cardinals won 100 games, the Pittsburgh Pirates 98, and the Chicago Cubs 97. No other team won more than 95.
("NL" will stand for National league, and "AL" for American League.)

Answer: Toronto Blue Jays

The Blue Jays had the longest playoff drought of any MLB team going into the 2015 season. Oddly, though, the Jays had won the World Series more recently than seven of the other nine playoff teams, the only exceptions being the Cardinals and the Yankees.

The Jays won both the 1992 and 1993 World Series, then vanished from the playoffs until the 2015 season. Their division, the AL East, was a tough division in which to compete during this period, with the Yankees and/or the Red Sox usually dominating the division. Of the other teams in the postseason in 2015, the Mets, Dodgers and Royals last won a World Series in the 1980s, the Pirates in the 1970s, the Cubs in 1908(!), and the Astros and Rangers never.

Answer: Kansas City Royals

The Royals snuck into the playoffs in 2014 as a wild card team, but in 2015 they avoided having to play a wild card game by winning the division outright in dominating fashion. The Detroit Tigers, by contrast, sunk to last place in 2015, after having won the division the prior four years.

Answer: Los Angeles Dodgers

The Dodgers stocked up on high-priced free agents, and did win their division. However, they got knocked out of the playoffs in the Division Series by the surprising Mets. The Dodgers actually ended the year with a higher payroll due to some expensive midseason acquisitions. It was hard to see any significant correlation between payroll and performance for the 2015 season. For example, of the four teams which were still around for the two League Championship Series, two were in the top half of payroll and two in the bottom half.

The wrong choices are the three teams at the bottom of the list of opening day payrolls.

Answer: Jake Arrieta

Arietta's season was remarkable, a true breakout season. His second-half ERA of 0.75 was the lowest in history for full-time starters during the second half of a season. The other choices are all pitchers who, like Arrieta, threw no-hitters during the 2015 season, which was truly "the year of the pitcher". Arrieta won the Cy Young award as the best NL pitcher in 2015, narrowly beating out Zack Greinke of the Dodgers.

Other Cubs winning postseason honors include third baseman Kris Bryant as Rookie of the Year, and manager Joe Maddon as Manager of the Year.

Answer: Yes

Average length of games dropped six minutes, down to two hours and 56 minutes. The rules changes required batters to keep one foot in the batter's box after taking a pitch, and put a time limit on between-inning breaks. Stricter changes were made in the minor leagues, with better length-shortening results. Until 2015, the length of MLB games had gradually increased over the years.

In the 1970s, the average game lasted only two hours and 30 minutes.

Answer: Josh Donaldson

Donaldson nosed out Mike Trout of the Los Angeles Angels. The issue of who was more deserving--Donaldson or Trout--depends on how one analyzes the stats. The sabermetricians preferred Trout, pointing out that Donaldson's amazing total of 123 RBI's was made possible because he came up to bat more often with runners on base, due to the Blue Jays' prolific offense. And Trout nosed out Donaldson in the stat favored by the statheads, wins above replacement (WAR). Cain of the Royals and Machado of the Orioles finished third and fourth, respectively, in the MVP voting.

Answer: Bryce Harper

Harper was a unanimous choice for MVP, the youngest unanimous choice in baseball history. Paul Goldschmidt of the Diamondbacks was the runner-up, while Fielder and Harvey were the Comeback Players of the Year in the AL and NL, respectively.

Answer: Dallas Keuchel

The other choices were the second through fourth place finishers in the voting.

Answer: Matt Williams of the Washington Nationals

The Nationals had a horribly disappointing season under Matt Williams. Most prognosticators had picked the Nationals to not only win their division, but to also go on to win the World Series. Instead, they finished only four games over .500, losing the division by seven games to the surprising Mets.

Ryne Sandberg quit his Phillies managing job in midseason, unable to stomach the woeful play of his team any longer. Hinch and Molitor both piloted their teams to surprisingly good seasons.