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Giancarlo Stanton continued his impressive tear on Friday night, homering twice in a winning effort as the Miami Marlins topped the San Diego Padres by an 8-6 score. With 49 home runs, Stanton now has a real shot at becoming the first player to top 60 in a season since Barry Bonds and Sammy Sosa both did it in 2001.

Meanwhile, the Marlins are quietly above the .500 mark, at 64-63, for the first time since late April. Though the National League East remains out of reach, Miami entered Saturday 4 1/2 games back of a wild card spot.

How Stanton goes is how the Marlins go. You might wonder, then, just what the SportsLine projections anticipate for both parties. Fortunately, we're here to provide an answer.

Stanton is now expected to hit 60 home runs, per Stephen Oh. He has a 28 percent chance at topping Roger Maris' 61 -- which, as Matt Snyder reminded everyone recently, isn't the true home-run record regardless of what Barry Bonds did or didn't do. If you calculate Stanton's chances by looking at just his post-All Star break pace rather than his season in full, his odds of beating Maris go all the way up to 88 percent over the remaining stretch of the season

As for the Marlins' postseason chances, they're now up to 20 percent -- that's nearly four times their odds as of a month ago. It's worth noting that Miami held just a 0.3 percent chance at playing in the playoffs back on May 18, when they were 14-25 and projected for 70 wins. Now, the Marlins have 64 wins and a chance -- albeit not a great one -- at reaching October for the first time since 2003:

Split

W-L

Proj. W

Playoff%

May 18

14-25

69.7

0.3%

July 26

45-53

77.1

5.5%

August 26

64-63

81.1

19.9%

We'll see if Stanton can continue to carry his team to the unlikeliest of playoff berths, all the while attempting to complete one of the best single-season displays of power production in history.