MLB Playoffs to expand in 2012 (Now official; see post 61)

[jlau20]

Worth pointing out that the games tonight wouldn't have mattered if there were two wild card spots. I know I'd rather have game 162 be the deciding factor if need be rather than watching short series of Rays/Sox and Cards/Braves. Win your games in the regular season/September. A second wild card spot would have allowed two ice cold teams into the playoffs and given them a chance at a championship when they did nothing to earn the right to play for one after coughing up huge leads within a matter of a couple of weeks.

[pitchleague]

yeah, tonight would have been not even close to as exciting as it was had there been 2 wild cards. I'm glad it's only 1 WC winner.

[SeriesFinale]

yeah, tonight would have been not even close to as exciting as it was had there been 2 wild cards. I'm glad it's only 1 WC winner.

I totally agree, but in the midst of this incredible positive night, it's amazing that Bud still finds a way to become the villain: he seems to be getting excoriated personally on the internet tonight because of this

[jlau20]

Yeah from clicking around a few other places he is getting the business right now. Didn't bring it up to compound on that, just bringing up that sometimes the right balance is found for something like this and as of right now, with the one wild card team in each league, MLB really has a pretty good thing going and for my money is the best postseason in pro sports (thinking of NBA and NHL, hard to compare to the NFL with the difference in series vs. one and done).

[Patrick425]

I'll also say that one of the things that really added to the excitement last night was that the season ended on a Wednesday in prime time and was not competing with NFL games. I wasn't really thrilled when the schedule came out for the 2011 season and it showed the final games ending on a weekday, but I now I really see the value in that. I hope they continue to do that.

[DuWayne Steurer]

yeah, tonight would have been not even close to as exciting as it was had there been 2 wild cards. I'm glad it's only 1 WC winner.

I think it's fair (and important) to note that seasons don't end like this very often. I'm not advocating adding a wild card, but this season here in 2011 shouldn't be used as the example of why we shouldn't add one.

 

We could easily see a scenario where adding a team creates just as much excitement, depending on the context of the standings at a given time.

[pitchleague]

yeah, tonight would have been not even close to as exciting as it was had there been 2 wild cards. I'm glad it's only 1 WC winner.

I think it's fair (and important) to note that seasons don't end like this very often. I'm not advocating adding a wild card, but this season here in 2011 shouldn't be used as the example of why we shouldn't add one.

 

We could easily see a scenario where adding a team creates just as much excitement, depending on the context of the standings at a given time.

oh, most definitely. But I would also think that more often that at least one or two of the wild cards (the #1 seed wild cards, if you will) will be decided by then and would only leave excitement for the other two wild cards (the #2 seed wild cards).

 

I can't really imagine too many times that they'd enter the final day of the regular season and none of the four wild cards have clinched yet. I'm sure it CAN happen but I doubt that it would happen often, if at all.

[pebadger]

Expanded playoffs work for me only if:

 

1) the new format is not disruptive in terms of the continuity of the season for some teams but not others

2) a greater effort is made to balance schedules for teams that are competing for the same 'champion' playoff berth (including some sort of realignment if need be)

 

I guess it's just the nature of American sports to make a big deal out of playoffs and to hugely diminish the accomplishment of being regular season champion (which in baseball is quite a substantial undertaking). In some ways I wish we could dial playoffs back a bit, but that argument has been lost and it's clearly not in line with a lot of American attitudes and desires in any event.

[rluzinski]

yeah, tonight would have been not even close to as exciting as it was had there been 2 wild cards. I'm glad it's only 1 WC winner.

The irony is that the major objection to the wild card being instituted was that it would make divisional races "not matter" when the runner up would still make the playoffs.

[Eye Black]

Selig made comments at (White) SoxFest this weekend that he still believes the additional wild cards will be in place this year. His actual quote.....

“I’m optimistic. I think we’ll have it in 2012,â€

[trwi7]

MLB announces expansion and also that for 2012 the team with a lower seed in the divisional round will get two home games to start, which is quite possibly the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

[TooLiveBrew]

It's so sad to me that MLB's apparent goal for the postseason under Selig is to make the regular season as meaningless as possible. Except for the ASG... 'this one counts'. Ugh. What's next, your ST record determines how many home games you get to play in a season?

 

I really wish the leagues would go back to two divisions, one LCS round & then the WS. Imho the importance of the regular season needs to be magnified, not diminished. Almost any team could beat any other team in a given 5- or 7-game series.

[1992casey]

MLB Expands Playoff Format From 8 Teams to 10

 

Major League Baseball expanded its playoff format to 10 teams Friday, adding a second wild-card in each league.

 

The decision establishes a new one-game, wild-card round in each league between the teams with the best records who are not division winners, meaning a third-place team could win the World Series.…

 

For the 2012 postseason, the five-game Division Series will begin with two home games for lower seeds, followed by home games for the higher seed. After that, it will return to the 2-2-1 format previously used.

[fondybrewfan]

The lower seed getting the first two home games in the Divisional round is a horrible idea. Even though the higher seed gets 3 home games the homefield advantage IMO is significantly diminished if Games 1-2 are on the road

[paul253]

I thought I was reading that wrong but the comments I see on here makes me realize I didn't. The team with the best record in the league has to play the first two games in a best of 5 on the road? This is quite possibly the worst idea you can have. I don't like the expansion to begin with. To me, having a one game first round is stupid enough. It's like they are just putting more teams in the playoffs just for the heck of it. It should either stay the way it is, or move to 6 teams like the NFL. Everything about this plan irritates me. You're better off having the second best record than the best record.

[Raw Biz]

It's so sad to me that MLB's apparent goal for the postseason under Selig is to make the regular season as meaningless as possible. Except for the ASG... 'this one counts'. Ugh. What's next, your ST record determines how many home games you get to play in a season?

 

I really wish the leagues would go back to two divisions, one LCS round & then the WS. Imho the importance of the regular season needs to be magnified, not diminished. Almost any team could beat any other team in a given 5- or 7-game series.

 

I like bigger playoffs, like the NFL and NHL (I dislike the NBA). It gives more teams a chance to win and you (usually) don't have the same teams dominating every year. I understand the argument that when you play 162 games, they should matter. I would've shortened the season to 154 (or even less) and expanded the playoffs. But then you have the problem of records and such not being comparable and everything. Obviously if you're a team like the Yankees, Red Sox, or Phillies and usually have a good shot at the playoffs every year, it doesn't really matter. But for teams like us, I like giving us more odds to get there. That being said, if they are going to add another team, it should be a 3 game series, not just a 1 game playoff.

[fondybrewfan]

The good news is the reversal of home games in the divisional round only applies to this year I believe. In future years they will have more flexibility in scheduling to revery back to the higher seed getting the first home games. That being said I am not sure how switching it this year actually saves on travel times.

[owbc]

I don't understand the argument that this diminishes the 162-game season. Instead, it makes it more important because the 2nd place team no longer gets an automatic berth into the divisional series.

 

I do think there should be one additional clause in the rule. If the 2nd Wildcard team finishes more than 5 games below the top Wildcard, then the top Wildcard automatically advances and doesn't have to play.

 

And of course they should add some scheduled doubleheaders to get more time for the playoffs. They can be day/night doubleheaders so that revenue is not lost.

[Menotti80]

I dont this diminishes the regular season at all. If anything, it puts MORE emphasis on winning your division because now if you are the 4 seed, you have to win an extra game to make it into the playoffs and get into a 5 game series.

 

Everytime a team gets the top wild card spot and loses, that's gonna be an enormous letdown.

[pebadger]

Not a big fan. Yes, elimination games are very exciting but the reason elimination games are exciting has more to do with everything that leads up to them being elimination games than it does with the game itself.

 

It just seems to me that MLB is trying too hard to create excitement rather than letting it spontaneously generate. Did the same thing with the All-Star game.

 

Not everything in the world has to be "the greatest X ever". Sometimes you'll have great playoffs, other times you won't. You can't force it unless you want to turn it into professional wrestling.

[Menotti80]

I would support it more if the 2 wild card teams would play a 3 game series.

[brettac1]

I'm not a big fan, either, due to the randomness of a one-game playoff. You could have a year like 2009 where the Red Sox won the Wild Card by 8 games and then they could lose that one-game playoff and be out. I certainly wouldn't consider the team that lost a play-in game to be a "playoff" team.

[OldSchoolSnapper]

I hate this for a lot of reasons.

 

The winner of this game is obviously throwing their ace and can't use him in Game 1 of the DS. There is also a possible awful scenario where a WC from a very good division has a very good record and loses the playoff to an average team that happened to be the 2nd WC.

 

No one will look at the 5th team in as a true playoff team. All they've done is made the regular season 1 game longer and made the one game playoff a yearly required event.

 

And seriously, why? Was the end of last season not exciting enough? I remember the final nights being pretty damn good.

[pebadger]

Have tie-breaking criteria been published yet? Is it possible we'll have multiple one-game playoffs before the actual one-game playoffs?

[Fear The Chorizo]

Have tie-breaking criteria been published yet? Is it possible we'll have multiple one-game playoffs before the actual one-game playoffs?

 

Yeah, that would be interesting - Say there has to be a game #163 to determine the AL Central winner between two teams. Then the loser of that game has the same regular season record as the #2-seeded wild card team, so they have a game #164 to see who the 2nd wildcard is. Then the winner of that game finally plays the top-seeded wildcard. What if there are multiple teams from separate divisions that have the same record for a wildcard spot?

 

I'm sure there are tiebreakers, but it gets tricky to do that because winning the division is now an even bigger deal than winning a wildcard spot.