There’s a pretty big difference between hating progress and hating stupid ideas. I’m all for an electronic strike zone, the universal adoption of the DH, a more extensive (and better) implementation of replay, I’m open to massive, radical realignment, “sanctity” of the leagues be damned. I’m in favor of all sorts of crazy crap, but I’m sure what I’ve listed already is enough to piss each and every HBTer off (well, just the DH comment would have taken care of that).

I’m not against this because it’s new and different. I’m against it because it’s new and dumb.

If Uggla doesn’t turn his head after rounding third to look at the throw from Pence he probablly gets to the plate a split second sooner and scores so the Braves and Cardinals would have tied.

And if Papelbon gets Davis or Reimold out in the 9th inning, the Rays and RS are tied.

Remember how baffled Selig looked when the All-Star game ended up tied like he had no idea what to do? Two teams tied at the end of the season might cause smoke to come out his ears.

And don’t even mention the problem if the last game of the regular season gets rained out.

At least the wildcard, as presently constructed, gives an out when the second best team in the league happens to be in the same division as the best team. IE, in ’04, the Yankees won 101, the Red Sox won 98, and no one else in the AL was over 92 (going off memory here, I think this is right). I think everyone can agree that keeping the Red Sox out of the postseason that year would have been a joke, it was obvious that the Red Sox and Yankees were the two best teams in the AL that year. So at least some years, the wildcard puts a great team into the playoffs that does deserve to be there. Now, under this system, that 98 win Red Sox team would have to face off against some 90-ish win team from the central or west. What kind of sense does that make?

Are you implying that a one game playoff in 2001 between the 102 Win A’s and the 85 Win Minnesota Twins would have been a mockery?

I don’t even like the Wild Card to begin with. It just dampens the importance of the regular season and allows situations where a weaker team gets to play a division rival in the playoffs when that division rival already beat them over the course of a 162 game season. Why should they have to beat them again? The exciting division crown race between the two best teams in the league are long dead. Adding a one game playoff just decreases the value of the season even more. Now, the only “races” are for the worst division in the league and the 2nd and 3rd place wild card teams.

Why not just make playoff games eleven innings long? That way, you’d probably get your extra games in, and you wouldn’t have to squeeze or stretch into near-infinity the already, grotesquely, distended baseball calendar?

*Without any intended reference to Jonathan Swift. We’ve already had a discussion about gagging down ballpark hotdogs on another thread. Screaming babies are horrible enough just to have around; Buddha only knows what they must taste like.

It also means all that week leading into it, with the all the building excitement as the Cards and Rays inched closer and closer would have been totally wiped away…as they would have been having a one game playoff anyway.

For god’s sake, there are 162 games in a season. How many chances is enough for a team to get into the playoffs already?!?

Let the “Thumbs Down”s begin.

So absurd. It’s ridiculous to try to manufacture a night like that. It can’t be manufactured because while you can monkey around with the wildcard system all you want, you cannot control the distribution of wins. A sudden-death match between two teams that have played to a stalemate over 162 is exciting. A sudden-death match between a 90 win team and, say, an 86 win team just makes a mockery of the regular season.