There’s tons of intriguing possibilities as the season closes. If every post-season position is locked in by September 10, then I agree: that’s awful boring baseball.

But as long as the threat of a one game playoff, I think there will always be drama…

I think it would be an interesting exercise to go back through past seasons and see how many close playoff races there would have been had different playoff formats been in place at the time. Obviously, you can’t check all possible formats in all past seasons. It doesn’t make sense to ask how, say, a “division winners make the playoffs” format would’ve worked before divisions existed. But I’d be very curious to see how it plays out. Maybe somebody’s already done this and I just don’t know about it.

Sure the American League has been good, but that is going to happen every year, some good some bad.

You could have a Dallas Cowboys vs. Washington Redskins Super Bowl.

Celtics vs. Heat NBA Championships.

Penguins vs. Flyers Stanley Cup.

You all get the picture.

Teams play all other teams evenly. Playoffs just take the top X amount of teams based on records… and then Top seed plays lowest seed, etc.

That way every year, home fans get to see the rest of the league at home at least every other year. Less problems with competitive balance due to being stuck in a horrible or stacked division.

Sure, it’s more travel/logistics cost for the league and teams. But why should I care about that? They make more than enough.

People would argue “it doesn’t build rivalries.” sorry… but rivalries will be built in the playoffs. When teams make it there more than once a decade. Good teams will develop rivalries when they run into the same opponent in the playoffs and one team ends the other team’s season.

And yes, the same principal would be applied to other sports.

Fearless leader Bud took it upon himself to ensure that happened every year with this new system.

Its cool, but it just seems artificial. Let awesome races happen organically.

I was living in the Bay Area that fall and got to go to Candlestick for the Giants’ final home game, against the expansion Rockies. I wore my Braves hat. The Giants lost that game, giving the Braves a one-run lead they lost a couple days later against (I think) the Astros.

In the end, it was Dodgers fans doing the Chop on top of the Giants dugout in LA on the last day of the season. Good times.

There is then the guaranteed excitement of a one game, win-or-go-home play-in game, along with the possibility of tiebreaker games to decide who goes to the one-game play in.

I obviously don’t know how it will shake out each year, but there are certainly more opportunities for exciting races under the current format than ever before.

Signed,

Pirate fan