(Waits for snide comments about soccer and Europeans.)

That. Was. Really. Helpful. Thanks.

Don’t f**k with me, neveraboutveracity! Not you!

Get rid of all of the extra travel days and I would be in favor of the 3 game WC series. Heck, play it over two days, making the second day a double header if a 3rd game is needed. That would still get you a 3 game series, while keeping the incentive to win your division. Play all three games in the city of the WC with the better record to keep the incentive there as well.

By the way, the AL would have played out exactly the same this year regardless of rule changes. Texas and Baltimore would have had to play one game to decide who was the WC team anyway. Do you think Texas wishes they had taken care of business and closed out the A’s in the regular season?

We’ve already got a best of five, a best of seven, and another best of 7. This should be more than enough to prove who the “best team in baseball” is.

Bottom line, and I really can’t stress this enough: win your division. There are already maximum of 18 post-season games in each division, not counting the World Series. Do you really want the quality of post-season play to degrade even more by adding MORE games?

Who “should” be there? What kind of statement is that? The teams that win should be in the post-season. If the Braves and Rangers couldn’t get it done, then they shouldn’t be there. If the Yankees and Nationals lose this week, it won’t matter if they had the best records in baseball: they lost. Would you cry a river over an Orioles/Tigers ALCS, even though those two teams had the worst records of any AL team in the postseason?

Seriously: win or go home. How hard is this?

So you’re telling me you would have written the same piece had “your Braves” won? I call BS on that one.

You would think most rational people would expect the Braves to choke. He’ll it’s the thing they’ve done best for the last 20 years.

ME: Hi Joe, the usual this morning. Tough break about those [name of team] losing last night.
JOE: What happened Brian — did no one get paid?
ME: Oh, they all made their money all right, Joe.
JOE: Oh, then you mean they won.

I’m sure you (or your dad) were moaning and groaning back in ’73, in the “old” format, when the 82-win Mets faced off, and beat, the 99-win Reds in the NLCS to advance to the World Series against the A’s.

And you were left shaking your head in ’87 in the “old” format when the 85-win Twins lucked in and got to a chance to take down the 98-win Tigers in the ALCS, and then went on to play–and beat—the 95-win Cardinals in the World Series.

Face it, ANY playoff system gives “inferior” teams an opportunity to beat a “better” team—that’s the point. Otherwise you’d just get rid of divisions and have the best of the 16 NL teams meet the best of the AL’s 14 teams.

You may quibble with the NUMBER of teams that make the postseason, but 10 out of 30–and really, only 6 out of 30 get a guaranteed multigame postseason series—seems like a reasonable number in 2012.

*slaps forehead*

Of course, I want division rivals to play each other 14 times (42 games), the rest of their league 6 times (72 games), and every team in the other league 3 times (48 games – alternating years at each venue) to get to 162. As a baseball fan, I’ll just ignore the obvious travel and scheduling objections.

The current system seems too contrived to me. MLB still can’t even award home-field advantage to the teams with the best records across the board. This isn’t rocket science. As overly involved as my ideas seem, none of it is any wackier than some of the stuff we’re already experiencing.

It’s not your fault.

It’s not your fault.