BASEBALL NEEDS CHANGES

I tuned in just in time for the 7th inning of last night's BoSox-Yankees game. Like Steven, I thought the Sox had it won. But, like the Cubbies, they managed once again to find a way to lose.

What's particularly annoying to me is that we once again have a wild card team in the World Series. Had the Sox not left Pedro in when he was obviously out of gas, we'd have the second consecutive all-wild card Series.

Baseball has the longest regular season by far of any of the team sports, yet also the system in which the regular season is most meaningless. In the NFL, for example, the teams with the best regular season records in each conference get a first round bye and then home field advantage. But the only advantage an MLB division champion gets over a wild card team is they get to play the deciding game of a five game series, if it comes to that, at home. Given how little home field matters in baseball, that's not much. Indeed, it's sufficiently meaningless that the San Francisco Giants forfeited a makeup game at the end of the season that would have given them a shot at home field in the NLCS, preferring instead to set their rotation for the NLDS.

Not only is the reward for winning in the regular season small indeed, but success in the regular season also has less correlation with postseason success than in the other sports. It's rare for an NFL team that went 13-3 in the regular season to lose a playoff game to a team that snuck into the playoffs with a 9-7 record. Barring injuries key players or freakish weather, regular season and postseason football are the same games. Not so in baseball. The Atlanta Braves, for example, have been a regular season phenomenon for over a decade, building their team around a strong starting rotation and solid offense. That's a great formula for a 162 game season with few off days. But the key to postseason victory is to have two hot starting pitchers, an excellent closer, and a bit of luck. In a five game division series, two dominant pitchers can pitch four of the five games because of travel days.

MLB should either radically shorten its meaningless regular season or render it more meaningful by changes of the postseason format. For one thing, I'd make the division series seven games. A five game series is simply unfair to the dominant team. Further, I'd give the team playing the wild card true home field advantage: the entire series would be played in their home stadium. Along with that, I'd eliminate the idiotic rule that a division champion can't play the wild card team in the opening round if it's from the same division. The team with the best record should play the team with the worst record, period.

Cross-post at SportsBlog

from OTB

CURSE OF HIGH EXPECTATIONS

Stephen Green argues,

If the Cubs or the Red Sox win the World Series, or even manage to win their respective pennants, it would be the worst possible thing to happen to baseball fans in Chicago or Boston.

Why? It takes away the "wait 'til next year" hope.

Not to mention the curse of high expectations, suffered by those such as myself who are fans of teams where Failure is Not an Option. Because I moved frequently growing up and got interested in different sports at different times, I'm a fan of the Dallas Cowboys, Alabama Crimson Tide, and the Atlanta Braves. For fans of those teams, merely beating a couple heated rivals during the regular season and getting into postseason play is not enough. Winning a national championship is the only measure of success. So, the Cowboys, Tide, and Braves have been dismal failures since 1995, 1992, and 1995 respectively. Most sports fans would be happy with five Super Bowl trophies, twelve (mythical) national championships, and twelve straight division titles. Not us.

Cross-posted at SportsBlog

from OTB