You’re not going to believe this. You know who is talking about the playoffs right now? Fans of the second place Orioles (44-38). Fans of the Indians (43-39). Fans of the Mets (45-38). YUP. I could list more, but I think those three are a good snapshot of why the extra Wild Card is awesome for the game. These are fans that are actually thinking “Holy $hit, we may actually make it in this year!” Yep. We’re ACTUALLY thinking that.Oh I know it’s premature. I am fully aware. Where were the Pirates last year at this time? Playoff contention via the fact that they were actually leading their division – that’s where. Flash forward to the end of the year – 3rd place and record under .500. So yes, clearly it’s very premature for anyone to be thinking about the playoffs. But OMG can you imagine if the Mets actually make it into the playoffs?! How amazing would that be?!
OK, just had to get that out of my system. However, that is my point. The best thing about the extra Wild Card isn’t the fact that it actually creates an advantage to winning the division (although that’s a good one), or that the trade deadline is probably going to be a lot more fun with more buyers. Nope, the best thing about it is that it is creating hope. Hope for the underachievers, hope for the have-nots, hope for the slow starters…just oodles of hope. And being dragged along with all that hope is a whole bushel of excitement, that’s only going to grow the closer we get to the end of the regular season.
Adding the extra Wild Card has made the marathon of the baseball season actually entertaining for some of those fan bases that haven’t had any fun in years. If you don’t believe me, talk to a Kansas City fan. They’re currently residing in 4th place at 37-44 (as of 7/6/2012) – but they’re merely 7.5 games off of the division lead, and there’s still ½ the season to go. You don’t think Kansas City fans are having a better time this year than they have in…well the past 15 years? Sure, some of that fun comes from the fact that they’re actually playing some good baseball here and there. But we all know playing good baseball here and there throughout the season doesn’t deliver the playoffs. Every team has some good games every year – even if they lose 100. But to be able to watch your team play some good baseball here and there, and know that there actually is a chance that they could go on a run and end up pulling out a Wild Card berth at the end of the year…a Wild Card berth that they would have probably had NO shot at last season…but there’s TWO this year, so just MAYBE…! Hope. Yankees fans may not understand what I’m talking about. Rangers fans probably don’t give a shit either. But Mets fans, Baltimore fans, Oakland fans, Cleveland, Milwaukee, Arizona, and yes Kansas City fans – they understand. And it’s damn exciting.  |  Of all the major sports, baseball is best set up to judge who the best teams are after it’s regular season. No need for teams to panic after a rough start to the year, no need to trip out when your short stop lets the ball roll under his glove allowing the game winning run. “It’s just one game” has meaning in baseball because there are 161 more that matter just as much. Keep playing well, keep doing your thing, and if you’re good, the wins will come. That’s the beauty of the baseball season, bad luck (outside of catastrophic injuries) can’t kill you. Good teams will win more than they lose, great teams will win a lot more than they lose. It’s the great teams that deserve a chance to contend for the title of World Series Champion. Well, this year, MLB decided to say “fuck all that”. What we have starting this season, is a play in game. Two wild card teams will play on Oct 5th to decide which one gets to play for a chance to wear the crown. They will play one game. After a 26 week grind, four teams will have their seasons reduced to one freaking game. How does this make sense? How does this help us better determine the best team? Isn’t that the whole point of the season? Everyone who’s ever watched a baseball game knows that flukey shit happens all the time. Umpires miss calls, runners slip on the base paths, outfielders loose balls in the sun. The best team doesn’t always win. It’s the nature of the game, it’s why, even during the regular season you usually play a team three or four times in a row, because it’s impossible to gauge anything after one baseball game. So to say a team who wins on one given night deserves a chance to play for the championship is flat out ridiculous. And no, this is not the same as a game 7. A game 7 is the culmination of a series, the teams have been even to that point, and if you beat a team four times, you’ve proven something. You beat a team once, on Oct. 5th, you’ve proven that the baseball gods smiled on you that day, that’s it. The only thing this set up does is further diminish the meaning of the regular season. People always complain that the NBA regular season is too long, that teams don’t even start trying until the all star break. The only reason these things are true (and they are) is because half the teams in the league make the playoffs. All you have to do is “just enough to get in”. Why would baseball want to move closer to this? I realize it’s still the most exclusive playoff structure in the major sports, but now we are up to almost a third of the teams in the league making the postseason. This doesn’t make the game better, it just makes it more like everything else.  |
