Extra wild cards coming to MLB playoffs this year

[El Supremo]

GLENDALE, Ariz. -- Major League Baseball, after month-long negotiations with the players union, will finalize the 2012 postseason format as soon as Thursday, expanding the playoffs by two teams.

"We'll have an answer in the next couple of days,'' Michael Weiner, executive director of the Major League Players Association, told USA TODAY on Wednesday.

The expanded format was approved for 2013 in November, but Commissioner Bud Selig strongly pushed for the extra wild-card round to begin this year. The difficulty was trying to squeeze in the one-game, wild-card round playoff game, with the regular-season and World Series schedules already finalized.

(snip)

The new postseason format will eliminate the rule that teams from the same division can no longer face one another in the first round. In fact, three teams could quality for the playoffs from the same division.

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/dailypitch/post/2012/02/mlb-baseball-playoffs-wild-card-2012/1

Squeezing money out of one lousy extra game.

[madinmaryland]

1. Heh! Colorado will play Pittsburgh in the first playoff game in Pittsburgh in 20 years, yet there

will be an asterisk attached to it.

Yeah, because Barry Bonds was the 2012 hitting instructor for the Pirates!!

[El Supremo]

4. How can he do that under house arrest?

[hughee99]

5. Must have had to special order that wig to fit his giant mellon. n/t

[madinmaryland]

9. Uhm. Being the hitting coach for the Pittsburgh Pirates IS house arrest.

[Auggie]

16. +1

[El Supremo]

2. Check out this scenario:

Yankees and Red Sox finish tied for first and have the best regular season records in baseball. The Rays are far back but have a better record than any other potential wild cards but worse than the other division champs.

Even though the Yankees won the head-to-head with the Red Sox they have to play one game with them to determine East champion. They lose. They then play the one game play-in with the Rays and lose. The Rays then beat the Red Sox in the 5 game first round and go on to beat the the next two teams to win the World Series. Thus a third place team wins it all.

Sumpin' ain't right here.

[madinmaryland]

3. I love that scenario!

Just replace the Rays with the Orioles!!

[hughee99]

6. If the Sox and Yankees are both in the playoffs already,

I don't think they play a head-to-head to determine the division winner, it goes on season head to head, and then maybe coin flip. They only have to play the 1 game playoff if it's the difference between getting into the playoffs and not getting in.

[El Supremo]

7. They play.

I said that a month or so ago. The loser of a tie breaker can't be made to play a one game wild card play-in. Before, they went to a five game series just like all the teams.

[hughee99]

12. Are you sure?

Under the old system, the 1 game playoff is only done if one of the two teams isn't going to make the playoffs. Otherwise you'd end up with a one game playoff in which neither team might be interested in screwing up their pitching before a guaranteed playoff series. A few years ago the Sox went into the final week of the season with a chance to win the division, and since both teams were already in the playoffs, the sox needed to win outright or the Yankees would win the tiebreaker. Under no circumstance would a 1 game playoff be played.

Does this change under the new system?

[El Supremo]

13. Yes, I'm sure.

I'll find a link tomorrow.

The new system changes it, because a wild card birth doesn't mean as much.

[hughee99]

14. I didn't know they changed this.

I thought it was the same rule as the old system, but I guess if the WC isn't just another playoff spot and is instead a 1 and done, it makes sense.

[El Supremo]

15. Here's a link from today:

Further complicating scheduling, the sides reached a consensus that ties for division titles would be broken on the field with a tiebreaker game under the new playoff format, and not by head-to-head record.

http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/news;_ylt=AiKqAlZeYu6ZW1DO1ogeM3wRvLYF?slug=ap-expandedplayoffs

[Auggie]

8. What a load of crap

They could have eliminated the same division rule and kept the playoff schedule as is (except add more DAY GAMES).

I hate this.

[Kingofalldems]

10. The Four Horsemen of the Natpocalypse liking this one---

http://www.natsenquirer.com

[El Supremo]

11. Remember last year when Boston, Tampa Bay, Atlanta and St. Louis...

were all playing for a wild card birth on the last day of the season? A day some call the best in recent history?

Won't happen now. They all would be wild cards.

[ellisonz]

17. Why change what ain't broke?