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Thread: Playoff Format Debate

  1. #1
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    Playoff Format Debate

    I was sitting around the ballpark last night as the Reds pulled out an awesome 3-2 victory in front of one of the livliest crowds I have seen since Griffey was chasing .600 and was thinking about the playoff situation. Why doesn't baseball adopt a 16 team playoff format like the NBA? I don't understand what it can hurt.. I know there are many baseball purist out there that don't agree with it, but in this day and age it could be nothing but positive for the game. I'll tell you what I propose and give you my reasoning why.

    -Move one team from the National League, someone such as the Rockies or Nationals, that don't have much history with the National League to the American League. This makes it an even 15 teams in each League.

    -Break the divisons down to 2 divisions in each League (East and West). This kind of simplifies things and makes division titles within themselves mean more to a Franchise because it is harder to win.

    - Make it where the 4 top teams in Each Division face off on one side of a playoff brackett. This would make it to where teams would not have to fly to the West Coast or East Coast for 1st and 2nd round playoff games. Heres and example.

    NL
    ===East 1
    ===== Winner
    ===East 4

    ===East 2 =====Winner
    =====Winner
    ===East 3
    ======NL Champion
    ===West 1
    =====Winner
    ===West 4
    =====Winner
    ===West 2
    =====Winner
    ===West 3


    This in my opinion would help baseball with so many of its problems. Heres my list.

    1. The obvious. It cuts down the number of meaningless August and September games and gives fans a reason of teams that normally wouldn't be into it to go to games. Local Market TV Ratings would go up.

    2. For baseball purist it kind of ends up being the way of old. The best team from the East takes on the best team from the West to determine who goes to the World Series.

    3. It would be great for local revenue as local markets and mlb.tv could be the exclusive home to first round games. Attendance would be high and it would give people a reason to subscribe to a mlb.tv package for playoff games.

    4. Attendance, which would normally be down for a meaningless Reds vs Pirates game in September would increase and help create more revenue due to the two teams playing for the 4 seed in the east.


    I think this would be so fun. Baseball needs to adopt something like this to help keep fans interest in the later part of the season. The one thing in baseball that can't be replaced is hope. If there is hope for a team, people will come to the ballpark and watch it on tv more. Alot of people will argue that it will hurt the dominant teams in the league. Well look at the NBA. The #1 seeded team has one the last three years. If you are good you are gonna advance in the playoffs. The game 7 that the underdog takes the top team to is what makes playoffs alot of fun.

    What do you all think??


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  3. #2
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    Re: Playoff Format Debate

    The format didn't come out as I typed it but you all get the point. It would create an East vs West showdown for the League Championship.

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    Re: Playoff Format Debate

    I hate the NBA format. What baseball has right now is great. As much as it sucks that some organizations go decades without a playoff berth, I wouldn't have it any other way.

    Call me a "purist," but I don't want a system that gives more teams this false hope late in the season only to cheapen the playoffs.
    "He looked like a surfer kid from SoCal," manager Dusty Baker says. "He didn't say much, but you could tell he was cool."

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    Re: Playoff Format Debate

    Quote Originally Posted by sabometrics View Post
    I hate the NBA format. What baseball has right now is great. As much as it sucks that some organizations go decades without a playoff berth, I wouldn't have it any other way.

    Call me a "purist," but I don't want a system that gives more teams this false hope late in the season only to cheapen the playoffs.
    I agree. And the move one team over thing doesn't make sense, since there needs to be an even number on both sides otherwise a team is left out in a series, unless you have interleague play year round with two teams.

    The thing with baseball is, there's sometimes one or two teams that feel like they should be in the playoffs. Sometimes though, like last year, there's really no teams that deserved to be in over another team, maybe the Rangers or something, but still - a stretch. It really varies each year, which makes it difficult to make a case for expanding the playoffs.

    The two things I would do with baseball are:

    1) Go back to two divisions. It seems like there's often an undeserving team in a division that gets in over a team who misses the playoffs in another division (ahem 1999 Reds.)

    2) Expand the first round of games to the best of 7. It was a horrible idea for the NBA, but a great idea for baseball. I mean, you play 162 games ALL year, only to be able to be eliminated by a short first series? That's really lame to me.

    One thing that does bug be about the MLB playoffs is, its sooo abbreviated compared to the regular season. In the NBA, you have to win 16 games to win it all, and its an 82 game season. In football you have to win either 3 or 4, after a 16 game season. In college basketball, you have to win 6 after around a 30-33 game season. In MLB? You have to win all of 11 games after a 162 game season.

    It just seems anticlimactic, and often the best teams get eliminated by an abbreviated playoff series or something, then we get wonky lopsided World Series', which up until last year had like a 20-1 advantage in favor of the winner in series wins versus losses over about 5 years.

    I wouldn't mind at all cutting the regular season back and allowing 6 teams in on each side in some ways, but MLB is so tradition heavy, that will never happen, so at least they could expand the first round to best of 7.

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    Re: Playoff Format Debate

    I wouldn't mind at all cutting the regular season back and allowing 6 teams in on each side in some ways, but MLB is so tradition heavy, that will never happen, so at least they could expand the first round to best of 7.[/QUOTE]


    6 teams would be nice but I don't think it could work in baseball because of the argument that "bye" weeks would mess up pitching rotations. To much rest in baseball could be a bad thing. As it has been in football for many teams that get bye weeks.. So I don't know.. It's an intersting debate

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    Re: Playoff Format Debate

    Why would you want to copy the NBA?

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    Re: Playoff Format Debate

    Quote Originally Posted by brm7675 View Post
    Why would you want to copy the NBA?
    for all the reasons i mentioned.. NHL also has a simular format.

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    Re: Playoff Format Debate

    Quote Originally Posted by arkimadee View Post
    for all the reasons i mentioned.. NHL also has a simular format.
    Any both are horrible leagues, with horrible regular seasons and average playoffs. Baseball is special because ONLY 4 teams from each league make it. Instead of expanding they need to reduce it. Also it would take the season into December, do you really want to watch baseball in december? And no they would not reduce the number of regular season games.

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    Re: Playoff Format Debate

    I hate the NBA playoff format. To me, it takes meaning away from the regular season. For baseball, after 162 games it should be evident which teams are deserving of the post season. I think having only 4 teams make it makes the verry long season meaningful. I really like the format of baseball.

    If they were to go to the NBA format, which takes nearly two months, then they are going to be playing well into the fall and possibly winter. The weather already sucks enough in October. I love baseball postseason just the way it is.

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    Re: Playoff Format Debate

    Quote Originally Posted by brm7675 View Post
    Any both are horrible leagues, with horrible regular seasons and average playoffs. Baseball is special because ONLY 4 teams from each league make it. Instead of expanding they need to reduce it. Also it would take the season into December, do you really want to watch baseball in december? And no they would not reduce the number of regular season games.
    That's a matter of opinion. I don't think the leagues are horrible. I don't think it would take it into December. You could be done by the end of October. Start the playoffs in mid September and start the season a week and a half earlier and cut out a week of spring training. It's not like the NBA where you would have to wait 3 days in between games in the first round.. maybe 1 to 2 off days per series.. I guess I'm in the minority here.. I'll shut up... lol

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    Re: Playoff Format Debate

    Quote Originally Posted by arkimadee View Post
    That's a matter of opinion. I don't think the leagues are horrible. I don't think it would take it into December. You could be done by the end of October. Start the playoffs in mid September and start the season a week and a half earlier and cut out a week of spring training. It's not like the NBA where you would have to wait 3 days in between games in the first round.. maybe 1 to 2 off days per series.. I guess I'm in the minority here.. I'll shut up... lol
    What? With just 8 teams total now we are playing baseball in Nov, add 8 more and we are playing into Dec maybe january. Second, you don't remove regular season games, no owner is going to go for that. We start the season now the first of April and how many games are played in horrible weather and you want to move it back to March? Sorry but baseball is special because everyone doesn't make the playoffs, sorry and both the NBA and NHL are horrible leagues.

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    Re: Playoff Format Debate

    Quote Originally Posted by brm7675 View Post
    What? With just 8 teams total now we are playing baseball in Nov, add 8 more and we are playing into Dec maybe january. Second, you don't remove regular season games, no owner is going to go for that. We start the season now the first of April and how many games are played in horrible weather and you want to move it back to March? Sorry but baseball is special because everyone doesn't make the playoffs, sorry and both the NBA and NHL are horrible leagues.
    The big picture is revenue and attendance and interest. More cities would be interested in baseball twoards the end of the season which means nothing but money for Major League baseball. It would be a wise buisness decision in my opinion. I would much rather have my hopes crushed in October than early August which is the case when teams when the Division by 20 games. I have been tired of meaningless August and September baseball the last 10 years. Plus what's wrong with a cinderella?? It makes the college basketball tournament interesting and yet they rarley win anything past the first round. It just spikes interest in the game.

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    Re: Playoff Format Debate

    Well, with 15 teams in each league there would have to be an interleague series going on on constantly or teams would get 3 days off in a row.

    And I'm not sure that it would really increase attendance much. Top teams would be virtual locks to make the playoffs by the time August rolled around. You would start running into the Braves effect where people are actually bored with the ease of winning. You're essentially letting every team that is .500 into the playoffs and some seasons teams below .500 would get in. I'm no purist, but it's just a bad idea all around.

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    Re: Playoff Format Debate

    I love your idea ark.....to many people are living in the "purist" point of view and thats great and all.....but what used to be America's Pastime is now taking a backseat to the NFL.....and some say the NBA is gaining ground on baseball...I dont buy that but its been said by many.

    anyhow, I agree that a change is needed for 2 reasons...increase monies comming into teams bankroll....teams need to start making more money...bottom line. 2nd reason is to save money for teams. The East/West idea is great and I love it...I wish more divisions were based on this....saves money in the long term.....

    guys, we baseball fans that live and breathe this stuff need to take a step back and realize that if we want our kids and grand kids to enjoy this game as much as we do, then changes are needed in structure of MLB.....it cannot and will not grow and thrive in a market where the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.....

    Of course noone ever wants to discuss it at the front office, Selig will do what is best for Selig and thats it....he is not going to make changes to help the future unless the future is easier on him. Once Bud is gone I think we have a legitimate shot at seeing some regionalization changes, but thats it...and that is a giant step in the right direction....

    I love Baseball the way it is right now....but it will not survive another 100 years with this design....I want my great grand kids to see the game the way I see it and not with Pepsi and Coke and Bud Light written all over the players uniforms.

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    Re: Playoff Format Debate

    Quote Originally Posted by lidspinner View Post
    I love Baseball the way it is right now....but it will not survive another 100 years with this design....I want my great grand kids to see the game the way I see it and not with Pepsi and Coke and Bud Light written all over the players uniforms.
    So you would rather have your grandchildren see under .500 teams become World Series Champions?


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