By: Christian Puglielli (cp1685@mynsu.nova.edu)

This year’s playoff picture is showing to be yet another exciting one, with many high quality teams ready to duke it out for baseball’s glorious World Series. However, that mostly applies to the American League, with many of the the top teams in baseball being from the AL, and some quality teams being left out of the playoffs. 3 American League teams (Red Sox, Astros, and Yankees) were able to reach 100 wins on the season, while no National League team was able to do so. In fact, 4 out of the top 5 best winning percentages are from the American League with the Red Sox winning 108 games, the Astros winning 103, the Yankees winning 100, and the A’s winning 97. So how can we separate these teams out to make a more competitive experience?

In my opinion, the format should be changed in a way that does not put the teams in two different leagues. They should all be able to play each other during the season and then the top 10 teams (based on record) will hold a seed. The current playoff format, where there is one Wild Card game, a best of 5 series, and then two best of 7 series, would still apply, the only difference being that the lowest 4 teams would play the Wild Card game and then the series would continue based on seed rank. If we want to decide a winner of all of baseball, why not have the 10 best teams play? This format also eliminates the problem with some divisions being much weaker than others, such as how the American League East Division is much stronger than the American League Central Division. This format would be similar to the Premier League in soccer, because of the fact that all the teams face each other an equal number of times, but still keeps the baseball playoff format that works for the sport.

Another alternative is to model the league similar to the NBA, where instead of the Eastern and Western Conferences, you keep the American and National Leagues, and the top teams from each League face off based on seed rank. In order to do this, the MLB would need to eliminate divisions and just make every team face each other in the respective leagues. The only problem with this format is that there is still a chance that one League will overpower another, but at least it eliminates a situation such as the American League East Division, where the Red Sox and Yankees have the best and third best records in the entire MLB, but the Yankees have to play in a one game Wild Card because they did not edge one team in their division.

 

For more articles like these, check out the links below:

https://aroundthehornbaseball.music.blog/should-the-designated-hitter-be-used-by-both-leagues/

https://aroundthehornbaseball.music.blog/who-should-win-the-mvp/