Do you realize that six teams from each league make the MLB playoffs this season?

Before the Major League Baseball playoffs expanded with divisions and wildcards, there were 10 teams in the American League and 10 in the National League. Only the pennant winners in each league advanced to the World Series. That is two out of 20, meaning that most teams had nothing to play for in August and September. And you think baseball is boring today?

First came adding more franchises in both leagues and expansion to three divisions in each with one wildcard team. Then, eventually, two wildcard teams got to enter the postseason.

This season, those who run Major League Baseball have made the national pastime more exciting than ever.

Besides the three divisional winners in each league, there are now also three wild cards, resulting in almost half of the teams making the playoffs.

So where once it was only 10 percent of the teams in each league, now 6 out of 15 get to battle in the post season to win a pennant and play in the Fall Classic. By comparison, that is 40 percent of the teams that began the regular season who get to keep playing into October.

Teams and their fans have much more to play for and reasons to keep coming to the ballpark.

The result is baseball is infinitely more exciting today than it was for the last generation. Ten more fan bases remain engaged in playoff races. While the Yankees and Astros are running away with their divisions, they still have to play their way into the World Series.

It works with seedings set by the divisional winners and the next three teams with the best won-lost records. The two divisional winners with the best records get byes in the first round of the playoffs.

The other four teams are seeded from 3 to 6 and play best-of-three to advance to the second rounds of the divisional playoffs to reach the AL and NL championship series.

So check the records of your favorite teams. They still might be alive for postseason berths when in the past they would be out of the running by now and, as they used to say in Brooklyn, waiting till next year.

 

Featured image via Associated Press/Ashley Landis

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