We hope that chaos will hit MLB's playoff system in most seasons. People want to see wild-card sham as it is. It is absurd to expect teams to play games just to make it to the playoffs, after 162 games and six month. Maybe we all just want to see something new. We've all seen the play-in games that lead to the wild-card. In 2013, the Rays won it. It was never the A-B–C method for a three-way tie, or the brackets for a four-way tie. Perhaps one day.
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We didn't win it this year. The Red Sox were playing an awful Nationals baseball team, and the Yankees couldn't continue to get their brains beat in by a Rays team who only wanted to make the Yankees miserable. They could get it again on Thursday. The Blue Jays did everything they could and the Mariners cannot lose two of their three home games to the Angels and claim that they deserve more. Both teams know their time is coming, and it will be next season.
There was much grumbling from Toronto that the Jays could have 91 wins and the third-best run differential in the AL and still miss the playoffs. This playoff system is not fair and will never be. They are not the only good team to be disqualified, nor the best. The 2015 Pirates won the Cy Young award for one game, winning 98 games. They would have won the East division in a canter, and had they done so they would have been able to play the wild card winner who had already thrown their best pitcher. This is how baseball geography works.
Divide MLB into two leagues. Have everyone play each team in their respective leagues eight times and each other three times. Then, take the top five teams in each league. It's that simple. Is this ever going to be possible? It is not possible. We have this. It will only get worse as the new CBA almost certainly expands the playoffs whenever it arrives.
We should be glad it ended that way. Baseball, when it gets something new, tries to make it every year. This is how we got this wild-card bullshit thanks the end of the 2011 season.
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So, we have Yankees-Red Sox. Another chapter in the loudest rivalry of the league. They are most likely competing for the right to be ridden by the Rays in the first round. The Rays look like the AL's deepest team by some distance. We'll see what system we have next season, should there be one.
