Best Solution: Shorten the Season and Extend the Post-Season?

Easier said than done. In a recent press meeting, MLB commissioner Bud Selig expressed strong interest in extending the post-season playoffs by adding more wild-card teams. This would alter the current best out of eight teams, which includes one wild card team per division, by adding two more wild card teams—making it a ten game playoff series. Sounds great, especially if your team barely missed the play-offs! Additionally, the newly furbished ten game series would give two more teams the opportunity for the title, a solution Selig claims to be a more “rational mix.”

However, with more comes less. The MLB, by adding another playoff round at the end of the current 162 game regular season, will probably have us watching the World Series around Thanksgiving. Sounds like the icing on the cake for those who love baseball but don’t forget that the NBA and NFL are also in high gear around this time. All the more, if “your team” did not make it to the finals, you’ve probably turned your attention to the myriad of sports offered on your expansive Direct TV.

The obvious solution would be to decrease the regular season (by around 30 games) and start the play-offs in September therefore ending the season before other sports are deep into their own seasons. The problem here is that shortening the regular season would mean a loss of ticket sales for the clubs. “I’m a devotee of a shorter season, but they’re not, and I understand it,” explains Selig, “Especially as global television ratings have gone up, you’re talking about a lot of money.”

What are your thoughts on the issue? Do you think the MLB should shorten the season and make space for more teams in the post season? Or is it a lost cause that can’t be changed?

By: Grace Pak