The league commissioner should move as fast as he can to implement this new, exciting system.
Reuters
Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig has a decision to make. The league has already said it will expand the playoffs, adding one wild card team in each league, meaning that 10, rather than eight, teams will make the post-season. The wild card teams will play a one-game playoff to decide which team advances to the respective divisional series. The question right now is whether Selig wants to implement this format for this season or next. Selig has until March 1 to decide, followed by the consent of the players' union. Let's hope they choose to go full steam ahead.
Baseball adores its traditions, which is funny because the game has been evolving since its inception. Sure, most of the basic field rules have remained static throughout the game's history. But determining the sport's champion has never been a settled process. Over the years the World Series has been a best-of-seven series and a best-of-nine series, the latter in place for the 1903, 1919, 1920, and 1921 Series. Determining which teams play in the World Series has also changed. Until 1969, the teams with the best records in the National League and the American League squared off. But when both leagues split into two divisions that year (following the addition of four new teams), the division winners played in the best-of-five league championship series (later extended to a best-of-seven) to determine who would represent each league in the World Series.