Two Teams, One Game, By themselves

The landscape of America's national pastime is changing again.

In the midst of the baseball off season news surrounding Albert Pujols' new team in 2012, the Houston Astros moving to the American League in 2013, and the Chicago Cubs finding their new skipper, there is one piece of new information that might not be getting the attention it deserves. MLB will expand on their playoff system after the most successful postseason in years.

To sum up these upcoming changes concisely, MLB would essentially add a play in game to it's current format that has been in place since Bill Clinton was in office. This robust new format would feature ten teams, five from each league, vying for their chance to compete for a World Series trophy. And here is the best part. There would be no agonizing third series that would push baseball's postseason into December. This new playoff format would feature a one game, winner take all, contest between the two teams that just barely made the cut.

This upcoming change could add a good deal of excitement to the already captivating pennant races.

For one thing this would put an additional amount of weight on the out of division schedule. Since there will be a second wild card team, teams like the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim (Orange County, California, United States, Western Hemisphere, Earth, Milky Way) would need to beat the Tampa Bay Rays and Boston Red Sox more often to have a leg up when the dog days of summer swing by. Out of division schedule includes interleague play; and interleague play means that your team will have more on the line when playing its NL or AL rivalry game.  

On a similar note, this upcoming playoff system ideally gives teams not in the American League East to make the playoffs. The current wild card format might as well have been called 'the playoff spot for whoever finishes second in the AL East this year.' And although a lot of people in the baseball world want to see the Sox and Yanks in the playoffs, it gets boring to see the same teams from one division in the playoffs all the time. The last time a team that was not from the AL East won the wild card was back in 2006 when the Detroit Tigers did it. And guess what? That Tigers team in 06 made it all the way to the World Series. This fifth team that enters the mix could give a sleeper team from the AL West or AL Central the chance to make a Saint Louis Cardinals type run for the Commissioner's trophy. 

And perhaps the most obvious reason that the playoffs are expanding is because two more playoff teams mean that more postseason priced ticket packages will be sold to baseball fans. And what baseball fan would not want to pay to see a winner take all, playoff berth on the line, game? The answer is nobody who likes baseball. This move may be in part a money grab, but it is a money grab that benefits the sport. 

Baseball is riding a huge wave of momentum after the best postseason in recent years. And so far, the higher ups in MLB are making all of the right pitches to improve the game.