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I agree with this. It's stupid. We're 87-72 and we have the 4th best record (tied with the Twins) in the American League, while the Dodgers are 83-76 and they're gong to make the playoffs.
I don't care about what other teams had the same thing happen to them, if they didn't like they should've spoke up like we do. That's their own fault, but I'm glad Steiny mentioned this. The Yankees are America's Team, you see more people wearing Yankee hats across the country than any other team, Major League Baseball is centered around New York and the Yankees. We're always a contender. But the Dodgers make the playoffs? Put them in the AL East where they play harder teams and they won't even be .500. Fact is, the NL West sucks and the AL East is the hardest division in baseball.
I believe I mentioned this in another thread--that loud pronouncements were going to start emanating from the Yankee front office right about this time of year. From the day George Steinbrenner bought the team, it has been run with one goal above all else: headlines. If the Yankees aren't going to the playoffs, then they're going to lead both leagues in making noise. Yankee fans will probably take issue with this, but all you have to do is go to your local library and start digging through newspapers over the last 35 years. It's all completely true.
So do you propose that baseball eliminate divisions entirely? I think that would make things less exciting, and create some scheduling problems. But it's really the only way to solve the "problem" you're referring to. Ever since divsions were introduced, in 1969, there have been many, many times that teams with good records did not make the postseason, and teams with bad records made it. The 1973 Mets won 82 games and the NL Pennant. The 1987 Twins won 85 games and were actually outscored on the season - they became World Champs. Don't get me started on the damn '06 Cardinals. On the other hand, the 1993 Giants won 103 games and missed the postseason.
Then, if baseball adopts a format with, say, just two leagues, 15 teams each, how do you proceed? Do you just take the top four teams in each league and run a postseason with seeds? So, what happens if the fourth-best team in the NL wins 87 games and the best team wins 105, but they play each other and the 87-win team wins? That's not fair, obviously the better team lost. Then, suppose that 87-win team beats a 96-win team in the World Series. That's not fair, either. And suppose the AL is superior to the NL that year, and the 87-win team wouldn't have even made the postseason in the AL. So, then, I suppose what we should do is just have all 30 teams play in one league with no divisions. That work? Good.
In fact, I think the 2000 Yankees should give back their world championship. They only won 87 games and were in a terrible division. If they were in the NL, they wouldn't have even made the postseason!
See what I'm saying here....this kind of logic gets silly real fast. Only the Yankees, who believe they ought to have a guaranteed spot in the postseason, would say something like that. Upsets and weird pennant races are a part of baseball, and always have been.
Oh, and Hank Steinbrenner looks like he stands a very good chance of being nearly as insufferable as his father, which is saying something.
Of course there was a time long ago, before the AL existed, when the team which finished with the best record in the NL was the champion. Once the AL was founded, prior to the start of divisional play, each league's champion was the team with the best record in the league. The World Series constituted the entire postseason. Already, you had the beginnings of the problem that Jr. pointed out. In the late '40's, when the Yankees, Indians, and Red Sox all had great teams, there were probably years when all three were better than anyone in the NL. The only way to ensure that the best team is really the champion is to have one league without divisions, have each team play each other team the same number of games, evenly divided between each team's park, and have the team that finishes first be the champion. As soon as you have any kind of divison, and use league or division championships as the qualification for the playoffs, you run into the problem of teams in a strong division failing to make the playoffs, while weaker teams who win weak divisions are in.
There is more than one problem with the current setup, becuase the wild card automatically gives up home field advantage in the first two rounds of the playoffs, regardless of which team's record is better. This year, should the Red Sox and the AL Central winner end up in a second-round matchup, the Central champion would have home field advantage despite having a worse record. The same is true in the NL, where a potential LCS matchup between either the Brewers, Mets, or Phillies, as the wild card, and the Dodgers would give the Dogers home field advantage despite the fact that the wild card's record would be better.
Of course we like having playoffs. They are exciting to watch. Ownership likes playoffs because they bring in a lot of money. We all like the playoffs. Having the two leagues is something we're not likely to see end, due to the long tradition of loyalty to one league or the other. Maybe the earlier suggestion by NeonW, to get rid of divisions and have the top four finishers in each league make the playoffs, is the way to go. It would not be perfect. There would still be the possibility that the fifth-place team in one league would be better than the third- or fourth-place finishers in the other. But the more divisions, the more you run into this problem. We need to balance the interests of having a playoff system, maintaining the tradition of the two leagues, and having the best chance of seeing the best group of teams in the playoffs. Maybe the system of two leagues, no divisions, and the top four in each league going to the postseason is the best way to do this.
When did Hank Steinbrenner start thinking that his opinions matter?
I think the Steinbrenners' opinions matter to everybody. The Yanks do bring in the most fans and revenue to the MLB. I think Selig cares a lot about what the Yanks front office thinks.
Second, half the point of creating a wildcard slot was to partially allay the concerns Steinbrenner raises. Nonetheless if he wants his team to go to the playoffs, they will have to beat teams in their own league and division, just like the teams in the National League have to do.
Third, his isn't the first team to have a better record than some teams that end up in the playoffs. In fact it happens a lot. There will be at least one and as many as 4 NL teams with better records than the Dodgers that don't make it to the playoffs. But you don't hear them acting all butt-hurt about it because they understand that's part of baseball.
I was actually against the creation of 3 divisions per league and the whole wildcard concept when they were implemented, though I did regard it as manifestly unfair when the Giants had the second-best record in the majors (103-59) and didn't even make the playoffs because they happened to be in the same division as the team with the best record. Nonetheless, if you look back at when fan attendance, TV ratings and overall revenues started to soar, it started when more divisional competition and rivalries were created. If Steinbrenner wants to re-rig the system to give the Yankees a better chance by simply eliminating division, he can expect to lose a lot of revenue as erstwhile resurgent fan interest plummets back to where it was before or worse.
Drover:
"Third, his isn't the first team to have a better record than some teams that end up in the playoffs. In fact it happens a lot. There will be at least one and as many as 4 NL teams with better records than the Dodgers that don't make it to the playoffs. But you don't hear them acting all butt-hurt about it because they understand that's part of baseball." [quote]
That's exactly the problem. It's not just the Yankees this year. It happens a lot. Also, to do a quick re-run of a point buried inside my kind of long post above, there is the issue of wild card teams giving up home field advantage in the first two rounds, even when they have better records than their opponents who happened to win weaker divisions and get home field because of being division winners. This year, the wild cards in both leagues will each have better records than one of their league's division winners, but will still be at home field disadvantage if those teams should end up playing in the LCS. The fact that these things happen often, not just to the Yankees this year, shows that there is definitely a flaw in the systerm.
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