'Wild Wednesday' means rethinking playoffs

The last day of this baseball regular season will forever be known as "Wild Wednesday." Some have called it the greatest regular-season day in baseball history. It may have been that.

But some have also used that exciting night - when simultaneous games in three different cities decided the AL and NL wild cards in dramatic fashion - to call for Major League Baseball to put the brakes on its plans to expand the playoffs with an extra wild-card team in each league.

The argument goes that Wild Wednesday would not have happened under the proposed new format, which could be in place by next season but is more likely to debut in 2013 along with minor realignment.

"I've been a fan of the status quo," said Yankees first baseman Mark Teixeira. "I think [Wednesday] proved there's plenty of intrigue and drama in the current system. I just don't think it's necessary for the game."

The playoff tweak is simple: the non-division winners with the two best records in each league square off in a one-game, winner-take-all wild-card playoff game for the right to make it to the Division Series. It puts a super premium on winning divisions - teams are going to knock themselves out to avoid being the wild card, which doesn't happen now at all. And it creates two made-for-TV elimination games every year.

There's little doubt elimination games are exciting and draw viewers to their TV sets. But are they too gimmicky? Is baseball going too far in trying to legislate drama?

"I think every sport needs a winner-take-all game," said broadcaster Michael Kay, who called the Yankees-Rays game on YES on Wednesday. "We never get Game 7s here and we hardly ever get Game 5s. [Wednesday] was really, really great for the sport. I think it showed people how great the sport can be. Just to create the urgency of one dynamic day with those two games, I think it's worth it."

Even though the Wild Wednesday games weren't true elimination games - different outcomes could have led to a pair of "play-in" games on Thursday - the spontaneous and simultaneous nature of the evening made it special for anyone who was involved or watched.

"I think it was a great night for baseball," said Yankees manager Joe Girardi, whose "B" team pitchers let a 7-0, eighth-inning lead get away in an extra-inning loss. "It was a playoff night for baseball to kick off the real playoffs."

The motivation for MLB to add more playoff games has always been simple: money. More playoff games equal greater television revenue. But in the last decade or so, postseason ratings have nose-dived. Thus, the impetus for the new system, which commissioner Bud Selig wants to have in place before he retires.

There have been play-in games before, when teams fought it out for the right to be in the postseason with an extra game or games after the regular 154- or 162-game season. It's happened 14 times in baseball history, including the Dodgers-Giants three-game series in 1951 that ended with Bobby Thomson's home run off Ralph Branca and the Yankees-Red Sox Bucky Dent game in 1978. In the wild-card era, it has happened six times, including three years in a row from 2007-09. It almost happened twice this season, but Wild Wednesday took care of that.

The pro-expanded playoffs argument is also simple: Who wouldn't want more of what happened Wednesday? Whether it really was the greatest regular-season day in baseball history or not.

Shot heard 'round the regular season

Evan Longoria's game-winning home run off the Yankees' Scott Proctor on Wednesday was the second walkoff home run in baseball history to clinch a postseason spot on the final day of the regular season.

The first was Bobby Thomson's "Shot Heard 'Round the World" in 1951.

It is a common misconception that the three-game Dodgers-Giants series to decide the 1951 NL pennant was a postseason series. It was not. It was an extension of the regular season.

If you look at the statistics for the Dodgers and Giants in 1951, they both are credited with 157 games instead of 154. The same is true of the players' statistics. Thomson's home run was his 32nd of the season.

Something wild

Under the most likely of baseball's expanded playoff proposals, an extra wild-card in each league would play a one-game playoff "series" for the right to advance to the Division Series against the top seed regardless of division. Here's how it would have gone this season:

AL

Wild-card playoff game: Boston at Tampa Bay

Division Series

Yankees (1) vs. Boston/Tampa Bay winner (4)

Texas (2) vs. Detroit (3)

NL

Wild-card playoff game: Atlanta at St. Louis

Division Series

Philadelphia (1) vs. Atlanta/St. Louis winner (4)

Milwaukee (2) vs. Arizona (3)