MLB Update

OK, so here's what I've decided to do.  I've decided to focus all my baseball energies on the playoffs, and largely disregard the regular season -- much like I do in college baseball.  Today is October 2, and the World Series would probably trail into November if it goes for all seven games.  So we have just about one month's worth of baseball.  I'm going to concentrate on that, and treat the regular season as mostly a type of exhibition.

So forget about the silly wild card system, or how the Central division winners get to be the number 3 seed even though their record isn't very good.  We don't worry about seedings in college baseball -- let's not worry about them here.  And we aren't going to worry about what happened to the Yankees and the Red Sox, for the same reason we wouldn't complain if Florida State missed the NCAA Baseball Tournament.  The bottom line is this:  the National League has six contenders, seeded as follows:

1.  Atlanta

2.  Los Angeles

3.  Milwaukee

4.  Philadelphia

5.  Miami

6.  Arizona

So we will open with the equivalent of Super Regionals, with Milwaukee hosting Arizona for a best-of-three series, and Philly hosting Miami in the same format.  Then the Philly/Miami winner will play Atlanta, while the Milwaukee/Arizona winner will play L.A.  That's best of five.  And then the two survivors will play best-of-seven for a trip to the World Series.

The AL uses the same format.  Here are the six seeds over there:

1.  Baltimore

2.  Houston

3.  Minnesota

4.  Tampa Bay

5.  Texas

6.  Toronto

Anyway, they'll all play until someone wins the World Series, and I plan to watch.