Post season baseball predictions

I’m not going chalk here, by any means. In fact, I’m predicting both visiting teams will win their respective wild card games although I must admit I’m not completely comfortable picking the Rockies over the Diamondbacks. I also lament the fact that the two best teams in baseball won’t meet in the World Series, but, instead, in the American League Championship Series.

With that out of the way, here are my picks:

AL Wild Card
Minnesota Twins over New York Yankees

NL Wild Card
Colorado Rockies over Arizona Diamondbacks

ALDS
Houston Astros over Boston Red Sox
Cleveland Indians over Minnesota Twins

NLDS
Washington Nationals over Chicago Cubs
Los Angeles Dodgers over Colorado Rockies

ALCS
Houston Astros over Cleveland Indians

NLCS
Washington Nationals over Los Angeles Dodgers

WORLD SERIES
Houston Astros over Washington Nationals

MLB considering diluting its regular season even more

It all started to go bad in 1969.

Before then, the winner of baseball’s National League played the winner of the American League in the World Series. That was the playoff scenario. Simple, but absolutely effective. It also meant the 162-game regular season meant something.

Then in 1969, each league was split into two divisions and the winner of each division played each other in something called the League Championship Series. The winner of that series met in the World Series.

That worked fine until 1994 when, after the leagues had split again into three divisions, baseball instituted the dreaded “Wild Card.” That came about because one year there was a team (San Francisco Giants, as I recall) that finished second in one of the divisions that had a better record than a team that finished first in one of the other divisions.

That’s the system that is being used today.

But wait. Now comes word that Major League Baseball is, in the words of commissioner Bud Selig, “moving inexorably” to adding another wild card to the mix. That would mean fully one-third of Major League Baseball’s 30 teams will now qualify for the playoffs each year.

Here’s the rub. Selig doesn’t want the season extending into November like it did last year. That’s the reason this year’s season began a week earlier than ever before. The owners don’t want to cut any games from the 162-game schedule (decreases owners’ revenues, you see) and the Players Association doesn’t want the schedule contracted with the addition of more doubleheaders.

But Selig still predicts the new playoff system will be in place by next season.

The best pitcher in major league baseball

For my money, it has to be Brandon Webb of the Arizona Diamondbacks. No one else even comes close. Take that, Johann Santana.