Quote:
Originally Posted by Onlydo2days
If I were them I wouldn't be too worried about the result of 1 postseason where they ran bad on matchups
I'd be worried that the league has basically no big stars and no one under 40 cares....Maybe the bottom line won't get hit too much but watching this world series felt like I was watching the college world series or something, it just didn't seem like a spectacle at all and I expect that to continue.
but as we all know at best these playoff series are a bunch of 60/40 matchups.
Now the league ran pretty bad this year- all first round games were sweeps, only a few great games, Dbacks in the series etc.
But the more mediocrity they let in the playoffs the more you're likely to get bad matchups with no stars.
I mean I like Moreno a lot as an overall player-but cmon this dude should not be a #3 hitter on a World Series team, especially a world series team that shrugs its shoulders when they need a game 4 starter.
Nothing against Gallen and Merrill Kelly but that's not exactly Curt Schilling and Randy Johnson starting 5 games in a 7 game WS including Schilling twice on 3 days rest.
So now you've completely watered down the regular season, and then you have the best teams sitting around with their thumbs up their ass after the season ends waiting to plays someone. Now no doubt the #1/#2 seeds have an advantage being in the DS vs teams who aren't, but once they get an opponent they don't have much of ad advantage left over that opponent anymore.
As someone who loves baseball and watched probably 95 percent of the playoff innings live I watched 1 game in all of September. Part of that was because I was bouncing around traveling, part of it was bc my team was totally out of it, part of it was bc Ohtani got hurt (i'd try and watch all of his starts) part of it was bc I knew i'd be watching almost every game in October and big part of it was the races sucked and I don't care if the Reds and Dbacks or 2 medicore teams are "battling" for the 17th wild card. And unless you're a fan of one of those teams you don't either.
Bud Selig loved baseball but I wasn't a fan of his. Manfred I'm convinced hates the sport. Selig obviously wanted the league to make money but he loved the sport. He bought his team in 1970- it wasn't the cash cow pro sports are today. Mandred only cares about dollars and really only dollars in the short term.
But Selig would react to things like 12 year old and throw together ideas like a 12 year olds last minute science project.
For example- they run out of pitchers in the ASG now the ASG decides Home field advantage in the WS.
The last day of the 2011 season has a bunch of incredible finishes you couldn't script inluding the Red Sox pissing away the wild card and something like a 6-0 lead while Tampa comes back down 7-0 at the same time. You can't make that up. So bc that happens at the last minute he adds a second wild card for 2012 trying to artificially recreate that crazy day. If that last day in 2011 wasn't so wild, he doesn't add that slot.
Casual fans want to see stars and great teams. So 2 great teams battling for first place in late September (when first place mattered) is riveting.
The Marlins Reds And Dbacks being lumped together in late September for the last spot- nobody cares.
I honestly never saw Corbin Carrol play until sometime this summer and I watch more baseball than 99 percent of fans despite my September lull.
And on top of that the season is way too long especially with this many teams in the playoffs. But within a decade we will likely have half the league in the playoffs and the entire thing will be a joke.
You need stars and drama to bring people in. The more mediocrity you let in, the less drama the regular season has and the more likely it is nobody cares when the world series rolls around.
Last edited by borg23; 11-02-2023 at 12:36 PM.