As a lifelong Dodger fan, every year I struggle accepting the randomness of Major League Baseball (MLB) playoffs where regular season success often doesn’t carry over to playoff success.
For over a decade, the Los Angeles Dodgers have had a dynasty in terms of regular season victories, having won their division 10 out of the past 11 years, yet only one World Series championship to show for it.
Look at their win-loss records:
2013 92-70
2014 94-68
2015 92-70
2016 91-71
2017 104-58
2018 92-71
2019 106-56*
2020 43-17 (pandemic-shortened)*
2021 106-56
2022 111-51*
2023 100-62
*best record in baseball
In total, the Dodgers have won 61 percent of their games during this stretch, an amazing long-term stretch of success which makes it heartbreaking when they lose so often in the playoffs.
While people want to believe that the World Series victor is the best team in baseball, all the playoffs really prove is which team plays the best over the course of a few weeks.
This year, three teams—Baltimore Orioles, Atlanta Braves, Dodgers—won at least 100 games. All three teams lost in the first Divisional round of the playoffs. Winning more games and playing on one’s home field are no advantages or guarantees that the team with the better record will prevail.
For the first 65 years of the World Series, MLB pitted the best teams from the American and the National leagues against one another. That’s when a team had a 50 percent chance of winning.
From 1969-1993 when there were two divisions in each league, adding a second playoff series, only 29 percent of the teams with the best record won the World Series.
Over the past 28 years with the addition of wild card teams and another playoff series, only 25 percent of the teams with the best record have won the World Series.
However, where the wild card format has hurt the best record teams is that fewer of them make it to the World Series. During the division format, 75 percent made it; during the wild card format, 50 percent made it.
In other words, teams without the best record over the course of a season have an equal chance of making it to the World Series, but a whopping 75% chance of winning it.
This postseason, the American League has the sixth best team, Houston, playing the eighth best team, Texas, while the National League has the seventh best team, Philadelphia, playing the 13th best team, Arizona. You read that right–the team which was almost in the middle of the 30 teams in baseball is four victories away from entering the World Series. That’s madness and puts a stain on the six months of superior play that the other teams accomplished.
It seems that Major League Baseball ensures that an underdog will usually win its vaulted trophy.
The worst example of an average team being proclaimed as The Best were the 2006 St. Louis Cardinals who won 83 games and lost 78 games, only five games above .500.
So, you see, it is a waste of emotions for fans to hold on to the notion that if their team is the best, they will be champions.
The system is fixed to make sure that doesn’t happen that often.
And that’s baseball.
Maybe it’s time for MLB to inaugurate a new type of trophy that recognizes excellence not just in a three-week period but the six-month period regardless if they win the World Series or not. Otherwise, the 162-game season diminishes considerably in importance.