Before we get to today’s main event — ten baseball players who, had they not gotten hurt, would (I feel sure) be in the Baseball Hall of Fame — I’ve got a thought about the MLB wildcard round, which was, again, a big ol’ dud. The Braves stomped all over the Phillies on Thursday, 6-2 — the game was over 30 pitches in — and the other series were all blowouts, and it got me thinking:
If we’re going to have a wildcard round (which we obviously are; we’re not going back now), can we just make them one-game playoffs?
Look, I’ll admit, I kind of liked the idea of going to three-game playoff series in 2022 because those one-game playoffs they were playing before seemed a bit too random.
But, well, two things.
First, three-game series, I think, are just about as random. The team that wins the first game almost always wins the series. I know it’s a small sample size, but there have been 20 three-game playoff series since 2022, and the team that won the first game won NINETEEN of them — 14 of them in a sweep.
The only team to lose the first game of a three-game series and still win the playoff was the 2025 Yankees against the Red Sox, and they only did that to make Mike Schur suffer.
So what are we getting with these three-game playoff series? I guess there’s the ILLUSION that it’s fairer (though 19 of 20 ain’t nothing). And I suppose the owners get the extra games and gate receipts they want (though attendance wasn’t all that great in Atlanta or Houston). But there’s a CLARITY to a one-game playoff that is missing now.
This year’s Yankees-Red Sox Game 1 drew a large television audience, averaging more than 7 million viewers. Would it have drawn even more if it was an all-or-nothing game? I’d say yes.
Sure, the owners want to milk the playoffs for every dime they can, but what they should really want to create are singular events that break through and capture the nation’s attention. A one-game playoff has a much better shot of doing that. I say: If you’re going to have chaos, then go ahead and embrace the chaos. Make all four of the first-round games one-game shootouts.
And then, if owners want to make up the lost games, make the next round seven-game series instead of five.
Reading through the first pass pages of FIFTY SEASONS — this is the actual title page! — I started thinking: Who are the players who, had they not gotten hurt, would be in the Baseball Hall of Fame?
Ten came to mind. Here they are:
Pete Reiser, 1940-52, 24.5 bWAR
Look, I’m trying not to give TOO much away with FIFTY SEASONS — though if you preorder the book and fill out the form here, you will immediately get the complete list of seasons that are in the book — but I will tell you that Pete Reiser’s wonderful and wacky 1941 season is in there.
Here’s how talented Pete Reiser was: Leo Durocher, who managed both the young Reiser and the young Willie Mays, used to say that he couldn’t choose between them as baseball prospects, but that Reiser was actually faster. In 1941, at age 22, he led the National League in average (.343), slugging (.558), doubles (39), triples (17) and total bases (299), even though he missed 15 games. He would miss a LOT of games because he had a tendency to run into walls and wake up in hospital beds.
Looking back on his career now, if I’m being honest, it might actually have been World War II that prevented him from having the Hall of Fame career everyone predicted. He missed three full seasons, 1943-45, and while he very well might have knocked himself out running into walls anyway, I’d have loved to see what kind of player he’d have been if he had played those seasons.
David Wright, 2004-2018, 49.1 WAR
