Playoffs!
The NBA and MLB playoffs need a tweaking. Both of these leagues are way more exciting during its playoffs and there should be no reason why each league isn’t trying their best to showcase their best product. Baseball has 30 teams and only 10 make the playoffs, and the last 4 teams to make it play in a one game playoff to determine the winner of the Wild Card round. The NBA has a problem with tanking with its teams who are near the bottom of the standing and overall there isn’t enough emphasis on great….okay good players who play on trash teams. Here’s the solution for each league.
Baseball plays way too many games to only have 10 teams make the playoffs. Let’s start by adding one more team in each league giving us 6 from the AL and 6 from the NL. Seeds 3&6 will play each other and seeds 4&5 will play each other in a best of 3 series over two days. The lower seed will play the first game at home on Day One. Day Two will be at the higher seeds stadium and will be a double header. This creates excitement because the lower seed is guaranteed a home playoff game and the higher seed knows that the next day, they have two games at home to secure a first-round win. From there you re-seed and continue with best of 5 series in the Divisional round and best of 7 in the Championship rounds. It creates and extra few days of talking points with the expanded playoffs and it keeps more teams in the race throughout the year.
The NBA needs to add two more teams to each conference which would bring the playoffs to 10 teams. The 7&10 seeds along with the 8&9 seeds on each side play in a one game playoff game at a neutral site. Not only does this keep more teams in the race longer, it gives cities who may not have NBA teams the opportunity to see meaningful games. The teams then reseed based on record and move the playoffs just are they are now.
In each scenario it keeps more teams involved in the playoff race longer which in term, should lead to better ratings for each team involved. The public generally cares more about the playoffs than the regular season, so it is time for these leagues to realize that and change for the better.