Is baseball’s bye still that bad?
By Ryan Hartman
Back in 2022, the MLB changed the baseball playoff structure, with its main goals being to add more games to the schedule and add more teams to the playoff bracket. However, while these goals were met, one big problem has caused fans to be outraged.
MLB introduced this new playoff structure in 2022, which added a third Wild Card team for each league, as well as changing the Wild Card game into two three-game series for each league. As many fans have stated over the last three years, this new playoff structure has its flaws.
One problem is that the new Wild Card round forces the third-place division winner in each league to play the sixth-seed wild card team. Since 2022, four of those division winners have been eliminated by a team that would have completely missed the playoffs before the new structure
However, the main problem has been the week-long bye offered to each league’s top two division winners. The two best teams in the National and American leagues are given five days off before game one of the division series, unlike the three-day break teams got before.
“The world’s not perfect,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts mentioned following the 2023 NLDS. “A couple-day break would have been nice. But five’s a little [much]”
This five-day layoff gives teams a couple of disadvantages. For starters, five days off can affect a hitter’s timing. As Fox Sports reporter and former baseball player Ben Verlander put it, “Hitters have to time every part of their physical mechanics, down to their blinking when they are facing 100-mph fastballs. I remember having to do that. That timing is not going to stick when you have five days off.”
In 2022, both the Los Angeles Dodgers and Atlanta Braves lost in heartbreaking fashion to their division rivals, despite both winning over 100 games during the regular season. The Dodgers especially won 111 games, tying the 1954 Cleveland Indians for the fourth-best winning percentage in MLB history, yet lost in the NLDS to the 89-win Padres in four games.
History repeated itself the following year, as both teams lost again in the same spot in 2023, with the Braves falling to the Philadelphia Phillies again in four games, and the Dodgers getting swept by the sixth-seed Arizona Diamondbacks. Along with the Dodgers, the Baltimore Orioles also got swept despite holding the AL’s best record in 2023.
Teams with a first-round bye in 2022 and 2023 went 3-5 and a sixth-seed team played in the World Series each year. Despite these numbers, MLB commissioner Rob Manfred still believed that the bye wasn’t the main reason for all of these top-seed teams losing.
“I’m sort of the view you need to give something a chance to work out,” he said after the Dodgers loss in the 2023 NLDS. “I know some of the higher-seeded teams didn’t win. I think if you think about where some of those teams were, there are other explanations than a five-day layoff.”
To Manfred’s credit, some of the teams did have other issues heading into the playoffs in 2022 and 2023. Plus, the five-day bye does have its advantages. Not only do teams get to bypass the Wild Card series where anything can happen in just three games, but teams can also line up their starters and have their entire pitching staff ready for the NLDS.
This is a huge advantage, and like Manfred said, the bye’s effect on teams didn’t strike this year. Except for the Phillies, every team with a first-round bye advanced to the Championship Series, and both top-seed teams advanced to the World Series for the first time since 2013. The Dodgers ended up outclassing the Yankees in five games to win their eighth World Series in franchise history.
“I also agree with him [John Smoltz] that teams are going to have to face the challenge of figuring out how to manage this five-day break,” Verlander said. “But that off period affects so much for players, and teams need to start taking it more seriously.”
As Ben Verlander also mentioned, teams like the Houston Astros have not been affected by the bye at all, as in 2022 they followed their break by sweeping the Mariners and Yankees and ultimately winning the World Series.
The first-round bye can be detrimental to teams, even after 162 games of incredible baseball. However, its benefits can greatly outweigh the disadvantages it gives teams.
It’s only year three of this format, and teams have already found ways to stay hot and keep momentum during the layoff. So, while the five-day bye might not be ideal, teams would most certainly take over the alternative, especially if they take their week off seriously.
