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Teams that could surprise in exchange for the MLB season
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It is expected that there will be Major League Baseball this year in the United States. MLB is gearing up to celebrate Opening Day on July 23 or 24 with the 60-game season slated to end on September 27 and then a month of “regular” playoffs with five teams from each league in the postseason. Many fans might wonder what the schedule will be like. And while we don’t have the specific timeline yet, prepare to drop by the end of this week or the beginning of next, there is a framework in place.
This is what we know.
Regions
Due to efforts to contain additional exposure to COVID-19, the teams will not venture outside of their “regions”. That is, the Easts (NL East and AL East) will only play each other, just as the Centrals and Wests will. We’ll see zero regular season games between, for example, the Braves and the Dodgers. We’ll see zero between the Cubs and the Phillies. We’ll see zero between the Yankees and the Twins (the Twins just breathed a sigh of relief). You got the idea. No team will depart from their region in the regular season.
Emphasis on division.
The schedule is not balanced. Within the region, teams will play most games against their own division rather than more interleague games. Each team will play 10 games each against their division partners for a total of 40 games. The remaining 20 games will come against the other division, though it’s unclear whether it will be a uniform breakdown of four games against each opponent in the league.
Let’s use the National World Series champions as an example to better illustrate the situation.
The Nats schedule could look like this:
There are your 60 games.
Playoffs
As usual. There will be three division winners per league along with two wild cards. Wildcards play a game at the team home with a best record, while the top division winner faces the winner in a five game divisional playoff. The other two winners of the division play each other. The rounds of the league championship series are seven games, as is the World Series.
The league has reserved the right to play where necessary. That is, if there is a big break somewhere and they need to move the place, the league will. Anything and everything is on the table to get the job done. We could end up seeing a World Series of neutral site.
