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Brian Walton

September 29, 2004

Wild Card Wildness

Could the Cards Play the Astros or Cubs in the NLDS, after all?

By Brian Walton

What would happen if there is a tie for the wild-card?  How would they determine the playoff game?  Who would the Cardinals end up playing and when?

The good news is that folks at MLB have published the possibilities.  The bad news is that they don’t completely make sense.  Read on and I will explain.  For reference, here is the story.  Related story.

Coin tosses have been held for the two-team Wild Card tiebreakers.  That game would be played on Monday if needed.  They are:

Chicago at San Francisco

Houston at San Francisco

San Diego at San Francisco

Chicago at Houston

Chicago at San Diego

Houston at San Diego  

That is very straightforward.  If they win the Wild Card, San Francisco or San Diego would come to St. Louis for Game One on Wednesday.  If the Cubs or Astros win the Wild Card, the NL West winning Dodgers would come to St. Louis for Game One on Tuesday. 

But, what if the Giants, Astros and Cubs all tie for the Wild Card?

In the three-way tie scenario, it gets crazy.  In fact, it is not documented.  I believe that two Wild Card playoff games would be required.  Based on the above coin toss results, San Francisco would be the big winner.  Monday’s game would be the Cubs @ Astros.  The winner would travel to San Francisco for a Tuesday game to decide it. 

However, that is where it all falls apart.  Because the Wild Card winner would not be decided until Tuesday’s second wild card elimination game, there is no way for the teams in the other NLDS match-up, also scheduled for Tuesday, to have been decided either.

There are only two ways out of this, and both require something to be broken, either the rule that a wild card winner must play an opponent out of division, or the days that the NLDS games are played must be adjusted.  Here are those two options explained further:

1)  Decide ahead of time that Tuesday’s Wild Card winner will play in St. Louis on Wednesday, no matter what.  That would allow the NL West winner and Atlanta to play on Tuesday as planned.  That would also mean that the Cubs or Astros could, in fact, end up playing St. Louis in the first round, despite the rules that say it cannot happen.

2)  Delay both NLDS Game Ones until at least Wednesday until the Wild Card is decided on Tuesday.  This would wreak havoc on schedules already set, but would protect the wild card not playing in its own division.  However, MLB is insisting that the Games are set – one NLDS game will be held on Tuesday.  They have not yet acknowledged this conflict.

Got that?

I have been going back and forth all afternoon with the author of the above article from MLB to try to get clarity on which scenario they would follow if there is a three-way tie.  I will update this article as needed.

As an aside, to date MLB has assumed that the Dodgers will hold on to defeat the Giants in the NL West.  As a result, they did not yet do the necessary coin tosses to figure the Dodgers into the Wild Card mix if the Giants were to win the division.  It would only get more confusing.

I should stop here, but I won’t. 

What happens if all four teams are tied – Dodgers, Giants, Astros and Cubs? 

This has really, really low odds of happening, but still, it is fun to speculate about.  As far as I can tell, there are plans for a division tie and a wild card tie as noted in the story linked to above, but not for the two of them when connected together. 

As I see it, there are two possible scenarios. 

1)  On Monday, the Dodgers would play at San Francisco for the NL West.  The Cubs would play at Houston for the Wild Card.  The losers are out.  The Cards would play the NL West winner on Tuesday in the NLDS Game One. 

2)  On Monday, the Dodgers would play at San Francisco for the NL West.  The Cubs would play at Houston in the first Wild Card playoff on Monday.  The loser of the NL West playoff game would host the winner of the first Wild Card playoff game on Tuesday to decide the Wild Card. 

However, scenario 2 is not doable because it would delay the first Game of the NLDS until Wednesday.  Just like mentioned above, that is because the Wild Card team would not be known until Tuesday’s elimination game was complete.  So, neither NLDS match-up could be defined until too late.   To make this work, either the wild card team would have to play-in division or both NLDS games would have to be delayed to start until at least Wednesday.  And, MLB is saying the latter will not happen, so scenario 1 is the only viable possible situation.  Scenario 1 makes the most sense anyway, since technically, the NL West playoff loser would at that point have a poorer record than the wild card playoff game winner and would no longer be tied.

Give up?

I will let you know when I can get this sorted out.  In the meantime, enjoy the fact that the Cards are only indirectly involved with the Wild Card.

Addendum:  After many exchanges, I got finally got the clarification I needed from Mark Newman from MLB:  “Thanks for the persistence. The NLDS would start Wednesday in that case as well.  Any DS would start Wednesday if there is a Tuesday game (heaven forbid) necessary.” 

This conflicts with his story on MLB.com, but at least it confirms that the Cards will not play the Cubs or Astros in the first round.  Instead, in the case of a three-team tie and two-game Wild Card playoff, the other NLDS game would be delayed until Wednesday.  That makes sense.

Wouldn’t it be great to see the other teams burn up their pitchers in two more must-win games?  May never happen, but now we know what would happen if the situation did present itself.