Theoretical Baseball Playoff Scenario

The Game Room
1

What happens if the Giants, Padres, Rockies (not bloody likely), and Braves all finish with the same record?

My theory:

  1. A 3-team, double elimination tournament to determine the NL West.

  2. A 3-team, double elimination tournament, with the Braves and the 2 losers of the previous tournament, to determine the Wild Card.

  3. Regular playoffs.

But this is a ridiculous scenario! Am I stupid (I’m a little buzzed), or is there a simpler way, or is there an official protocol?

Joe

2

Did you try Google?

3

In the past, there have been procedures for a three-way tie. IIRC, there is some sort of draw, and it’s all single elimination. The winner chooses between playing two games at home or one on the road. If they choose the one on the road, the other two teams flip a coin for home advantage. The winner of that game plays the team that sat out.

If the winner decides to play two games at home, the other two flip to see who plays them first.

For a four-way tie, they’d draw up two games the first day, leading to the championship the next day as the winning teams play.

4

My guess is that the NL West teams would have two additional games - one between teams A&B, then one between the winner of that game and team C. Team C would be the one that won a series of coin flips earlier. The winner of the second game would be the division winner.

Then, because those games go on the books as regular season games, the Braves would be the wild card winner, because both of the losing teams would wind up with worse records than the Braves.

5

This is not true. Those games do not count for regular season records. If there is a 3-way tie between the Giants, Braves, and Padres, the tiebreakers would go like this:

-Padres and Giants play a 1-game playoff to decide the NL West
-The loser of the game then plays a 1-game playoff against the Braves to decide the wild card

6

Cite? One-game “playoff” games have always counted as regular season games in the past.

7

They do count as regular season games, but the procedure is correct. This was changed after a 3 way tie either gave or almost gave (Don’t quite remember the teams Mets, Astros, Reds maybe?) the wild card automatically to the team not part of the division race.

8

http://www.mlb.com/news/press_releases/press_release.jsp?ymd=20030908&content_id=517243&vkey=pr_mlb&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb

9

Right 3 teams; it was 1999. It didn’t quite happen that way, as the Astros finished a game ahead of the Reds, who went on to lose the one-game playoff to the Mets.

10

[quote=“markdash, post:5, topic:555250”]

And if the Padres, Giants, and Rockies are tied for the division, AND have the same record as the Braves for the Wild Card?

Joe

11

[quote=“wheresgeorge04, post:10, topic:555250”]

I would have to research that particular situation, but it’s moot now because it’s impossible for the Giants, Padres, and Rockies to finish with the same record (the Rockies are 5 games back with 6 to play, and the Giants/Padres are guaranteed to win at least 3 games between them).