Wild (Card) Thing Has Real Ring to It

Bud Selig was feeling good about himself as he sat in his Milwaukee office Tuesday morning.

After a season that culminated with neither a division title nor a wild card determined until the final weekend of the regular season, the commissioner of major league baseball had a sense of gratification.

His beloved yet controversial experiment of wild cards and divisional playoffs had indeed added a sense of excitement and drama to the national pastime.

“It’s exceeded everybody’s expectations, even those of us who supported it in the beginning,” Selig said of his radical plan. “If you watched what was happening at Shea Stadium last weekend, I think that answered any question about if the wild-card system was working. The drama has been incredible.”

There is no doubt that the Mets, playing for their playoff lives at home before traveling to Cincinnati and beating the Reds in a one-game playoff for the National League wild card Monday night, are the direct benefactors of Selig’s vision. But wild-card detractors contend that had the Mets not stumbled badly down the stretch--a losing streak that included seven in a row--they would have been battling the Atlanta Braves for a more prestigious division crown.

In the most hallowed and tradition-minded sport of baseball, the debate over the wild card is an argument of opportunity versus integrity. Just ask the Florida Marlins, who won the World Series in 1997 as a regular-season second-place team.

Doubtlessly, baseball purists dislike a second-place club entering an expanded playoff race.

Not only is NBC commentator Bob Costas a member of the bash-the-wild-card club, he’s also the president.

“My point is this--there is a difference between a pennant race and a playoff-qualifying tournament,” said Costas, who was in New York to call Game 1 of the American League division series between the AL East champion Yankees and AL West champion Texas Rangers. “Baseball really lucked out. If not for the Mets losing seven in a row and plummeting back to where the Reds were, we wouldn’t be talking about this. The wild card both clouds the issue and provides a fallback.

“The fact is that the wild card does diminish the regular season,” Costas added. “How can four slots [per league] be as meaningful as two? If you have a wild card, you can never have a classic pennant race.”

Costas has a point.

If you took the records of this year’s teams and moved them back into the two-division leagues that composed baseball from 1969-93, there still would have been great races.

The Mets would have won the NL East by a comfortable 17 1/2 games over the Pittsburgh Pirates; however, the race for the NL West title would have whetted even Costas’ appetite.

Four teams would have finished within seven games of one another, with Atlanta eking it out by three over the second-year Arizona Diamondbacks, who we’ll put in the West for geography’s sake, six games ahead of the Houston Astros and seven up on the Reds.

Meanwhile, the AL East would have been an equally epic sprint with the top three teams--the Yankees, Cleveland Indians and Boston Red Sox--finishing within four games of one another.

The Rangers, who held off the young but game Oakland Athletics by eight games, still would have been crowned in the AL West.

The wild card was introduced with realignment for the 1994 season, but it did not come to fruition until the next year because of the season-ending strike.

Since then, however, it has been the exclusive property of the AL East, with the Yankees claiming it in ‘95, the Baltimore Orioles in ‘96, the Yankees in ’97 and the Red Sox the last two years.

It has been a tad more spread out in the NL with the Colorado Rockies earning the wild card in ‘95, the Dodgers in ‘96, the Marlins in ‘97, the Chicago Cubs in ’98 and the Mets this year.

In fact, the last two NL wild-card teams had to survive one-game playoffs to extend their respective seasons.

You’d be hard-pressed to find players and managers who staunchly oppose the five-year-old system.

In fact, if San Francisco Manager Dusty Baker had his way, the wild card would have existed back in 1993, the year his Giants won 103 games but finished a game behind the Braves in the NL West.

“It keeps a good three or four teams involved in the race down at the end,” said Baker, whose 1998 team lost a wild-card playoff to the Cubs. “A lot of times that wild-card team is perhaps one of the hottest, toughest teams that didn’t get off to a real good start. Or they may be the best team at that time, but they’re in a tough division. There are a lot of variables there.”

Dodger Manager Davey Johnson, who took the Baltimore Orioles to the AL championship series as the wild card in ‘96, said he has accepted the added round of playoffs.

“I’m from the old school, and I like the idea that if you win your league you go right to the World Series. But things change,” Johnson said. “With more clubs with opportunities, there’s more excitement.”

Ranger dugout coach Bucky Dent said that his only complaint is that the wild-card team should play the team with the best record in the first round, even if both teams are from the same division. Dent has a vested interest, of course. Under his system, the Rangers wouldn’t be playing the Yankees in the first round for the second consecutive year, the Red Sox would.

“I like the wild card and I think it’s interesting, especially with what happened this year [between the Mets and Reds],” Dent said. “But that should happen. I don’t care where the wild card comes from. If the wild card’s in, they should play the team with the best record. I don’t care if they’re in the same division or not.”

There may be a compromise for purists in the near future. There is talk that, should the NL again realign in 2001, it will eliminate the wild card because there would be four divisions, hence, four division winners.

As far as Dodger left fielder Gary Sheffield is concerned, the current system is good for the game.

“Now fans will stick around a little longer to see their team try to win a wild card and know that they have a 50-50 chance to win the World Series,” said Sheffield, a member of the ’97 champion Marlins. “It helps. But, of course, I’m a bit biased because I won the World Series as a wild card.”

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Call of the Wild

How the wild-card teams have fared:

NATIONAL LEAGUE

* 1995--Colorado, lost to Atlanta, 3-1, in division series.

* 1996--Dodgers, lost to Atlanta, 3-0, in division series.

* 1997--Florida, defeated San Francisco, 3-0, in division series; defeated Atlanta, 4-2, in championship series; defeated Cleveland, 4-3, in World Series.

* 1998--Chicago, lost to Atlanta, 3-0, in division series.

* 1999--New York Mets.

AMERICAN LEAGUE

* 1995--New York, lost to Seattle, 3-2, in division series.

* 1996--Baltimore, defeated Cleveland, 3-1, in division series; lost to New York, 4-1, in championship series.

* 1997--New York, lost to Cleveland, 3-2, in division series.

* 1998--Boston, lost to Cleveland, 3-1, in division series.

* 1999--Boston Red Sox