Bud Selig: MLB Expanded Playoffs to Begin in 2012

It’s been a while since we’ve heard anything regarding Major League Baseball’s expanded playoff system or additional wild-card teams, as the Hot Stove has since taken over.  Bud Selig addressed the topic last night while attending the White Sox annual SoxFest.  Though it seemed as if it was still to be determined whether or not the new playoff format would be implemented in 2012, Selig sounded confident that MLB would add an additional wild-card team and game to this coming postseason’s schedule.

Selig said that it has been decided that the additional playoff round will consist of a single do-or-die game, not a best-of-three series.  According to Selig, everyone involved in the decision making process wanted it to be one game.

CSNChicago.com’s Jim Owczarski provides several Selig quotes from last evening.

The commissioner said that he really believes that MLB will “have the wild-card for 2012, this year”.  Selig noted that “clubs really want it” and that he doesn’t think he remembers an issue that teams ever wanted more than to have the extra wild-card team added.

Selig said that he and Major League Baseball are “working on dates” for the one-game playoff, and said that it looks to him like the single game will be added to next fall’s lineup.  Selig called the development “exciting”, noting that extra wild-card team and one-game playoff will “start the playoffs out on a very exciting manner”.