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Which Team(s) Are Your Pick(s) for the MLB Playoffs?
This will be the first edition of the postseason since 2012 to have a new format, as it has been expanded to include six teams per league.
Indeed these days those “boys of summer” play well into fall. November 5 would be the date of a World Series Game 7 - the soonest the postseason could end would be on November 1, the date of a World Series Game 4.
As for the teams that are still in the mix, in the American League, the Houston Astros were the first team to clinch a postseason spot (7th in the last 8, though there’s surely an asterisk there somewhere), the New York Yankees also clinched their seventh postseason berth in the past eight years, while the now-Cleveland Guardians clinched their 5th in the past seven seasons. The Toronto Blue Jays made it back, their 2nd in the past three years, while the the Tampa Bay Rays made it 4 in a row. For their part, the Seattle Mariners snapped a two decades-long streak – getting to their first postseason berth since 2001 (btw, the longest active postseason drought in the American League).
Over in the National League, the Los Angeles Dodgers made it 10 in a row to the postseason (the first team to make ten consecutive postseason appearances since the Yankees did so from 1998 to 2007), The Mets got their first postseason showing since 2016, The defending champion Atlanta Braves made it five in a row, and it was 4 in a row for the Cardinals, while the San Diego Padres clinched their second postseason berth in the past three years. The Philadelphia Phillies ended what had been the longest active postseason drought in the National League – clinching their first postseason berth since 2011.
However, that was then – and since those new wild card rounds, we’ve seen the Phillies take out my beloved Cardinals, the Mets claw their way back against the Padres (only to slip back in game #3), the Guardians outlast the Rays, and the Mariners upend the Blue Jays. Leaving us with the Mariners against the Astros, the Yankees versus the Guardians, the Dodgers against the Padres, and the Braves taking on the Phillies – as we work our way to (and ultimately, through) the 2022 World Series.
This week, we’d like to know how you’re pulling for – or if you’ve already turned your attention to other things…