How will the MLB Playoffs be played this year?

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Ah, yes, it’s now the second week of August and as the dog days of summer are baking much of the United States, it’s hard to believe that fall is just around the corner. The MLB postseason is just around the corner as well and the 2022 playoffs will be very different than what fans have become used to in prior years.

How will the 2022 MLB playoffs be different than in prior years?

First and foremost, Major League Baseball has added a sixth team from both the NL and the AL into the playoff mix.  With three divisional winners within each league, there will now be three wild card teams who will move on to the postseason.  MLB has done away with the single wild card elimination games in favor of a best of three series before teams can move on to the divisional playoff round.

In another change, baseball will use a bracket and assign seedings for playoff-bound teams.  The top divisional winner will receive the number one seeding, the team with the second-best record will receive a number two seeding and then the third best divisional a team will be seeded as the number three team.  The wild card teams will then receive a seeding at the four, five and six spots within the bracket.  In another twist that awards divisional winners with strong records, the top two divisional teams automatically advance to the Divisional Series.  The divisional winner with the weakest record will have to face the 6^th seeded wild card team while the 4^th and 5^th seeds will battle it out against each other.

In addition, wild card teams with better records than divisional winners will not gain any advantages; winning a division regardless of a team’s overall record moves them ahead of all wild card playoff teams.  The Wild Card Series will be played on three consecutive days in order to move up the overall pace of the postseason.  There will be no reseeding of teams after the Wild Card Series and the top divisional winners will face the winners of the wild card round.  The Wild Card Series will be a best of three games; the Divisional Series will be a best of five and the World Series remains a best of seven series.  Home field advantage this year goes to the team with the best overall record regardless of seeding or divisional title.  If there are any tied records, the home field advantage will be decided mathematically and use factors from the entire season to decide which team will gain the upper hand in the Fall Classic.