Cthomas wrote:
The Red Sox would probably be just as happy to play ONE playoff, against the ChiSox, rather than a guaranteed ONE and POSSIBLY TWO, against either the Yanks alone or the Yanks then the Chisox (given how they'd be spent before the playoffs even started).
Of course not. You're forgetting that under your suggestion, the Red Sox would HAVE to win that one game to make the playoffs. No team would want to have to win ONE game when they would have the option of winning EITHER of two games. A double chance at reaching the playoffs trumps pitching rest, since with only one playoff game there's a roughly 50% chance that your ace would end up being rested for his Tuesday morning tee time.
You're right, of course, that the Yankees would be happy with head-to-head record as it played out, but I'm speaking from an objective standpoint. If you asked either Joe Torre or Terry Francona two weeks ago what system is preferable, they'd both tell you the one-game playoff is what they'd want if a playoff berth were guaranteed to only one team.
The point is that there is nothing intrinsic to head-to-head record in baseball that entitles a team to anything. It's just one of many slightly-less-than-arbitrary factors that MLB could have chosen to avoid a playoff game in circumstances where
nobody would want one.
(You're also getting the White Sox and Indians mixed up.)