The World Series

The World Series and the Road to its Path

One of the biggest championships in all of the major sports in America and around the world is discussed in some detail here. 

The World Series, the Fall Classic, etc. Major League Baseballs' championship is known by many names, but most sports fans refer to it as the World Series. It is to baseball as the Super Bowl is to football, the NBA Finals are to basketball, and the Stanley Cup is to hockey. It is the biggest set games in all of baseball and the winning team not only gets a trophy and bragging rights for the year, but also a lot of attention and money. 

The 27-Time World Series Champion New York Yankees with 

another World Series Trophy (2009)

Each Major League baseball season consists of a 162-game regular season that runs from the beginning of April till, depending on the year, either the end of September or the first couple of days of October and each team makes the trades, plays as hard as they can, and tries to avoid as many injuries and stratagise as well as possible for one goal: Make it to the playoffs and win the coveted World Series trophy and all the glory that comes with it. 

Here is a basic explanation of the MLB Playoff format as it currently stands. In each league (The National League and the American League), the winner of each division automatically makes the playoffs. To win the division, you have to have a better record than every other team in your division. However, if there is a tie and two teams have the same record, the team who has won more head to head match ups is the team that wins the division. If the two teams have the same record and have tied in head to head match ups, then the team that wins the division is the team with a better overall division record. There's even more tie breakers after this if the division winner still isn't determined but that will not be covered in this blog post. 

Anyways, so there are three division winners in each league and are seeded as the 1, 2, and 3 seeds based on their records. However, there are also two wild card teams in each league, the teams that haven't won their divisions but have the next best records. Unfortunately, this makes there be 5 playoff teams in each league and so to bring it down to 4 so that the ALDS and NLDS (Division Series) can be played, there is a one game wild-card playoff between the two wild card teams which is played at the stadium of the higher-ranked wild card team which is the team with the better record of the two wild card teams. Whoever wins this then plays the number 1 seed in one of  the 2 division series in each league. As you can see, the playoff system in Major League Baseball isn't as simple as it may seem at first. 

The rest of the playoffs runs as follows:

1) ALDS (American League Division Series- Best of 5 Games)  

• AL Number 1 Seed Vs. AL Number 4 Seed 
• AL Number 2 Seed Vs. AL Number 3 Seed

NLDS (National League Division Series- Best of 5 Games) 

• NL Number 1 Seed Vs. NL Number 4 Seed
• NL Number 2 Seed Vs. NL Number 3 Seed

2) ALCS (American League Championship Series- Best of 7 Games)

• AL Number 1/4 Seed Vs. AL Number 2/3 Seed 

WINNER: AL Champions

NLCS (National League Championship Series- Best of 7 Games)

• NL Number 1/4 Seed Vs. NL Number 2/3 Seed

WINNER: NL Champions

3) The World Series ( Best of 7 Games)

• AL Champions Vs. NL Champions 

Hopefully, this post has helped you understand some more of how the MLB playoffs work! 

The Different Divisions in Baseball

The Different Divisions in Baseball

A look into all the different teams that make up the  Major League Baseball League.


Below are each of the thirty Major League Baseball teams, in order vertically by division and alphabetically in each division. As you can see, there are six different division with five teams in each of them, making up the thirty teams of the league. Also, the first three columns make up the teams in the American League and the last three columns make up the teams in the National League, but we will go into more detail with this very soon.

All 30 MLB Teams and Their Divisions




There hasn't always been thirty teams in Major League baseball. In fact, back as early as 1901, there were still do leagues, but there was only one division in each league with only eight teams in each league, totaling a mere sixteen teams (http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/standings/#19011006).
However, slowly, more cities wanted to invest in professional teams, with the Tampa Bay Rays being the most recent team in 1998 unless you count the Montreal Expos move to Washington and becoming the Washington Nationals, as a whole new team in 2005 (Major League Baseball, Wikipedia Contributors).


Anyways, there are 6 divisions in the current MLB format, with each having 5 teams in them are two leagues, the National League and the American League, which each have 3 of these divisions within them. This is how the MLB Teams are set up based on each division which is based on the locations of each of the teams within the country, and Toronto in Canada.


A) The American League (AL):


1) AL East:                                       
Baltimore Orioles
Boston Red Sox
New York Yankees
Tampa Bay Rays
Toronto Blue Jays


2) AL Central:
Chicago White Sox
Cleveland Indians
Detroit Tigers
Kansas City Royals
Minnesota Twins


3) AL West:
Houston Astros
Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim
Oakland Athletics
Seattle Mariners
Texas Rangers


B) National League (NL):


1) NL East:
Atlanta Braves
Miami Marlins
New York Mets
Philadelphia Phillies
Washington Nationals


2) NL Central:
Chicago Cubs
Cincinnati Reds
Milwaukee Brewers
St. Louis Cardinals
Pittsburgh Pirates


3) NL West:
Arizona Diamondbacks
Colorado Rockies
Los Angeles Dodgers
San Diego Padres
San Francisco Giants


Now you know all the teams in the MLB, the divisions they play in, the leagues they play in, and where they are located.