MESA, Ariz. — Fame and fortune and personal satisfaction still not quite enough to save baseball’s six-month, 162-game regular season, it instead the victim of lingering competitive whims and disparity, the league’s latest plan proposes a more permissive postseason to incentivize all that comes before it.
While this has always been the presumed objective — win games, go to the playoffs and win championships, more than a few franchises have been left behind. For some, it’s a run of bad luck or bad decisions or neglectful ownership, which happens. For others, it is self-inflicted. The very intention is to lose, lose big, sell sunshine and beer, and then hope nobody realizes tomorrow has already come and gone.