Home Field Advantage for the World Series

(Photo by Jed Jacobsohn/Getty Images)

Home Field Advantage

Alright so I am sure you’ve heard it before, but why should MLB’s All-Star determine home field advantage in the World Series. I say, why not, it’s as good as anything else out there. I know most of you are probably thinking, what is he talking about? Well I’ll get into all the pros and cons of using the All-Star game as well as show you that there really is no good way to determine home field advantage.

Current Format

Winner of All-Star Game Gets Home Field Advantage.

Sounds simple enough, whatever league’s best players are better gets to have their league host the World Series. Well, as we all know there is a major flaw in this, not all of the league’s best players make the All-Star game. With fan voting and every team needing an All-Star (Full disclosure, I like every team being represented and hate fan voting) some inferior players make the All-Star team. Also, the game is an exhibition and the game is still treated that way.

No manager is going to throw Roy Halladay for nine innings in an All-Star game to guarantee home field advantage. At most I expect to see a pitcher only pitch three innings tonight. Also, all the All-stars get rotated out in situations they normally wouldn’t. Would Manuel really bench Albert Pujols in a real game the way he is hitting right now? No. but because it’s an exhibition they will.

So clearly the current format has flaws. Let’s look at other ways they’ve used to determine home field advantage.

Team with Most Wins Gets Home Field Advantage.

Another plan that sounds simple enough. This is how the reward home field advantage in every other major professional sport’s playoffs, including MLB until the World Series. There is a flaw though. Without getting into the debate of which brand of baseball is better or which league of baseball is better, but there are some years where the AL is better then the NL and years when the NL is better then the AL.

With the recent dominance of the AL in both the All-Star game and Inter-league play we can assume the AL is better. So would it be fair to give the Dodgers home field advantage over the Red Sox? The Dodgers might have more wins then the Red Sox at the end of the season, but they did so beating inferior teams while the Red Sox had to play a more difficult schedule. So should number of wins be used? Again it is flawed.

Home Field Advantage Switches Every Year.

To avoid dilemma just mentioned, MLB used to just switch off who hosted World Series. At this time, outside of the All-Star game, this is the only time the NL and the AL would go head to head. There was no real way to determine which league was better and made number of wins tougher to compare.

So what did baseball do? 1 year AL hosted, the next year NL hosted. Now this might sound dumb, but it might actually be the most fair in the long run. Yes an AL would be upset when an NL team hosted an vice versa, but that same AL team would not be complaining if it was an AL year. Again another flawed way to determine home field advantage, but as I am sure you are starting to see, they all are.

So these have been done in the past, what other ways could be used to determine home field advantage. These are suggestions that I have heard.

Team with the Better Inter League Record Gets Home Field Advantage.

One team is better against the other league so they should get home field. This is again flawed. What happens if both teams go 10-5? Do they then use margin of victory? If they do that, then they are turning into College Football and saying the two wins are not equal?

Another way it’s flawed is the regional match ups. Is it fair that the Yankees and Mets, two recently traditionally good teams play each other six times in inter league play while the Cardinals and the Royals, with the Cardinals being traditionally good and as of late the Royals have not, play six times? Of course not, no two inter league schedule are the same.

League with Better Inter League Record Gets Home Field Advantage.

You're currently logged into Facebook

Do you want to share your Bleacher Report activity on Facebook?