Series of changes in last 40 years
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - I guess it's time some of us stop pining for the Olden Days, huh?
This is the 40th year of what I'll call extra-layer baseball, although these are only the 39th League Championship Series because of the 1994 cancellation. But it's definitely long enough for all of us to have made an accommodation with the idea of extended playoffs to determine which team has the right to call itself the champion of major league baseball.
You'd have to be in your mid-40s to have any recollection of a time when postseason baseball meant World Series, and World Series only. The last time that was the case was 1968, when the Tigers upset the defending champion Cardinals in seven games. Baseball was split into four divisions the following year, and extended postseason play began.
There will forever be an argument as to whether postseason play really does determine which truly is the best team. More than any sport, baseball is a long-haul affair. It's a daily grind of 162 games, not 16 or 82. The schedule is almost twice as long as any other major sport, so the dynamics are far different. If you've won out after 162 games, should you really have to prove yourself again? And again? And, good Lord, again?
In the old days, people kind of accepted the idea that, given all I've just said, perhaps the best team didn't always win the World Series, that the championship went on occasion to the hotter team or luckier team. That thinking began taking root as early as 1906, the third World Series (though it began in 1903, there was none in 1904 because the haughty New York Giants refused to play the American League champion Boston Americans), when the Chicago White Sox beat the Chicago Cubs in six games after the Cubs had established a still-standing record of 116 victories.
More often than not, the respective champions entered the World Series regarded as equals. But every once in a while one team appeared to be vastly superior to the other, and thus people were pretty well gobsmacked when the "wrong" team won, all the more so when the "wrong" team swept the favorites.
That was the case in 1914 (Miracle Braves over the Philadelphia A's), 1954 (New York Giants over the Cleveland Indians), and 1990 (Cincinnati Reds over the Oakland A's), to name three. Those are just the sweeps. For the fact is that when the 1960 Pirates beat the Yankees (7), the 1969 Mets beat the Orioles (5), and the 1971 Pirates beat the Orioles (7), there were a lot of people left with their jaws hanging.
Nowadays, with three tiers of playoffs, what's an upset? Well, we can start with the 1988 Dodgers, who weren't supposed to beat either the Mets in the NLCS or the A's (notice how often the A's keep coming up in this discussion?), but who beat them both to give Tom Lasorda banquet stories for the rest of his life. And that was in the two-tier days. Could the Dodgers have done it three times? We'll never know, but the fact is they didn't have to. The Red Sox, Rays, Phillies, and Dodgers do.
But with expansion, additional playoffs had to come. And the fact is, a great many of baseball's storied postseason incidents these past 40 years have taken place before the World Series. The Division Series, and especially the League Championship Series, are a vital part of baseball lore.
A few examples:
1972 - Johnny Bench leads off bottom of the ninth in Game 5 of the NLCS against Pittsburgh with a home run. Reds win on Bob Moose's wild pitch.
1976 - Chris Chambliss's Game 5 walkoff beats Royals.
1977 - Black Friday in Philadelphia as Dodgers come from two runs down and nobody on in ninth inning to win Game 3.
1980 - Extraordinary Phillies-Astros NLCS, featuring four consecutive extra-inning games.
1986 - Dave Henderson.
1986 - Mets score three in ninth to tie Game 6 against Astros; win it in 14th.
1988 - Mike Scioscia's two-run, ninth-inning homer off Doc Gooden ties Game 4; Dodgers win in 12th.
1992 - Francisco Cabrera's pinch-hit single scores Sid Bream with winning run in Game 5 as Braves beat Pirates.
1995 - In first year of Division Series, Mariners come from 0-2 to beat Yankees on Edgar Martinez's double, scoring Junior Griffey and making a relief winner out of Randy Johnson.
1996 - Jeffrey Maier interferes with Derek Jeter's ninth-inning fly ball that is ruled a home run and leads to Yankees' 11-inning Game 1 ALCS triumph over the Orioles.
1999 - Pedro shuts down Indians.
2001 - Jeter makes the "what's-he-doing-there?" backhand flip to get Jeremy Giambi at the plate.
2003 - Pedro leaves. Aaron Boone swats 11th-inning homer. Yankees win in 7.
2003 - Bartman.
2004 - 19-8. Dave Roberts. Papi back-to-back game-winners. Bloody sock. Damon two home runs. Hub euphoria.
2007 - Josh Beckett. J.D. Drew's granny.
All this happened before anyone got to the World Series. Included are some of the greatest baseball moments ever, and I haven't even mentioned such things as Will Clark hitting about .700 against the Cubs in 1989, or Ozzie Smith hitting his first career lefthanded homer to beat the Dodgers in 1985, or George Brett hitting three homers in Yankee Stadium in 1978 but being trumped when Thurman Munson hit a game-winner into far away left-center.
So, yes, we've had our thrills from the added postseason play. The trade-off is that the extended games put a terrific strain on the players (pitchers especially) and managers, whose stress level can be tripled. It has created a circumstance in which there may very well be more pressure in the League Championship Series than in the World Series.
Adding games has tinkered with the essence of the game, starting with some of the abominable weather conditions mid- and late October can bring to so much of the country.
Had someone told John McGraw or Casey Stengel that a phenomenon known as the "wild card" would win the World Series, they would have had you committed. But this is baseball in the early 21st century, and it's here to stay.
Bob Ryan is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at ryan@globe.com. 