MLB Wants Its Best Teams to Pick Their Own Playoff Opponents

The league's offer to players would also cut the season to 154 games in 2029 and stretch the Division Series to seven.

The best team in each league would get to choose its playoff opponent under a plan Major League Baseball put to its players Thursday.

The same offer would cut the regular season to 154 games starting in 2029 and stretch the Division Series from best-of-five to best-of-seven, the league's own site, MLB.com, reported. The current schedule is 162 games, CBS Sports noted. The plan is MLB's latest move in bargaining with the MLB Players Association, so for now it's a pitch, not a rule.

The picking would happen twice. Once the regular season ends, the No. 3 seed in each league, whichever division champ finished worst of the three, would decide whether it wants the No. 5 or No. 6 seed. After the Wild Card round, the No. 1 seed would choose which of the surviving Wild Card teams it faces.

MLB's case is that this would let a top seed avoid a scarier opponent and make the regular-season record count for more. It would also take away whatever edge comes with being the third Wild Card. Either way, somebody gets told to their face that they look like the easy out.

The league made the pitch in the middle of October, with Division Series being played in both leagues and the Dodgers still alive in the playoffs.

The regular season would change shape too. Every Monday would be a scheduled day off, except for one or two games shown in a new national TV window, and any team playing that Monday would sit out Thursday instead. National holidays and special-event games are exempt. Each club would also play four split doubleheaders, one against each team in its division.

"Returning to a 154-game schedule would allow us to introduce a weekly off-day, which is good for player health," MLB spokesman Glen Caplin said, according to MLB.com.

For players, the pitch is about money and rest. MLB said salaries wouldn't go down for the shorter season, though the thresholds players hit for bonuses and options would be scaled down to match. The league also pointed to roster churn: from 2022 to 2025, teams averaged 1.45 optional assignments in weeks that had an off day and 1.90 in weeks that didn't. That's about 24% fewer.

The number itself is old. According to MLB, 154 games was almost always the standard from 1904 through 1960. The 2029 start is also when MLB's next national media agreements begin, and the league argues that extra postseason off days would raise ratings and make its media rights worth more.

October is where the plan grows. A best-of-seven Division Series could add as many as eight postseason games. MLB also wants a staggered start to the playoffs, which would get rid of the early weekday daytime slots it uses when four games fall on the same day. It also wants an off day before League Championship Series Games 5, 6 and 7, so those games don't go head to head with the other league and star pitchers can be ready for them.

By MLB's math, the regular season would end a week earlier, but a World Series Game 7 would land only two days later than it does now. That week doesn't disappear. It moves to October.

Source: ktla.com.

Source: mlb.com, retrieved October 8, 2026. Other sources: cbssports.com.