FanPost

The Wild Card format doesn't need changed, the Pirates just need to win the game

Two years ago, as I stood in a bowling alley, watching the Pirates push across two runs in the bottom of the eighth inning of Game 3 of the 2013 NLDS against St. Louis, it was basically the greatest baseball experience of my life. A few minutes later, when Gaby Sanchez secured the final out in the top of the ninth inning, and Jason Grilli celebrated with Russell Martin, I thought, just before I turned to roll my next ball (I was way more excited on the inside than I appeared on the outside), "It doesn't get any better than this."

Turns out (rather unfortunately), I was right.

Since that day, the Pirates have lost four-straight postseason games and, in 36 innings, they've managed to string together just as many runs as they did in that aforementioned bottom of the eighth inning (two). They've been shut-out twice, had three complete games pitched against them and have never been ahead for even a half of an inning.

When Madison Bumgarner dominated the Pirates at PNC Park in last year's Wild Card game, the talk immediately began about the need to make the format a best-of-three. First of all, why wasn't this sentiment popular in 2013, when Francisco Liriano and the rest of the Pirates dominated the Reds in the Wild Card game? It's funny how things become "unfair" once your team loses.

Secondly, if you make the wild card teams play a best-of-three series, doesn't that, once again, lessen the importance of winning the division? After all, that was the whole purpose in the first place. It was changed to reward teams for finishing in first place. Remember the old days when the wild card winner in each league celebrated on the field like they just won their division? They celebrated like that because, essentially, they did win a "division." Even though they finished in second place in their respective division, they were thrust ahead into the same field as the other three teams who actually did come in first place. Now, it's not so easy for the best second place team in a league to enter the playoffs on equal footing as the division winners. Now, that team must really earn it by taking on the next best non-division winner in the league in a one-game playoff, where the stakes are suddenly Game 7 and the consequences for the loser are that your postseason could end just as quickly as it started.

To me, adding the second wild card to each league was the best thing MLB has done in quite some time. For a league that will probably never surrender to the idea of a salary cap, it has evened the playing-field for mid and small market teams in ways unimaginable even five years ago. It might be bad timing for a team like the Pirates who would have advanced right to the NLDS in two of the last three years under the old format. But it keeps more teams in the race, and it gives more fan bases a reason to hope, even if their teams are hopelessly out of their division races and maybe even a few games behind the second best non-division leader.

Maybe it's because I'm a football fan and used to sudden-death playoff consequences, but I like the current wild card format just the way it is. Is it unfair for a 98-win team like the Pirates to have to play a one-game playoff after such a great season? No, because winning the division was on the table up until the end, and they couldn't quite get the job done.

This doesn't mean the Pirates had a bad year and that they should look back on some losses with regret. No, it just means that the Cardinals were two-games better over the course of the year.

Everyone keeps harping on the Pirates and their 98 wins. That's right, the Pirates were a team that won 98 games, which obviously indicates they had a roster filled with many talented and productive players in 2015. And guess what? It was up to those talented and productive players to come through on Wednesday night against the Cubs (a 97-win team, by the way) and Jake Arrieta. Yes, Arrieta was on the pitching roll of a life-time, but Andrew McCutchen is one of the two or three best all-around position players in baseball. Yes, it might be unfair to have to run into a hot ace in a one-game playoff, but Gerrit Cole is an ace in his own right, who won 19 games in the regular season.

For all his faults (and there are many), Charlie Morton was the last Pirates pitcher to have a really good postseason start, when he pitched into the sixth inning of Game 4 of the 2013 NLDS against the Cardinals, with Pittsburgh up two games to one. Since that day, Pirates pitchers have given up 20 runs in those same 36 innings that the hitters have produced two.

For all his faults (and there probably aren't so many that he should be a platoon player), Pedro Alvarez was the last Pirates hitter to produce in the clutch (or high-leverage for you non-emotional types). when he came through with a run-scoring single in the bottom of the eighth inning of Game 3 of the 2013 NLDS that put Pittsburgh ahead for the last time in the postseason.

Yes, Arrieta is an ace, but he's an ace that throws a ton of strikes, same with Bumgarner and Adam Wainwright. Maybe their control is pinpoint. Maybe their stuff is nasty. However, at some point in most at-bats, every hitter has at least one pitch to try and do something positive with. For the great hitters, sometimes all they need is one pitch to make history.

I was at the Wild Card game on Thursday, and during the pregame ceremonies, they flashed a video montage of some of the greatest moments in Pirates postseason history--including every huge hit and home run you could imagine. As you might guess, people like Barry Bonds, Andy Van Slyke and Bobby Bonilla weren't featured much if at all (if my memory serves me right), and why? Because, in 20 postseason games as members of the Pirates in the early '90s, they couldn't come through when the chips were down and they really, really had to. Maz came through when it mattered. Roberto did as well. We all know about Pops and Game 7 in '79. Fact is, all it takes is one swing of the bat (a split-second) to make history and become immortal to Pirates fans. Those players of the early-'90s aren't celebrated in Pittsburgh as perhaps they should be given what they accomplished over three years. But that's because, for as good as they were, they did nothing to make themselves immortals. For all the attitude problems of a Bonds, Van Slyke or Bonilla, do you think fans would care at all today if one or all of them were part of the Wednesday video montage, making history in past postseasons? No, in-fact, one of them may have been on-hand to throw out the first pitch or get the crowd going.

As for these current Pirates, they're heading down the same road as those early '90s teams. McCutchen has no RBIs in eight postseason games. Neil Walker is like 0 for his last 26 postseason at-bats.

Cole could have gone pitch-for-pitch with Arrieta the other night (he certainly has the pedigree and may be more talented), but he gave up four earned runs.

To the Pirates' credit, none of them have complained about the wild card format (at least publicly). Like manager Clint Hurdle said earlier this week, they knew what they signed up for. Next year, if the Pirates find themselves in the wild card game for a fourth straight year, maybe they'll run into another great ace and people will cry foul once again. However, maybe instead of that, they'll have a hot ace of their own; maybe their hitters will come through with an actual run or five.

The Pirates controlled their own destiny during the regular season and again in that wild card game on Wednesday. Nothing needs to change with the postseason format. The only thing that needs to change is the form of the Pirates once they get to the postseason.

Do something to make yourselves immortal.

This is a FanPost and does not necessarily reflect the views of the managing editors or SB Nation. FanPosts are written by Bucs Dugout readers.