Rob Neyer comments on the idea of expanded playoffs:
But the players’ feelings do matter, which is why the math never seems to work. If you play fewer games, you negatively impact revenues. Which hurts the players’ feelings (and the owners’, too). If you add another round to the postseason tournament without playing fewer regular-season games, now you’re playing World Series games in the middle of November. Which nobody wants. Not until they start playing the Series in Hawaii or Florida or Southern California every year.
The “solution” here is incredibly simple, and everyone knows it …
Doubleheaders.
Actually, there is another solution, which is no days off in the playoffs. Get rid of the travel days, one day off between the scheduled last game of one series and the start of the next. That would take a week off the current format, so they could use that week for the wild card playoff.
I agree in theory, but a series like Philadelphia vs San Francisco where the teams make two cross country trips necessitates one off day, I think. I’d put it between games 5 and 6, forcing teams to either use a starter on short rest in game 5 or dip into the back end of their rotation. Depth would finally come into play again. It may also make the day off irrelevant if one team wins in 4 or 5 games.