Proposal to change baseball playoffs is voted down

   A proposal to create a double-elimination postseason baseball tournament in the CIF Southern Section beginning in 2013 was rejected on Thursday by a vote of 46-26 at the Southern Section Council meeting.

   Some coaches have wanted to replace the single-elimination playoffs with a double-elimination tournament for Divisions I through IV. The San Diego Section has had a double-elimination tournament.

   Concerns about travel costs and adding up to seven additional games for teams in the playoffs were among the reasons it was voted down.

   According to the double-elimination proposal, the regular season would have ended one week earlier to allow for an extra week of playoffs, and there would be single-elimination wild-card games to create a 32-team field for each playoff division.

   Once the field is set, the 32 teams would have been broken into four eight-team brackets, with teams seeded one through eight in each bracket.

   Each eight-team bracket would have played a traditional double-elimination tournament over a two-week period, which would consist of two rounds the first week, and three rounds the second week to determine a champion of each bracket.

   To determine home games, CIF rules would still apply.

   Higher seeds and league champions would host first-round games, and teams with the fewest home games would automatically host subsequent rounds, with coin flips determining tie-breakers when both teams have had the same number of home games.

   Once teams reached the championship game, the team that advanced without a loss would automatically host the championship of each bracket, and a second game if needed.
Once the semifinalists were determined, the semifinal and championship rounds would have been a best-of-3 to determine the champion.

   In the current format, a team must win five consecutive games to win a championship. In a double-elimination, it could take as many as 12 games or as few as eight games to win a title.

   If the proposal were adopted, one of the downsides was there likely would not have been championship games at Dodger or Angel Stadium for the top four divisions.
Instead, the semifinalists and finalists would have agreed on a neutral site to play the best-of-3, which most likely would be at a community college or high school capable of supporting a large crowd.

   The San Gabriel Valley Tribune's Fred J. Robledo contributed to this story.