With the MLB Playoffs around the corner, the time has come to discuss the World Series. There’s nothing more exciting than the fall time in Major League Baseball, with countless teams vying for their right to be crowned world champions. So which team has the biggest chance to win it all?

Los Angeles Dodgers

The defending champions haven’t exactly slowed down since last year. Although they trail the Giants in the NL West, the Dodgers still hold the second-best record in the entire league. With an insanely stacked roster, they’re arguably the most dangerous team of all.

San Francisco Giants

With the current best record in the league, we’d be remiss if we didn’t include the Giants on this list. They’ve been incredibly dominant this season and might just carry that success into the postseason as well.

Milwaukee Brewers

The Brewers have taken care of business this year, currently tied for third in the league with an impressive .618 win percentage. If they translate that success in the playoffs as well, it’ll be a special year for Milwaukee sports team all around.

Tampa Bay Rays

The defending American League champions are tied with the Brewers for third-best record in the league, and they could easily find their way back to the World Series if they stay on their game. But will they succeed where they failed last year?

The post Who Will Win the MLB World Series This Season? appeared first on SportzBonanza.

Due to the shortened regular season in 2020, MLB made a decision to expand this year’s playoffs from 10 to 16 teams. The move proved to be popular with baseball fans while bringing the league more revenue, which is why MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred hopes to keep the expanded postseason in the future as well.

In a recent interview with Associated Press, Manfred discussed the matter and voiced his support towards having more teams in the playoffs past 2020. 

 “I like the idea of, and I’m choosing my words carefully here, an expanded playoff format,” said Manfred.

Manfred ruled out the option of having 16 teams in the postseason like this year, as he believes this would make the regular season lose its importance. However, two or four more teams seem like a legitimate option.

“I don’t think we would do 16 like we did this year,” he added. “I think we do have to be cognizant of making sure that we preserve the importance of our regular season. But I think something beyond the 10 that we were at would be a good change.”

MLB has been pushing for 14-team playoffs the last offseason but didn’t manage to get the momentum they needed for a change. It is important to note that the league can’t decide this by themselves, as they need the MLB Players’ Association approval for any change.

The post MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred Hopes to Keep Expanded Playoffs Past 2020 appeared first on SportzBonanza.

Baseball fans will get to attend this year’s World Series in person after all. On Wednesday, Major League Baseball announced plans to sell tickets for title games as well as National League Championship Series.

According to the league’s press release, there will be 11,500 tickets available for each game in both series, which are set to take place at Texas’ Globe Life Field. The 10,550 fans will be seated on the stands while an additional 950 will watch the contests from suites.

The NL championship series is set to kick off on October 12, while the World Series will start on October 20. Game 1 of the NLCS will be the first time that fans will be at a baseball game since spring training in March.

The American League, however, won’t get the same treatment as California has stricter protocols when it comes to public gatherings. The AL Championship Series is set to take place in San Diego and Los Angeles.

MLB follows the NFL’s lead, considering that a number of football teams started allowing their fans to attend games in recent weeks. On the other hand, NHL closed out their season in empty arenas while NBA is about to do the same in a bubble setting in Orlando.

The post MLB Will Allow Fans to Attend NLCS and World Series appeared first on SportzBonanza.

Minnesota Twins still can’t get it done in the postseason. Despite being favored entering the wild-card series against Houston Astros, the Twins lost two consecutive games and have been eliminated from the postseason

With these two defeats, the Twins have now extended their playoff losing streak to stunning 18 games. This is now the longest winless streak in all of the four major American sports leagues.

Minnesota’s last postseason win came in 2004 during a Divisional Series against New York Yankees.

Things looked good for the Twins early in the Game 1 on Tuesday, as they got a 1-0 lead in the third inning thanks to a double by their designated hitter Nelson Cruz. Both teams were then scoreless until the seventh inning when the Astros pulled level with a single from George Springer.

Houston used the momentum and closed out the game in the ninth inning with three more scores.

“We didn’t give ourselves enough room to work,” said Twins manager Rocco Baldelli after Game 1. “In a tight situation, anything you’re not going to execute comes back to bite you, and that’s what happened in today’s game.” 

Although they were expected to bounce back in Game 2, the Twins delivered another disappointing performance and bowed out with a 3-1 loss.

The post Twins’ Playoff Losing Streak Up to 18 Games appeared first on SportzBonanza.

In yet another twist to the upcoming MLB Postseason in an atypical season, this year, teams’ seeding in the playoffs will be more important than ever after the league agreed to make seeds the base for home-field advantage.

The agreement with the MLB Players’ Association, which includes an eight-team playoff for the first time in the league’s history, also stipulates that in any given matchup between teams, from the first round of the playoffs to the World Series, the team with the higher seed will bat last in a game.

As matchups throughout the playoffs could include a wild card team with a better record than a division qualifying team in the National League and American League stages, this could be important even before the World Series.

However, the World Series, which is set to be played at Globe Life Park in Arlington, Texas, will be the main part of the playoffs where this change will play a role.

Since the All-Star Game provision was changed prior to the 2017 season, the team with the better record had home-field advantage in the World Series.

Now, though, if the #4 seed team in the NL has a better record than the #3 seed in the AL and the two teams meet in the Fall Classic, the American League team would play as the home team in Games 1, 2, 6, and 7.

This new provision adds a new foreign twist to what should be an interesting October for baseball fans.

The post Seeding to Determine Home-Field Advantage in MLB Playoffs appeared first on SportzBonanza.

The Tampa Bay Rays defeated the New York Mets by an 8-5 final score on Wednesday night, clinching the franchise’s first AL East pennant since 2010 and only the third in the team’s history.

The Rays, who were considered along with the New York Yankees to be the two strongest teams in the division heading into the season, outlasted the big-budget Yankees to claim their spot on top of one of baseball’s toughest divisions.

In a typical Rays game, the team got an excellent starting outing from pitcher Tyler Glasnow, who struck out 8 batters and allowed only 2 runs in 6 innings of work.

Tampa was knotted in a 2-2 pitcher’s duel until the top of the sixth inning, when outfielder Randy Arozarena smacked a two-run homer off of Mets starter Michael Wacha. He hit two home runs on the night.

Rays veteran outfielder Kevin Kiermaier spoke to the importance of winning the division after the game, saying, “It feels great to win the division, no matter what division you’re in. But especially the American League East—it’s just a different animal.”

The Rays will be the #1 seed in the AL playoffs barring an improbable comeback by the Minnesota Twins or Chicago White Sox and are set to face the Toronto Blue Jays in the first round.

The post Rays Clinch First AL East Division Crown Since 2010 appeared first on SportzBonanza.

The Atlanta Braves demolished the Miami Marlins by an 11-1 score on Tuesday night, clinching their third consecutive National League East title in the process.

The Braves, who have led their division since August 17th without letting the Miami Marlins or Philadelphia Phillies catch them, will head to the playoffs for the third straight season as either the #2 or #3 seed on the NL side of the bracket.

Despite major problems with the team’s starting pitching and rotation depth, which has seen the Braves start an almost unbelievable 13 pitchers in only 55 games so far this season, the team has overcome the odds to push ahead and build on their streak of division crowns.

The Braves’ 11-1 victory on Tuesday night featured plenty of offense, a hallmark of the team’s season. NL home run leader Marcell Ozuna blasted two long balls, and Dansby Swanson, Ozzie Albies, and NL MVP candidate Freddie Freeman also hit homers.

Atlanta is second in Major League Baseball with 98 home runs on the season, trailing only the NL #1 seed Los Angeles Dodgers, a likely playoff foe for the Braves.

The team will now make a bid to finish out its 5 remaining games strong, as it could be the difference between the #2 and #3 playoff seed in the race between the Braves and Cubs.

The post Braves Clinch 3rd Consecutive NL East Title appeared first on SportzBonanza.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, fans were unable to attend games during the 2020 MLB season. However, this might change during later stages of the playoffs, according to MLB commissioner Rob Manfred.

Speaking at a recent virtual event, Manfred said that the league hopes to have fans at stadiums in some capacity during League Championship Games and World Series.

“I think it’s important for us to start back down the road,” said Manfred. “Obviously, it’ll be limited numbers, socially distanced, protection provided for the fans in terms of temperature checks and the like. Kind of the pods like you saw in some of the NFL games. We’ll probably use that same theory. But I do think it’s important as we look forward to 2021 to get back to the idea that live sports, they’re generally outdoors, at least our games. And it’s something that we can get back to.”

Some leagues, like NFL, started opening their stadiums to fans, but MLB decided to see out the regular season in front of empty stands. Still, the league is reportedly leaving the possibility to change their policy at some point during the postseason.

Having fans at parks will mostly depend on MLB’s plan to stage the playoffs in a bubble setting. According to reports, the league plans to play the first round at the park of the higher-seeded team, while Divisional Series, League Championship Series, and World Series would take place at four stadiums: Dodgers Stadium in Los Angeles, San Diego’s Petco Park, Houston’s Minute Maid Park and Globe Life Field in Arlington.

The post MLB Hopes to Have Fans at Games During Later Stages of Playoffs appeared first on SportzBonanza.

We could have expanded playoffs in the 2020 MLB season after all. According to ESPN, the league and the MLB Players’ Association are currently talking about increasing the number of postseason spots from 10 to 16 for this year.

The two sides had a similar discussion last month while trying to work out a plan for baseball return in 2020. However, as two sides couldn’t agree on several other terms and abandoned negotiations, this idea was shelved.

Now, MLB is trying to have another go at the expanded playoffs before the start of the regular season and is reportedly optimistic that the union would be open to the proposal.

Having six more teams in the playoffs would likely benefit both sides. MLB would get more games in a shorted season while getting more money from TV rights, which account for the majority of league’s revenues this year as the coronavirus pandemic removed the fans from stands.

Players, on the other hand, will get playoff bonuses and have their earnings increased in a year when they are set to earn just around 40 percent of their usual salaries.

In case that the league and MLBPA come to an agreement, the first round of the playoffs will most likely be best-of-three due to an already packed schedule. The rest of the postseason is expected to follow the standard format. 

The post MLB and Union Discuss Expanding Playoffs to 16 Teams appeared first on SportzBonanza.

Major League Baseball and the MLB players’ association continue their talks about the 2020 season resume this week, and it appears that the two sides are getting closer to making a deal.

While it was previously reported the MLB wouldn’t be making new offers to the players for the time being, the league went on and presented another proposal on Monday. According to this new proposal, there would be 76 regular-season games in 2020, while the players would be guaranteed 50 percent of the prorated salaries.

In case that the postseason goes through as planned, the players’ salaries would then be bumped up to 75 percent of the prorated salaries. This would mean that the players would receive 35 percent of the money they were set to make before the coronavirus pandemic.

Under this proposal, the regular season would wrap up on September 27th, while the World Series would end by late October.

MLBPA countered the league’s offer on Tuesday, proposing an 89-game season and full prorated salaries for the players. Also, the proposal includes extended postseason that would see eight teams from both American League and National League making the playoffs in 2020 and 2021.

These terms would secure that players get 55 percent of the full 162-game salary.

Reportedly, the league will decline the MLBPA’s offer but there is optimism in both camps as their terms get closer with each swapped proposal.

The post MLB and Players Swap Proposals for the 2020 Season Resume appeared first on SportzBonanza.

With the MLB Playoffs around the corner, the time has come to discuss the World Series. There’s nothing more exciting than the fall time in Major League Baseball, with countless teams vying for their right to be crowned world champions. So which team has the biggest chance to win it all?

Los Angeles Dodgers

The defending champions haven’t exactly slowed down since last year. Although they trail the Giants in the NL West, the Dodgers still hold the second-best record in the entire league. With an insanely stacked roster, they’re arguably the most dangerous team of all.

San Francisco Giants

With the current best record in the league, we’d be remiss if we didn’t include the Giants on this list. They’ve been incredibly dominant this season and might just carry that success into the postseason as well.

Milwaukee Brewers

The Brewers have taken care of business this year, currently tied for third in the league with an impressive .618 win percentage. If they translate that success in the playoffs as well, it’ll be a special year for Milwaukee sports team all around.

Tampa Bay Rays

The defending American League champions are tied with the Brewers for third-best record in the league, and they could easily find their way back to the World Series if they stay on their game. But will they succeed where they failed last year?

The post Who Will Win the MLB World Series This Season? appeared first on SportzBonanza.

Due to the shortened regular season in 2020, MLB made a decision to expand this year’s playoffs from 10 to 16 teams. The move proved to be popular with baseball fans while bringing the league more revenue, which is why MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred hopes to keep the expanded postseason in the future as well.

In a recent interview with Associated Press, Manfred discussed the matter and voiced his support towards having more teams in the playoffs past 2020. 

 “I like the idea of, and I’m choosing my words carefully here, an expanded playoff format,” said Manfred.

Manfred ruled out the option of having 16 teams in the postseason like this year, as he believes this would make the regular season lose its importance. However, two or four more teams seem like a legitimate option.

“I don’t think we would do 16 like we did this year,” he added. “I think we do have to be cognizant of making sure that we preserve the importance of our regular season. But I think something beyond the 10 that we were at would be a good change.”

MLB has been pushing for 14-team playoffs the last offseason but didn’t manage to get the momentum they needed for a change. It is important to note that the league can’t decide this by themselves, as they need the MLB Players’ Association approval for any change.

The post MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred Hopes to Keep Expanded Playoffs Past 2020 appeared first on SportzBonanza.

Baseball fans will get to attend this year’s World Series in person after all. On Wednesday, Major League Baseball announced plans to sell tickets for title games as well as National League Championship Series.

According to the league’s press release, there will be 11,500 tickets available for each game in both series, which are set to take place at Texas’ Globe Life Field. The 10,550 fans will be seated on the stands while an additional 950 will watch the contests from suites.

The NL championship series is set to kick off on October 12, while the World Series will start on October 20. Game 1 of the NLCS will be the first time that fans will be at a baseball game since spring training in March.

The American League, however, won’t get the same treatment as California has stricter protocols when it comes to public gatherings. The AL Championship Series is set to take place in San Diego and Los Angeles.

MLB follows the NFL’s lead, considering that a number of football teams started allowing their fans to attend games in recent weeks. On the other hand, NHL closed out their season in empty arenas while NBA is about to do the same in a bubble setting in Orlando.

The post MLB Will Allow Fans to Attend NLCS and World Series appeared first on SportzBonanza.

Minnesota Twins still can’t get it done in the postseason. Despite being favored entering the wild-card series against Houston Astros, the Twins lost two consecutive games and have been eliminated from the postseason

With these two defeats, the Twins have now extended their playoff losing streak to stunning 18 games. This is now the longest winless streak in all of the four major American sports leagues.

Minnesota’s last postseason win came in 2004 during a Divisional Series against New York Yankees.

Things looked good for the Twins early in the Game 1 on Tuesday, as they got a 1-0 lead in the third inning thanks to a double by their designated hitter Nelson Cruz. Both teams were then scoreless until the seventh inning when the Astros pulled level with a single from George Springer.

Houston used the momentum and closed out the game in the ninth inning with three more scores.

“We didn’t give ourselves enough room to work,” said Twins manager Rocco Baldelli after Game 1. “In a tight situation, anything you’re not going to execute comes back to bite you, and that’s what happened in today’s game.” 

Although they were expected to bounce back in Game 2, the Twins delivered another disappointing performance and bowed out with a 3-1 loss.

The post Twins’ Playoff Losing Streak Up to 18 Games appeared first on SportzBonanza.

In yet another twist to the upcoming MLB Postseason in an atypical season, this year, teams’ seeding in the playoffs will be more important than ever after the league agreed to make seeds the base for home-field advantage.

The agreement with the MLB Players’ Association, which includes an eight-team playoff for the first time in the league’s history, also stipulates that in any given matchup between teams, from the first round of the playoffs to the World Series, the team with the higher seed will bat last in a game.

As matchups throughout the playoffs could include a wild card team with a better record than a division qualifying team in the National League and American League stages, this could be important even before the World Series.

However, the World Series, which is set to be played at Globe Life Park in Arlington, Texas, will be the main part of the playoffs where this change will play a role.

Since the All-Star Game provision was changed prior to the 2017 season, the team with the better record had home-field advantage in the World Series.

Now, though, if the #4 seed team in the NL has a better record than the #3 seed in the AL and the two teams meet in the Fall Classic, the American League team would play as the home team in Games 1, 2, 6, and 7.

This new provision adds a new foreign twist to what should be an interesting October for baseball fans.

The post Seeding to Determine Home-Field Advantage in MLB Playoffs appeared first on SportzBonanza.

The Tampa Bay Rays defeated the New York Mets by an 8-5 final score on Wednesday night, clinching the franchise’s first AL East pennant since 2010 and only the third in the team’s history.

The Rays, who were considered along with the New York Yankees to be the two strongest teams in the division heading into the season, outlasted the big-budget Yankees to claim their spot on top of one of baseball’s toughest divisions.

In a typical Rays game, the team got an excellent starting outing from pitcher Tyler Glasnow, who struck out 8 batters and allowed only 2 runs in 6 innings of work.

Tampa was knotted in a 2-2 pitcher’s duel until the top of the sixth inning, when outfielder Randy Arozarena smacked a two-run homer off of Mets starter Michael Wacha. He hit two home runs on the night.

Rays veteran outfielder Kevin Kiermaier spoke to the importance of winning the division after the game, saying, “It feels great to win the division, no matter what division you’re in. But especially the American League East—it’s just a different animal.”

The Rays will be the #1 seed in the AL playoffs barring an improbable comeback by the Minnesota Twins or Chicago White Sox and are set to face the Toronto Blue Jays in the first round.

The post Rays Clinch First AL East Division Crown Since 2010 appeared first on SportzBonanza.

The Atlanta Braves demolished the Miami Marlins by an 11-1 score on Tuesday night, clinching their third consecutive National League East title in the process.

The Braves, who have led their division since August 17th without letting the Miami Marlins or Philadelphia Phillies catch them, will head to the playoffs for the third straight season as either the #2 or #3 seed on the NL side of the bracket.

Despite major problems with the team’s starting pitching and rotation depth, which has seen the Braves start an almost unbelievable 13 pitchers in only 55 games so far this season, the team has overcome the odds to push ahead and build on their streak of division crowns.

The Braves’ 11-1 victory on Tuesday night featured plenty of offense, a hallmark of the team’s season. NL home run leader Marcell Ozuna blasted two long balls, and Dansby Swanson, Ozzie Albies, and NL MVP candidate Freddie Freeman also hit homers.

Atlanta is second in Major League Baseball with 98 home runs on the season, trailing only the NL #1 seed Los Angeles Dodgers, a likely playoff foe for the Braves.

The team will now make a bid to finish out its 5 remaining games strong, as it could be the difference between the #2 and #3 playoff seed in the race between the Braves and Cubs.

The post Braves Clinch 3rd Consecutive NL East Title appeared first on SportzBonanza.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, fans were unable to attend games during the 2020 MLB season. However, this might change during later stages of the playoffs, according to MLB commissioner Rob Manfred.

Speaking at a recent virtual event, Manfred said that the league hopes to have fans at stadiums in some capacity during League Championship Games and World Series.

“I think it’s important for us to start back down the road,” said Manfred. “Obviously, it’ll be limited numbers, socially distanced, protection provided for the fans in terms of temperature checks and the like. Kind of the pods like you saw in some of the NFL games. We’ll probably use that same theory. But I do think it’s important as we look forward to 2021 to get back to the idea that live sports, they’re generally outdoors, at least our games. And it’s something that we can get back to.”

Some leagues, like NFL, started opening their stadiums to fans, but MLB decided to see out the regular season in front of empty stands. Still, the league is reportedly leaving the possibility to change their policy at some point during the postseason.

Having fans at parks will mostly depend on MLB’s plan to stage the playoffs in a bubble setting. According to reports, the league plans to play the first round at the park of the higher-seeded team, while Divisional Series, League Championship Series, and World Series would take place at four stadiums: Dodgers Stadium in Los Angeles, San Diego’s Petco Park, Houston’s Minute Maid Park and Globe Life Field in Arlington.

The post MLB Hopes to Have Fans at Games During Later Stages of Playoffs appeared first on SportzBonanza.

We could have expanded playoffs in the 2020 MLB season after all. According to ESPN, the league and the MLB Players’ Association are currently talking about increasing the number of postseason spots from 10 to 16 for this year.

The two sides had a similar discussion last month while trying to work out a plan for baseball return in 2020. However, as two sides couldn’t agree on several other terms and abandoned negotiations, this idea was shelved.

Now, MLB is trying to have another go at the expanded playoffs before the start of the regular season and is reportedly optimistic that the union would be open to the proposal.

Having six more teams in the playoffs would likely benefit both sides. MLB would get more games in a shorted season while getting more money from TV rights, which account for the majority of league’s revenues this year as the coronavirus pandemic removed the fans from stands.

Players, on the other hand, will get playoff bonuses and have their earnings increased in a year when they are set to earn just around 40 percent of their usual salaries.

In case that the league and MLBPA come to an agreement, the first round of the playoffs will most likely be best-of-three due to an already packed schedule. The rest of the postseason is expected to follow the standard format. 

The post MLB and Union Discuss Expanding Playoffs to 16 Teams appeared first on SportzBonanza.

Major League Baseball and the MLB players’ association continue their talks about the 2020 season resume this week, and it appears that the two sides are getting closer to making a deal.

While it was previously reported the MLB wouldn’t be making new offers to the players for the time being, the league went on and presented another proposal on Monday. According to this new proposal, there would be 76 regular-season games in 2020, while the players would be guaranteed 50 percent of the prorated salaries.

In case that the postseason goes through as planned, the players’ salaries would then be bumped up to 75 percent of the prorated salaries. This would mean that the players would receive 35 percent of the money they were set to make before the coronavirus pandemic.

Under this proposal, the regular season would wrap up on September 27th, while the World Series would end by late October.

MLBPA countered the league’s offer on Tuesday, proposing an 89-game season and full prorated salaries for the players. Also, the proposal includes extended postseason that would see eight teams from both American League and National League making the playoffs in 2020 and 2021.

These terms would secure that players get 55 percent of the full 162-game salary.

Reportedly, the league will decline the MLBPA’s offer but there is optimism in both camps as their terms get closer with each swapped proposal.

The post MLB and Players Swap Proposals for the 2020 Season Resume appeared first on SportzBonanza.