What to know ahead of this week’s House v. NCAA settlement votes
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Dan Murphy
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Dan Murphy
ESPN Staff Writer
- Covers the Big Ten
- Joined ESPN.com in 2014
- Graduate of the University of Notre Dame
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Pete Thamel
The trajectory of major college sports is set to bend this week to give athletes a significantly larger portion of the billions of dollars they help generate for their schools.
The industry’s top leaders will gather in the next few days to vote on the proposed terms of a landmark settlement. The deal would create a new framework for schools to share millions of dollars with their athletes in the future and create a fund of more than $2.7 billion to pay former athletes for past damages.
The settlement would also mark the end of at least three major federal antitrust lawsuits looming as existential threats to the NCAA and its schools, and would resolve the most pressing — and arguably most formidable — legal challenges facing the college sports industry. The deal would not, however, solve all of the NCAA’s problems or even provide clear answers to many crucial questions about how a more professionalized version of major college sports might look in the near future.
Here are some of the details and unsolved questions shaping conversations during what could be a monumental week in the history of college sports.
Terms of the settlement
While several important details are not yet finalized, sources have confirmed the following general structure of an agreement to settle the House v. NCAA case:
The NCAA’s national office would foot the bill for a $2.7 billion payment for past damages over the course of the next 10 years. The NCAA would generate the majority of that money partly by cutting back on the funds that it distributes to Division I schools on an annual basis.
The power conferences would agree to a forward-looking revenue sharing structure that would give schools the ability to spend a maximum of roughly $20 million per year on direct payments to athletes. The $20 million figure could grow larger every few years if school revenue grows. Each school would be left to decide how to allocate that money while remaining compliant with Title IX laws.
The plaintiffs, which could include all current Division I athletes, would give up their right to file future antitrust claims against the NCAA’s rules. This would include dropping two pending antitrust cases (Hubbard v. NCAA and Carter v. NCAA) that also have been filed by plaintiff attorneys Steve Berman and Jeffrey Kessler.
The sides would also agree to renew the class on an annual basis to include new athletes. New athletes — mostly incoming freshmen — would have to declare that they are opting out of the class in order to challenge the NCAA’s restrictions on payments in the future.
This rolling new class of athletes would, in effect, retire the most impactful tool that has been used over the past decade to chip away at the NCAA’s amateurism rules. Previously, Berman and Kessler needed only one athlete to lend his or her name to a case that would aim to remove illegal restrictions for all college athletes. Moving forward, a lawyer pushing to provide more benefits for athletes will first have to organize and gain commitments from a large group of players who opted out of the settlement.
Athletic and university administrators have long argued that their athletes are generally happy with what the schools provide and that the last decade’s lawsuits are the product of agitating lawyers and advocates. A settlement would not close the door on bargaining with athletes in the future, but it would make it less appealing for attorneys to test the legality of the NCAA’s rules without an explicit demand from a large swath of athletes.
While individual athletes could still opt out and sue the NCAA, the damages for a single athlete or small group of athletes would be far smaller. So, in practice, the House case settlement would provide schools with protection from future suits by removing the financial incentives that make these cases — which often takes years to fight — worthwhile for a plaintiffs’ attorney.
Class action cases have been an important tool to date for plaintiff attorneys because organizing college athletes — a busy and transient group of young people — is extremely difficult. (Although there are a number of groups actively attempting to form college players’ associations.) Some sports antitrust experts, such as Baruch College law professor Marc Edelman, say that, by making future class action lawsuits more difficult, this settlement would give schools ample license to collude on restricting payment to players. Edelman said this conflict could give a judge pause when deciding to approve the terms of the settlement.
Who’s in?
Attorneys representing the plaintiff class of all Division I athletes proposed terms to all defendants involved in the lawsuit in late April. To settle the case fully, the NCAA and each of the five power conferences will have to agree to the terms. Leaders from each group are expected to hold votes by Thursday.
The NCAA’s Board of Governors is scheduled to meet Wednesday.
The Big Ten presidents are planning to meet in person and vote this week as part of the league’s regularly scheduled meetings. That league has long been considered the major conference with the least amount of pushback on the vote. ACC presidents, SEC leaders and Big 12 leaders will also vote this week. In an odd twist, the Pac-12’s membership from this past season will gather virtually to vote, as the 10 departing programs will not vote in the conferences they plan to join next year. Since the Pac-12 was part of the suit as a 12-team league, the 12 presidents and chancellors of those schools will vote as a 12-school unit.
While the NCAA and conferences have to opt in, any athletes involved in the class will have an opportunity to opt out once the attorneys hammer out the details of settlement terms. Any athletes who opt out would retain the right to sue the NCAA in the future, but they would miss out on their cut of the $2.7 billion in damages. On the flip side, it’s unlikely that a current athlete who opts out would give up the opportunity to receive the forward-looking revenue share money, according to legal sources.
Next steps
If all parties agree to the broader terms of a settlement of the House case this week, their attorneys will get to work drafting the fine print of an agreement. That process can take weeks, according to attorneys with experience settling complex antitrust cases.
The judge overseeing the case, Judge Claudia Wilken of California’s Northern District, would then hold a preliminary hearing to review the terms of the settlement. If the judge approves, notice would be sent to all athletes providing them with a chance to formally object or opt out. And finally, the agreement would go back to the courthouse where Wilken would consider any arguments presented in objection before deciding whether the settlement meets her approval.
The Fontenot Case
Alex Fontenot is a former Colorado football player who sued the NCAA in late November for restricting athletes from sharing in television rights revenue. He filed his case a few weeks before Berman and Kessler (the two attorneys representing athletes in the current settlement negotiations) filed a similar complaint called Carter v. NCAA.
Both Kessler and the NCAA have argued that the two complaints are similar and should be consolidated into a single case, which would likely lead to the Fontenot case being part of the pending settlement talks. Fontenot’s attorneys do not want to consolidate and will present their argument for why the cases should be separate in a Colorado courtroom this Thursday.
Garrett Broshuis, Fontenot’s attorney, said he has concerns about how the House settlement could make it harder for future athletes to fight for more rights. Broshuis, a former pitcher at Missouri, has spent most of the last decade successfully suing Major League Baseball to help minor leaguers negotiate better working conditions.
The judge in the Fontenot case has not yet made a ruling on whether it should qualify as a class action lawsuit. If the House settlement is finalized, any college athlete would have to opt out of the settlement in order to take part in the Fontenot case. Opt-outs or objections raised during the House settlement hearings could give Judge Wilken additional pause in approving its terms.
Would Fontenot and other athletes who are working with his attorneys on this case opt out of the House settlement in hopes of pursuing a better deal in their own case?
“To the extent we can, we’re monitoring the media reports surrounding the proposed settlement,” Broshuis told ESPN this weekend. “Once the actual terms are available, we’ll closely scrutinize them. We do have concerns about what’s being reported so far, especially when it comes to the ability for future generations of athletes to continue to fight for their rights.”
Scholarship and roster limits
In the sprint to settle, there’s a bevy of details that are going to be left to college sports leaders to work out in coming months.
The inclusion of roster caps could impact college sports on the field. Right now, college sports operate with scholarship limits. For example, Division I football is limited to 85 scholarships, baseball to 11.7, and softball to 12. Meanwhile, Division I football rosters run to nearly 140 players on the high end, while baseball rosters top out around 40 players, and softball averages about 25 players.
Leaders in college sports are considering uniform roster caps instead of scholarship limits, which could be viewed as another collusive restraint on spending. This would give schools the choice to give out 20 baseball scholarships, for example, if they wished.
If rosters are capped at a certain number, the ripple effect could be more scholarships and smaller roster sizes. The viability of walk-ons, especially for rosters with dozens of them, could be at risk.
Sources caution that this won’t be determined for months, as formalizing roster caps are not part of the settlement. Sources have told ESPN that football coaches in particular will be vocal about radical changes, as walk-ons are part of the fabric of the sport. Stetson Bennett (Georgia), Baker Mayfield (Oklahoma) and Hunter Renfrow (Clemson) are all recent examples of transformative walk-ons.
The future of collectives
Multiple sources have told ESPN that some school leaders are hopeful the future revenue sharing model will eliminate or significantly decrease the role that NIL collectives play in the marketplace for athletes.
While an additional $20 million flowing directly from schools to athletes could theoretically satisfy the competitive market for talent and decrease the interest of major donors from contributing to collectives, experts say there is no clear legal mechanism that could be included in a settlement that would eliminate collectives. Those groups — which are independent from schools even if they often operate in a hand-in-glove fashion — could continue to use NIL opportunities to give their schools an edge in recruiting by adding money on top of the revenue share that an athlete might get from his or her school.
For the schools with the deepest pockets or most competitive donors, a $20 million estimated revenue share would be in reality more of a floor than a ceiling for athlete compensation. Most well-established collectives are planning to continue operating outside of their school’s control, according to Russell White, the president of TCA, a trade association of more than 30 different collectives associated with power conference schools.
“It just makes $20 million the new baseline,” White told ESPN. “Their hope is that this tamps down donor fatigue and boosters feel like they won’t have to contribute [to collectives]. But these groups like to win. There’s no chance this will turn off those competitive juices.”
How would the damages money be distributed?
Any athlete who played a Division I sport from 2016 through present day has a claim to some of the roughly $2.7 billion in settlement money. The plaintiffs’ attorneys will also receive a significant portion of the money. The damages represent money athletes might have made through NIL deals if the NCAA’s rules had not restricted them in the past.
It’s not clear if the plaintiffs will disburse the money equally among the whole class or assign different values based on an athlete’s probable earning power during his or her career. Some class action settlements hire specialists to determine each class member’s relative value and how much of the overall payment they should receive. That could be a painfully detailed process in this case, which includes tens of thousands of athletes in the class.
The NCAA also plans to pay that money over the course of the next 10 years, according to sources. It’s not clear if every athlete in the class would get an annual check for the next decade or if each athlete would be paid in one lump sum with some of them waiting years longer than others to receive their cut.
Are there any roadblocks to settlement expected?
In short, the NCAA’s schools and conferences will likely move forward with the agreement this week despite unhappiness in how the NCAA will withhold the revenue from schools to pay the $2.7 billion over the next decade.
There is significant pushback among leagues outside the power leagues on the proposed payment structure. According to a memo the NCAA sent to all 32 Division I conferences this week, the NCAA will use more than $1 billion from reserves, catastrophic insurance, new revenue and budget cuts to help pay the damages, sources told ESPN this week. The memo also states that an additional $1.6 billion would come from reductions in NCAA distributions, 60 percent of which would come from the 27 Division I conferences outside of the so-called power five football leagues. The other 40 percent would come from cuts the power conferences, which are the named defendants with the NCAA in the case.
The basketball-centric Big East is slated to sacrifice between $5.4 million and $6.6 million annually over the next decade, and the similarly basketball-centric West Coast Conference between $3.5 million and $4.3 million annually, according to a source familiar with the memo. The smallest leagues would lose out on just under $2 million annually, which is nearly 20% of what they receive annually from the NCAA.
(The NCAA would withhold money from six funds across Division I leagues — the basketball performance fund via the NCAA tournament, grants-in-aid, the academic enhancement fund, sports sponsorships, conference grants and the academic performance fund.)
In an e-mail obtained by ESPN from Big East commissioner Val Ackerman to her athletic directors and presidents on Saturday morning, she said the Big East has “strong objections” to the damages framework. She wrote that she’s relayed those to NCAA president Charlie Baker.
The 22 conferences that don’t have FBS football — known as the CCA22 — have also been engaged in conversations about their disappointment with the damages proposal, according to sources.
Per a source, some members of the CCA22 are planning on sending a letter to the NCAA requesting the responsibility be flipped — the power conferences contributing to 60 percent of the damages and the other 27 leagues contributing 40 percent. In her message, Ackerman wrote she expects former FBS football players will be “the primary beneficiaries of the NIL ‘back pay’ amounts” — suggesting that the damages may not be shared equally among athletes.
Ackerman’s letter does mention the widely held belief in the industry that it may be tough for any significant change: “At this stage, it is unclear how much time or leverage we will have to alter the plan the NCAA and [power conferences] have orchestrated.”
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Adam Rittenberg, ESPN Senior Writer
Former NFL coach Jack Del Rio, the senior adviser to Wisconsin head coach Luke Fickell, was arrested early Friday for operating a vehicle while intoxicated following a crash in Madison, Wisconsin.
Del Rio, 61, was arrested shortly after midnight Friday after a vehicle he was driving hit a street sign, broke a fence and came to a rest in a yard, according to a Madison Police incident report. Officers were dispatched to the scene, located west of campus and Camp Randall Stadium, at 12:35 a.m.
Witnesses directed the officers to the driver, who was walking away from the area, according to the incident report. No injuries were reported.
Del Rio “showed signs of impairment” and admitted to driving the vehicle. He was arrested for first-time OWI and released.
“Wisconsin Athletics is aware of the incident involving football staff member Jack Del Rio,” the school said in a statement. “We take matters like this very seriously and we are continuing to gather information.”
The former Jaguars and Raiders head coach joined Fickell’s staff at Wisconsin in August. Del Rio had previously served as Commanders‘ defensive coordinator and had held coordinator roles with Carolina and Denver.
Del Rio played linebacker with four NFL teams before embarking on a coaching career entirely spent at the pro level until he came to Wisconsin.
The Badgers are coming off a bye week heading into Saturday’s showdown at home against No. 1 Oregon.
With Week 11 coming to an end, we look back at key takeaways from exciting victories, surprising losses and teams making a late surge toward the College Football Playoff.
No. 16 Ole Miss pulled off an exhilarating win at home over No. 3 Georgia. With Georgia now suffering two conference losses on the season, how could this week’s loss affect its potential CFP ranking?
With a little more than a month left of the regular season, Army and Colorado are making late pushes toward title games and a possible spot in the 12-team CFP field. What does each team need to do to gain one of those spots?
Our college football experts break down key storylines and takeaways from Week 11.
Head-to-head results matter to the CFP selection committee … sometimes
Ole Miss just beat Georgia in a critical game that boosted the two-loss Rebels’ playoff hopes, but it’s not a guarantee that Ole Miss will be ranked ahead of Georgia in their second ranking on Tuesday. The committee will compare Georgia’s best wins — against Texas and Clemson — with Ole Miss’ wins against South Carolina and Georgia. They will also look at the Rebels’ home loss to Kentucky, and the overtime loss to LSU — which just got smacked by Bama.
The FCS win against Furman will also stand out in the room. In what is still a very subjective system, the head-to-head win against Georgia could mean more to one committee member than it does another. Will they drop their No. 3 team behind two two-loss teams? It depends on whom you ask. — Heather Dinich
Is it better to be the deep SEC or the top-heavy Big Ten with CFP selections?
After Week 11, the SEC marketing brain trust is undoubtedly working on a modified message: It just means more to go 10-2. The league amazingly has seven teams with one or two losses, including Missouri, which pulled off another bewildering win that left coach Eliah Drinkwitz stumping for CFP consideration. Two blowout losses for the Tigers are likely disqualifying, but the SEC undoubtedly will push them and its other two-loss contenders. Ole Miss and Alabama are in that group after very impressive wins over now-eliminated LSU and still-very-much-alive Georgia, which can bring Tennessee into the two-loss cohort this coming week.
If Georgia beats Tennessee in Athens, Texas A&M beats Texas in College Station and every other team wins its other games, the SEC still could have seven two-loss teams at the end of the regular season. Good luck sorting all of them out for CFP selection.
Things are much cleaner in the Big Ten, which is arguably more top-heavy than ever. Two undefeated teams remain, including Indiana, which won its 10th game for the first time in team history but faced true adversity for the first time this fall. Indiana faces Ohio State on Nov. 23, but the other Big Ten CFP contenders, Oregon and Penn State, do not have a ranked opponent left. After the top four, the Big Ten drops off substantially, as every other team has at least three conference losses. If Indiana falls at Ohio State and everyone else wins out, the Big Ten will be left with three 11-1 teams and Oregon at 12-0.
How will the committee evaluate Ole Miss, Alabama and Georgia against Indiana and Penn State? If Ohio State loses to, say, Indiana, how will the Buckeyes stack up against the SEC’s 10-2 group? I’m sure everyone will be satisfied with what the selection committee decides. — Adam Rittenberg
Bruins continue surprise surge
At Big Ten media days, first-year UCLA head coach DeShaun Foster caused a stir when he stumbled and froze through his opening remarks to begin his news conference. Then, after failing to evoke much confidence in Indianapolis, Foster and the Bruins started 1-5, their only victory coming in a narrow win over Hawai’i.
But since, UCLA under Foster has quietly surged.
Friday night, the Bruins knocked off Iowa 20-17 for their third win in a row. Quarterback Ethan Garbers is up to sixth in the Big Ten in QBR (71.5), with eight touchdowns and only two picks over the past three games.
Suddenly, the Bruins (4-5) are knocking on the door of bowl eligibility in Foster’s debut season. With a win over rival USC in two weeks, they could even finish ahead of the once-ballyhooed Trojans in the Big Ten standings. — Jake Trotter
Ole Miss’ portal overhaul pays off
One year ago, in the moments after a 52-17 beatdown loss to Georgia that knocked Ole Miss out of playoff contention, Lane Kiffin knew what needed to change.
“We’ve gotta recruit at a higher level,” Kiffin told reporters.
He needed to build a team with size and length on par to the SEC’s best, particularly on defense. Closing the gap on Georgia and Alabama required bigger and better. The Rebels were already ahead of the game on transfer recruiting. But going into 2024, they couldn’t afford to miss.
They didn’t. Ole Miss proved an awful lot in its 28-10 rout of Georgia on Saturday, dominating a top-3 opponent with a lineup that included eight starters on offense and nine on defense who came to Oxford via the portal. The toughness of Jaxson Dart and the Ole Miss offense deserves plenty of praise, but coordinator Pete Golding’s turnaround on defense really fueled this win.
Pass rushers Princely Umanmielen, Jared Ivey and Walter Nolen overwhelmed Georgia and were worth every penny. Linebackers TJ Dottery and Chris Paul Jr. combined for 19 tackles and effectively contained the Bulldogs’ rushing attack. John Saunders Jr. grabbed a clutch fourth-quarter interception. All of them transferred to Ole Miss to help this program finally break through and win these season-defining games.
Two early SEC losses cranked up the pressure on this team and has brought out its best. Against Georgia, Kiffin proved he accomplished his mission: Ole Miss finally has the talent, experience and depth it takes to chase a national championship. — Max Olson
Virginia fights on two years after tragedy
There are some days where it hits Virginia coach Tony Elliott more than others, nearly two years after Devin Chandler, Lavel Davis Jr. and D’Sean Perry were shot and killed.
Time has passed, but the pain has not. On Wednesday, the two-year anniversary of their deaths, the university will hold a moment of silence. Anyone with the football program is invited to place flowers at the memorial trees planted in their honor last year. The roster has turned over since the tragedy happened, but there remains a core group of players who lived through the devastation. Elliott has tried to find a way to lead them forward. Because the work in building a football team continues on.
That is why what Virginia has done this season should not go unnoticed. Following a 24-19 upset win over No. 19 Pittsburgh on Saturday night, Virginia (5-4, 3-3) is one win away from bowl eligibility. After winning three games in each of his first two seasons, the Cavaliers have more overall wins and more ACC wins in Year 3.
The schedule has been daunting, with games already against ranked Louisville, Clemson and Pitt and two more to come — at Notre Dame on Saturday, then home to SMU before finishing at rival Virginia Tech.
During an open date before playing Pitt, Elliott refused to talk about the degree of difficulty with the schedule, telling ESPN, “Truth be told, I want to find a way to go win at least two of these games and get these seniors to a bowl game. I’m not going to sell this group short.”
Given what the program has overcome, Elliott said, “Everybody who is a part of the program has embraced what our new normal is. So it’s been a little bit easier just to stay in our rhythm because we don’t constantly have something going on associated with it. We have certain moments in time where we take a pause, and I’ve been intentional by acknowledging it but not being overbearing with it.
“I am day-to-day. There are moments in time where just unprovoked I’ll have my moments where I think about it and it hurts me to my core that something like that happens.”
Virginia has daily reminders when it walks into the facility, as three mannequins dressed in the jersey numbers of Chandler, Davis and Perry greet them, as a lasting tribute in their honor. Elliott and his team have repeatedly said they want to play every game to make them proud. Getting to a bowl this season would be a testament to the work they have collectively done to get the program back in the face of unthinkable circumstances. — Andrea Adelson
Daily returns, powers Army to crucial November win
Army’s Week 11 trip to North Texas marked the most significant remaining hurdle left on the Black Knights’ AAC schedule with a seismic meeting against Notre Dame waiting in Week 13. So it was a good day for Army to get quarterback Bryson Daily back under center.
Sidelined by an undisclosed injury against Air Force in Week 10, Daily returned Saturday and turned a career-high 36 carries into 153 yards and a pair of touchdowns in a 14-3 road victory, extending the nation’s longest active win streak to 13 games. Daily’s 10-yard, first-quarter touchdown run erased the Black Knights’ first deficit of the season. And the senior quarterback was the catalyst for Army’s 21-play, 94-yard scoring drive after halftime, accounting for 12 carries and 51 yards on a game-sealing series that ate up 13:54 of game clock and sucked the life out of a lingering North Texas comeback bid.
For Daily, who trails only Boise State‘s Ashton Jeanty for the nation’s touchdown lead after Week 11, it was another dazzling performance in what has been a dominant season powering an explosive Black Knights offense. With two more touchdowns on Saturday, Daily became the first FBS quarterback to reach 20 rushing scores in a season since Louisville’s Malik Cunningham in 2021. Per ESPN Research, Daily is also the first passer to log 20-plus rushing touchdowns in his team’s first nine games since at least 2000, while his run of six consecutive games with 100-plus rushing yards and multiple rushing scores is tied for the longest streak by an FBS quarterback over the past 20 seasons.
Daily’s return on Saturday and the win that followed not only pencils Army into the AAC title game ahead of the program’s Nov. 30 conference finale with UTSA, but sets up what is likely to amount to a playoff elimination game when the Black Knights meet Notre Dame at Yankee Stadium on Nov. 23. Beat the Irish and close out the AAC Championship, and Army could very well vault past Boise State and into the CFP. And with Daily back in the fold, there’s plenty of reason to believe at West Point. — Eli Lederman
Colorado is ready for its close-up now
The novelty of Deion Sanders, head coach of a Power 5 program hit college football like a tsunami wave last season. The Buffs’ highs and lows were chronicled in detailed fashion resulting in one of the most polarized teams in recent history.
A second year into the Deion era, the eyes of the sport had started to drift away, the wave of attention had subsided and yet Colorado and Sanders have now turned novelty into substance.
The Buffs have won four games in a row — including an impressive 41-27 win over Texas Tech Saturday — turning what felt like a middling season into a potential playoff run. Their defense has improved (they are allowing around 100 fewer yards per game than last season) while the offense has been more productive and efficient in Shedeur Sanders‘ second season under center. Travis Hunter remains otherworldly and the likely best player in the sport.
With three games remaining, Colorado now controls its own destiny. The Buffs play three teams that currently have losing records and they will be favored in every one of those matchups. Make it through those unscathed and a likely meeting with currently undefeated BYU awaits in the Big 12 title game. Win them all and they’re in.
The addition of Sanders to the sport’s tapestry created much hoopla last season. But as the results worsened, it became easy to question the experiment altogether. Now, the attention is fully back and it should be: There’s more here than meets the eye. — Paolo Uggetti
Sports
Trout vs. Harper in October? No Astros title in 2017? What if every World Series was between No. 1 seeds?
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Bradford Doolittle, ESPN Staff Writer
For just the third time since 2012, the teams with each league’s best regular-season record met in the World Series. What if that happened every year?
For decades, that was how Major League Baseball worked. The best players on the best teams went from the top of the standings on the final day of the regular season directly to a yearly opportunity to write the October narrative in the World Series. With every addition to the postseason since it expanded to four teams in 1969, the odds of the best teams being the last two standing have gotten a little longer. The format has controlled the narrative.
The stories we remember about a season are largely driven by the structure that it employs, intentional choices made by the league’s designers about the schedule, the alignment and the playoff field. From 1903 through 1968, there was only one possible way to play in the Fall Classic. Thus, the narratives about a big chunk of baseball history are told through that prism. It’s a prism that hasn’t been applicable very often during the wild-card era.
Today, we’re playing a little what-if. What if the dynamic that was in place for the American League and National League all those years — no playoffs but simply pitting the two first-place teams against each other in the Fall Classic — never changed?
Yes, baseball would have still added teams over time and moved teams into different markets and such, but the World Series would remain the domain of the league’s two pennant winners. Everyone else goes home once the game meter hits 162.
The 2024 Los Angeles Dodgers–New York Yankees showdown reminded us just how big the matchups could feel, and the alternate realities that emerge in these scenarios over recent years are as rich in possibilities, both for the changed regular seasons as well as the World Series. What’s lost is everything that happened between the end of the regular season and the start of the Fall Classic — no wild-card games, no division series, no championship series. That’s a lot of dramatic moments lost to oblivion, which we must bear in mind.
Obviously, the stories we’d remember about each season would be very different, but would they be better or worse? Keeping our focus on the current four-round playoff era, let’s rewrite recent baseball history.
Note: Numbers in parentheses represent league rank by won-lost record, not playoff seed. Where needed, ties were broken based on head-to-head results.
Actual World Series: (3) San Francisco Giants over (7) Detroit Tigers
No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: New York Yankees vs. Washington Nationals
What’s gained: The gains in the regular season would have been considerable. In our alternate AL, the Yankees won the pennant by one game over the Athletics and two over the Orioles and Rangers. The Yankees were four games back of Texas on Labor Day, so it would have been a torrid stretch run that put the Bombers over the top. Going into the last week of the season, six teams would have been mathematically alive, and one of them would have been the real-life pennant winner, Detroit.
The final days of the season would have been epic. The Yankees beat Boston three times in a row to hold on to the flag over the A’s, who won their last six games only to fall short. In doing so, the Athletics nudged aside the Rangers, whom they swept to end the campaign. In the Yankees’ clincher in Game 162, Robinson Cano went 4-for-4 with two homers and six RBIs in a memorable 14-2 drubbing of the Red Sox. By the middle innings, it would have been clear: The Yankees win the pennant!
The NL stretch run would have been almost as dramatic. The Nats edge the Reds by a single game, with the Braves and real-life champion Giants finishing four back. Everyone else would have been eliminated entering the final week. That pennant race would have also been decided on the final day.
The Series would have been a juicy matchup featuring current and soon-to-be superstars. That Yankees team had Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez, Andruw Jones and CC Sabathia, among others, though Mariano Rivera was injured. The Nationals, seeking a franchise-first championship, had two emergent young stars: budding ace Stephen Strasburg and a 19-year-old rookie named Bryce Harper who was playing in his first World Series.
What’s lost: The Giants-Tigers World Series pitted the two eventual MVPs — Buster Posey and Miguel Cabrera — against each other. Bruce Bochy, without the expanded playoffs, would not only lose this title in a classic-format universe — he’d lose all four of the championships he has won.
In the regular season, we would have lost the AL Central race in which Detroit edged the White Sox by three games and led them by just one game with a week to go. We would have also lost a pair of semi-close races for the second wild-card slot in each league.
2013: Red Sox-Cardinals remains
Actual World Series: (1) Boston Red Sox over (1) St. Louis Cardinals
No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Same
What’s gained: Before 2024, this was the last full season that yielded a one-versus-one World Series matchup. So our alternate reality season ends up in the same place. The biggest changes in narrative would have been the September chases in both leagues.
In the AL, only three teams are alive entering the final week, and the focus is on Boston’s one-game lead over Oakland. The Red Sox hang on despite losing two one-run games at Baltimore to finish the season. The Athletics are eliminated in Game 161, losing 7-5 in Seattle thanks to a two-homer, five-RBI outburst from Brad Miller.
Over in the NL, the final week is operatic. Five teams are alive with seven days to go, and they are all within 2½ games of each other — the Braves, Cardinals, Dodgers, Reds and Pirates. The Cardinals were five back of Atlanta on Labor Day but have been coming on strong down the stretch. With no margin for error, the Redbirds win their last six and 10 of their last 12. The clincher comes on the final day with a 4-0 whitewashing of the Cubs.
What’s lost: Cleveland, Texas and Tampa Bay all finished within a game of each other for the two AL wild-card slots. The Rangers and Rays tied for the last spot and in the classic format we would have lost the Rays’ 5-2 victory in a tiebreaker, a victory that featured David Price‘s complete-game win. Also, in the playoffs, we lose Detroit’s five-game win over Oakland in the ALDS. The Tigers won Game 5 behind a gem from Justin Verlander, who went eight two-hit innings with 10 strikeouts.
In the NL races, nothing too dramatic would have gone by the wayside. However, in the classic format, the Pirates would still be stuck in a long postseason drought. When the Pirates earned a wild-card slot in 2013, as they went on to do in 2014 and 2015 as well, they made the playoffs for the first time since 1992. In the classic format, the drought would stretch back to 1991, but the upside is that Pittsburgh owned the NL’s best record in both 1990 and 1991, and thus would have seen a pair of Barry Bonds-led pennant winners in those campaigns.
2014: Mike Trout(!) vs. Bryce Harper
Actual World Series: (5) San Francisco Giants over (4) Kansas City Royals
No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Los Angeles Angels vs. Washington Nationals
What’s gained: Both leagues would have featured uncrowded races in the season’s final days. In the AL, the Angels held a 2½-game edge on the Orioles with a week to go. In the NL, Washington led the Dodgers by the same margin, though the Cardinals were still alive at 4½ games back. The Angels and Nationals both ended up winning by two games, and neither pennant was still up for grabs on the final day.
With pennant race drama somewhat muted in 2014, the focus would have been on the amazing individual matchup in the World Series, which would be remembered as the Mike Trout-Bryce Harper World Series. Trout, 22, won his first MVP that season, though his 2012 and 2013 seasons were even better. In real life, 2014 was his only playoff appearance; but in the classic format, that would have come in the Fall Classic. That particular albatross is one he would have shed long ago.
Harper would be making his second World Series appearance, though 2014 wasn’t his best season. Early injuries and struggles left him with just three homers through the end of July. However, Harper caught fire after that, hitting 10 homers over the last two months, and would have been firing on all cylinders by the time the clash with Trout came to pass. This year’s Aaron Judge–Shohei Ohtani hype would have included something like “the best World Series superstar matchup since Mike Trout and Bryce Harper a decade ago.”
What’s lost: The Royals and Tigers would have been out of the running, their AL Central battle lost. Kansas City, which won the pennant as a wild card, would still be working on a long playoff drought. Its amazing comeback in the epic wild-card game against Oakland would never have happened. And not only would Bochy lose another title, as mentioned, but the Giants would not be a three-time champion in the 2010s. Indeed, they might still be looking for their first San Francisco title. But maybe not — stay tuned.
2015: An in-state Fall Classic
Actual World Series: (1) Kansas City Royals over (5) New York Mets
No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Royals vs. St. Louis Cardinals
What’s gained: For 2015, we have to begin with that World Series matchup. Thirty years after the first I-70 Series, the Cardinals get a chance for revenge. St. Louis skipper Mike Matheny would have been managing in the Series against the team he eventually managed. But you have to wonder: Matheny only managed St. Louis for two more full seasons after 2015. If he had led the Cardinals to another World Series (in addition to 2013), would it have been longer?
In the AL pennant race, four teams were alive entering the last week, with the Royals and Blue Jays tied for the lead. They were still tied entering the final weekend, on which Toronto lost two straight at Tampa Bay. The Royals grabbed the lead on the second-to-last day, beating Minnesota behind a gem from Yordano Ventura. Meanwhile, the Jays lose a gut puncher on a two-out, two-run game-winning single by the Rays’ Tim Beckham against Toronto closer Roberto Osuna. Kansas City wraps it on the final day, beating Minnesota again to finish the season with a five-game winning streak.
The 100-win Cardinals cruise to the NL pennant despite being shut out in their last three games during a sweep in Atlanta. St. Louis had the NL wrapped up before that series began but, obviously, the Cardinals would not have entered the Fall Classic matchup against the red-hot Royals on a good note. The Cubs and Pirates faded, but they were both within striking distance of the Cardinals going into the last week.
What’s lost: The rise of the Cubs would have been a hot story in any context. But in real life, Chicago earned a wild-card spot and advanced to the NLCS, losing to another hot story in the pitching-rich Mets. The Matt Harvey phenomenon? Much less muted on a fifth-place team out of the running by the middle of September.
There would have been a lot of good playoff baseball lost. The Mets beating the Dodgers in a five-game NLDS, with Jacob deGrom shining in the clincher. The Royals’ come-from-behind ALDS win over Houston, gone. Kansas City’s dramatic six-game ALCS win over Toronto, poof.
We also would have lost a seminal what-if: Had the Mets not made the playoffs, then Harvey would not have been on the mound in the ninth inning of the last game of the World Series. Would his career have turned out differently had that never happened?
2016: The Cubs vs. … ?
Actual World Series: (1) Chicago Cubs over (2) Cleveland
No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Cubs vs. TBD (Cleveland or Texas Rangers)
What’s gained: A crowded AL pennant race would have gone to overtime. As of Labor Day, six teams would have been in the running, all within 6½ games. By the time we hit the final week, that number was down to four, with the Red Sox and Rangers tied for the lead, 1½ games ahead of Cleveland, and the Blue Jays clinging to hope, down 5½ games.
With the pennant race reaching its crescendo, Cleveland ran into bad weather in Detroit. Their game on Thursday, Sept. 29, is washed out and can’t be made up until the day after the regular season. This happened in real life. Texas finished a half-game ahead of Cleveland for the AL’s top seed, but since the Rangers owned the rulebook tiebreaker, and tiebreaker games aren’t played just to determine a seed, the makeup game was never played.
However, in the classic format, it would have been. Had Cleveland won that makeup game in Detroit, it would then have played the Rangers in a tiebreaker for the AL pennant. Thus we might have gotten our Cubs-Indians World Series after all — and arguably in a much more dramatic fashion. Meanwhile, the Red Sox missed a chance to really muddle the end-of-season waters by losing two straight one-run games at Fenway Park against Toronto to finish the campaign.
As for those Cubs, they pretty much made a shambles of the NL, so there was zero pennant-race drama down the stretch.
What’s lost: Once again, dramatic wild-card races drew our eyeballs as the season wound down. As with all seasons like this, where the wild-card races are the closest ones, our attention drifts to the middle of the standings. The Mets and Giants edged St. Louis by one game for two NL slots, while Baltimore and Toronto held off Detroit and Seattle in the AL. There weren’t any division races with even a semblance of drama in 2016, so all the down-the-stretch attention was fixed on the wild cards. This would not have been the case in the classic format.
As for the playoffs, we had just one series go the distance. That was in the NLDS, where the Dodgers eked past the Nationals, winning Game 5 4-3. That was the game where Kenley Jansen threw 2⅓ scoreless relief frames and Clayton Kershaw got the last two outs for what remains his only career save.
The real drama was the 2016 World Series — which we might well have gotten in any format.
2017: Sign-stealing Astros lose their crown
Actual World Series: (2) Houston Astros over (1) Los Angeles Dodgers
No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Cleveland vs. Dodgers
What’s gained: Who knows what would have become of the Astros’ sign-stealing scandal, but we can at least say this: After losing an epic pennant race against Cleveland, Houston would not have had the chance to win a tainted championship. Instead, Cleveland would have gotten perhaps its second straight shot at ending its title drought.
The AL race would have largely been a two-team battle between Cleveland and Houston, but it would have been an all-timer. On Labor Day, the unofficial start of the stretch run, Houston led by three games, but Cleveland was in the midst of its 20-game winning streak, ending up going an incredible 33-4 to finish the season.
Still, Houston was also hot, as the Astros went 14-3 to end the season. With both teams losing their second-to-last games, it would have come down to the final day, with Cleveland holding a one-game edge. Cleveland beat Chicago 3-1 to clinch, riding a solid start from Josh Tomlin and 3⅔ scoreless innings from the backbone of that team, its bullpen. Final standings: Cleveland 102-60, Houston 101-61.
The NL was down to a two-team race between the Dodgers and Nationals by Labor Day, but L.A. pulled away from there, cruising to a pennant and into a rematch of the 1920 World Series.
What’s lost: Frankly, not much. The Red Sox and Yankees went to the wire in the AL East, though both made the postseason. Neither would have joined the Cleveland-Houston derby in a classic format. The race for the NL’s second-wild card came down to the finish, with the Rockies edging the Brewers by a game.
The playoffs in 2017 featured a lot of close, tense matchups, so losing those would be tough. The Yankees overcame a 2-0 deficit to beat Cleveland in five, then dropped a classic seven-game series to Houston in the ALCS. The Cubs beat the Nationals in a five-game NLDS series, winning the finale 9-8.
Mostly though, we never would have gotten that Astros-Dodgers World Series. Whether or not you consider that a loss depends on how jaded you feel about it, given the Houston scandal. But at the time, that seven-game classic was one of the better Fall Classics in quite awhile.
2018: An MVP matchup on the biggest stage
Actual World Series: (1) Boston Red Sox over (3) Los Angeles Dodgers
No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Red Sox vs. Milwaukee Brewers
What’s gained: Well, first of all you have the Brewers’ first NL pennant, their only other World Series appearance coming when they were still in the AL. With a pennant comes the chance at a championship, so perhaps the Brewers would no longer be one of the five franchises without one.
More certain is that the Brewers would have earned that shot by winning a tremendous NL pennant race in which they overcame their bitter rivals to the south, the Cubs. Chicago and Milwaukee played in a tiebreaker for the NL Central title in 2018, but in the classic format, that would have been a winner-take-all game for a berth in the World Series.
The race would have been about more than those two teams. Going into the last week, six NL clubs would have been alive, with the Cubs leading the pack, 2½ games up on Milwaukee. Chicago didn’t collapse but instead the Brewers caught fire, winning their last seven to get into that tiebreaker which, of course, they won.
The Red Sox ran away with the AL pennant but perhaps the lack of drama on that side would have been outweighed by a World Series matchup that featured the two eventual MVPs in Mookie Betts and Christian Yelich.
What’s lost: To say the Red Sox ran away with the AL in the classic format is true — going into the last week, the Astros — at 6½ games back — were the only other contender still mathematically alive. But the Yankees and Astros joined the Red Sox as 100-game winners in 2018 and neither would have made the playoffs in a one-seed-only scenario. Still, Boston lost just two games in rolling over both teams on the way to the Series.
In the NL, we would have lost a second tiebreaker game, as the Dodgers had to beat the Rockies to determine the NL West champion. We also would have lost the outstanding, seven-game NLCS in which the Dodgers beat Milwaukee.
2019: Now we get our Astros-Dodgers showdown
Actual World Series: (4) Washington Nationals over (1) Houston Astros
No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Astros vs. Los Angeles Dodgers
What’s gained: While the classic format would have prevented the 2017 Astros-Dodgers pairing, we would have gotten it here, and it would have been a clash between teams that combined to win 213 games. Again, we can’t know how this matchup might have been colored by the Houston scandal, which didn’t break until after this World Series. But at least the matchup itself would have been untainted.
The Dodgers and Braves are the only serious NL contenders, and even that race would die out by the last week as L.A. pulled away. The real story would have been on the AL side.
The AL featured three 100-win teams in 2019, the Astros, Yankees and Twins. The pennant race boiled down to those three by Labor Day, when the Yankees and Astros were tied, with Minnesota four games back. By the final week, the Twins were barely alive at six games behind, but the Yankees were just a half-game back of Houston, both teams with 102 wins.
That set up an intense conclusion but, alas, the Yankees faded in the final days, losing four of five at Tampa Bay and Texas. Houston won six of its last seven contests, and 12 of its last 14, to seize the crown — its first during the period covered in our revised history.
What’s lost: The Cardinals finished two games up on Milwaukee to win the AL Central, though the Brewers still got in as a wild card. Neither would have been in the running in a revised format. Milwaukee had to fend off the Mets, Diamondbacks and Cubs for that second wild-card slot.
The eventual champion Nationals, the top NL wild card, would never have sniffed the postseason in the classic format. Whether or not this means the Expos/Nationals franchise was still seeking its first title depends on how our alternate-history 2012 and 2014 World Series came out, as Washington would have represented the NL in both of them.
2020: Dodgers-Rays remains
Actual World Series: (1) Los Angeles Dodgers over (1) Tampa Bay Rays
No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Same
Look, we all know there is a lot we’d change about 2020 if we could, in baseball and beyond. Insofar that the 2020 MLB season can be redeemed, it is arguably redeemed because despite a 16-team bracket, the best teams actually ended up in the World Series, and the clear best team that year — the Dodgers — won it. Beyond that, there’s not much to be gleaned about that season.
2021: Do Giants finally win their first title in San Francisco?
Actual World Series: (5) Atlanta Braves over (3) Houston Astros
No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Tampa Bay Rays vs. San Francisco Giants
What’s gained: Here’s a Giants pennant gained via the classic format but, alas, it’s too late for Bochy, as this was Gabe Kapler’s club. The Rays win their second straight AL pennant, giving them another shot at exiting the zero-titles club.
Starting with the AL, the Rays would have had this well in hand by the middle of September. The Astros, Yankees, Red Sox and White Sox — the other teams that made the real-life AL playoffs in 2021 — all were within hailing distance of the Rays, but it wasn’t that close. Tampa Bay ended up five games better than Houston atop the AL.
In the actual NL that season, the Giants and Dodgers staged a memorable battle to win the NL West, with San Francisco (107) winning by a single game over L.A., making the Dodgers one of the best-ever second-place teams. That still would have been the case in the classic format but the stakes would have been higher — first place, or nothing. The teams’ last head-to-head game that year was Sept. 5, which would have seemed like a tremendous lost opportunity at the time. At 4½ games back on Labor Day, the Brewers had hopes of joining this sprint but soon faded.
This might have been a World Series in pursuit of firsts — the Rays trying to secure the franchise’s first title; the Giants perhaps trying to win their first championship since moving to San Francisco. Don’t forget — their 2010, 2012 and 2014 titles never happened.
However, the Giants also finished with the NL’s best record in 2000, so that would have been another shot at winning it. It also would have been Bonds’ third Fall Classic, after his two alternate-history pennants in Pittsburgh.
What’s lost: Braves history would look a lot different in the classic format. They’d lose this title, which means Freddie Freeman would have just won his first ring — with the Dodgers. However, get this: Atlanta finished with the NL’s best record nine times in 12 years between 1992 and 2003. They actually won four pennants (and one title) during that span, but it could have been so much more.
The only playoff series that went five games was the Dodgers’ NLDS win over the Giants. But if we’d have had that long, head-to-head scramble between them for the NL pennant, we wouldn’t have needed that.
2022: Astros-Dodgers II
Actual World Series: (1) Houston Astros over (6) Philadelphia Phillies
No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Astros vs. Los Angeles Dodgers
What’s gained: A long time to analyze the pending Astros-Dodgers rematch from alternate 2019. The teams won 217 games between them this time, and both enjoyed sizable leads in their respective leagues over the final weeks of the campaign.
What’s lost: The first six-seed in a World Series, for one. The first five-versus-six seed LCS as well — the Phillies and the Padres. The Mets and Braves tied for the NL East title with 101 wins — no tiebreaker games in the new format, a shame — and rather than moving into the bracket, they both would have finished 10 games back of the Dodgers. The down-the-stretch fixation on the race for the NL’s third wild card — Philly beat the Brewers by a single game — would have been lost.
2023: Ronald Acuna Jr. starts 40/70 club, meets O’s in October
Actual World Series: (4) Texas Rangers over (6) Arizona Diamondbacks
No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Baltimore Orioles vs. Atlanta Braves
What’s gained: A great World Series pairing. The Braves, riding Ronald Acuna Jr.’s historic season, and the title-starved Orioles, with young stars Adley Rutschman and Gunnar Henderson, among others. Both teams won over 100 games during the regular season.
Both leagues would have featured two-team races. The Orioles and Rays duke it out into the final week, though Baltimore wraps things up with a couple of days to go. The Braves and Dodgers go toe-to-toe in the NL, but Atlanta is able to keep L.A. at arm’s length down the stretch.
What’s lost: The Rangers’ first title would never have happened, as neither World Series entrant would have sniffed the postseason. The three-team race in the AL West, the one in which Seattle was left without a playoff slot, would have not happened. The seven-game ALCS in which both the Rangers and Astros went perfect on the road would not be a thing. Arizona’s seven-game NLCS win over the Phillies would also be gone, so we’d have lost two winner-take-all pennant clinchers.
2024: The East Coast-West Coast showdown we just saw
Actual World Series: (1) Los Angeles Dodgers over (1) New York Yankees
No. 1 vs. No. 1 matchup: Same
What’s gained: Sometimes, even the format can’t get in the way. Although, this is a season in which the alternate-reality regular season is greatly enhanced by the classic format.
The only down-the stretch dramas we had involved teams that won 80-something games. The Royals, Tigers and Mariners comprised one of those races, all for two of the three AL wild-card slots. The Mariners also had a shot at the AL West crown, won by the 88-win Astros. The NL was the same story, with the Diamondbacks left out of an NL wild-card spot in the three-team derby with the Mets and Braves.
In the classic format, there would have been six AL teams within 5½ games of the lead on Labor Day, while the NL would have had five teams within six. It would have made for an awfully fun September. By the last week, we would have been down to two in the AL (Yankees by 2½ over the Guardians) and four in the NL (all within four games).
Entering the final weekend, we would have had the Yankees with a one-game edge over Cleveland, and the Dodgers one game up on the Phillies.
What’s lost: A very good postseason, including the Mets’ run, the Royals and Tigers advancing to the ALDS, the great Dodgers-Padres NLDS — all of it, vanished. And it does feel like a loss, but how much of that is because, as fun as the journey might have been, we still ended up with the matchup so many wanted in the first place?
We also wouldn’t have gotten that epic day-after-the-season, on which the Mets and Braves played their memorable makeup doubleheader, giving Francisco Lindor the platform for his clinching homer that is one of the signature moments of his career.
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