New FHSAA Baseball Playoff Format Brings Mixed Reviews

The FHSAA has spent the past several years completely revamping the high school baseball landscape here in Florida. First, they added a couple classifications. Then they went to a rankings based postseason system, and now they have gone full throttle towards ensuring the best teams end up in Fort Myers.

Coaches at some of the most competitive programs in the state have been lobbying the FHSAA for years to expand the playoffs to include two-out-of-three formats in regional play. This year, the group also attempted to expand the regular season to 28 games.

After all of the posturing and lobbying, coaches ended up with half of what they were seeking.

This week, plans were approved that will bring two-out-of-three playoff series’ to the regional quarterfinals, semifinals, and finals. The 28 games were denied for the upcoming season, leaving the teams 25 allowed regular season games.

The reactions to the system changes have been broad, with opinions mostly falling along tier lines. The schools that have built traditionally deeper programs, are in favor of the new format. Schools that have seen their programs raided in recent years by the top programs, believe the gap has grown wider, and the chances of them making a magical run to the State Final Four, have diminished.

As someone who is in constant contact with coaches from all tiers, I will try to outline each of their stances, along with some insight of my own.

The traditional power teams like the new format, because it strongly lessens the chance that their teams have a bad day, and get knocked out of regionals to what would be considered a lesser opponent. Logic says that the teams with the deeper pitching staffs would be much better positioned to win a two-out-of-three series.

Teams that are in the middle of the pack, or are attempting to rebuild their programs are against the new format. In past years, these teams traditionally have one or two top players, which coupled with a group of players that buy into a system, made for some stunning and exciting regional upsets.

So where do I stand?

As someone who strives to help all programs reach new heights, and tries to spotlight all programs, I am torn between my responsibilities to the baseball community, and my desire to see the best baseball being played at the state tournament.

Too often over the past decade, teams have rode one star pitcher to the state tournament. Once there, the team usually has a strong showing in the state semifinal. The issue is once the state final came around, these teams have not had the depth to compete, and the result has been some blowout state title games. So the baseball fan in me, tells me we will get much more exciting baseball in the state Final Four.

The other part of me, however, has to acknowledge that some of the best stories we have written, or games we have covered, have come from regional games where an underdog team upsets a favored powerhouse program. There is little denying the excitement surrounding those games, and the lifetime of memories that have been created by the student-athletes and players who were part of those upsets.

The obvious debate is over the two-out-of-three format and what it does for playoff success. But I think there are some bigger underlying issues that could be in play.

First off, by moving to the two-out-of-three format, the season schedule for the regular season had to be compressed. That means more teams will be forced to play three game weeks to get their 25 games in. For the majority of programs, pitching and healthy arms is a problem for three games in a week. So that may lower the level of play we see during the regular season.

Secondly, and the bigger factor, is one that has rarely been talked about. Recruiting is rampant these days. When we started HSBN 14 years ago, we processed on average, 10-15 transfer players a year. The past five seasons, that number has increased substantially in each year. With 2024 seeing over 300 transfer players in Palm Beach, Broward, and Miami-Dade alone.

How does the new system affect this? Well, knowing that it will take four to six quality arms to make a state title run, the pressure will be on the big time programs to produce these arms. And the only place those arms can come from, are teams that are clinging to their one or two top arms each year.

We had already entered a time of top-heavy programs, with not much being done to keep student-athletes at their home schools, and my fear is that will move further in that direction.

How it will play out, nobody knows. One thing the FHSAA must get credit for is, they are always open to altering their formats in search of a better system. Sometimes they get it right, and sometimes it goes wrong.

The one thing I have been telling the dozens of coaches, parents, fans, and players that have been calling me is, give it time. Don’t rush to judgement and create a strong opinion.

Keep an open mind, and see how the system plays out before saying how great or terrible it is.

At the end of the day, its still all about playing the game. And rule changes like this shouldn’t take away from the excitement of another season being just around the corner.

***Check back tomorrow for reactions from coaches around South Florida to the new system changes***

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