The World Series is the championship series of Major League Baseball and the culmination of the sport's postseason each October. Since the Series takes place in mid-autumn, sportswriters many years ago dubbed the event the "Fall Classic". The St. Louis Cardinals are the current (2006) World Series champions.
The World Series is played between the winners of the American League and National League, which currently includes 30 clubs based in certain U.S. and Canadian cities. The modern World Series has been an annual event since 1903, with the exceptions of 1904 and 1994. Baseball has employed various championship formulas since the 1860s. When the term "World Series" is used by itself, it is usually understood to refer to the "modern" World Series exclusively.
The World Series championship is determined through a best-of-seven playoff. Best-of-seven has been the format of all the modern World Series except in 1903, 1919, 1920 and 1921 when the winner was determined through a best-of-nine playoff. The Series winner is awarded the World Series Trophy, as well as individual World Series rings.
The New York Yankees have played in 39 of the 102 Series up to and including 2003 and have won 26 World Series championships, which is far more than any other Major League franchise. The St. Louis Cardinals have won ten championships, which is the second most all time and the most for any National League team. The Cardinals also hold a 3 Series to 2 edge against the Yankees in Series play, the only one of the "classic eight" National League teams to lead the Yankees overall.
The first modern World Series was held between Boston of the American League and Pittsburgh of the National League in 1903. Boston won the series 5 games to 3, helping to establish the new league's credibility. However, the next year, the National League champion New York Giants refused to play the American League champions (Boston again) because of the alleged "inferiority" of the American League, along with the legitimate claim that there were no formal or standard rules for this championship (a factor which had helped kill the 1880s version of the Series). In response, the World Series was instituted in 1905 as a permanent institution, through which the leagues would "meet annually in a series of games for the Professional Base Ball Championship of the World.
Until 1969, teams reached the Fall Classic merely by having the best records in their respective leagues. If two teams were tied for the best record at the end of the scheduled season, the winner of a head-to-head "pennant playoff" game between the two teams was declared winner of the "pennant" (league championship), and thus represented the league in the Series.
The reorganization of each league into two divisions for the 1969 season changed the road to the Series. The winners of the East and West divisions of each league would meet in a best-of-five (later best-of-seven) League Championship Series to determine the winner of the pennant. The split into two divisions was partially based on the premise that there were too many teams in the league to have one division ("you can't sell a twelfth place team"[citation needed]). It also ensured more "pennant races" to generate more regular-season attendance, along with more post-season revenue.
A further change occurred in 1994 with the expansion of the Major Leagues and the establishment of the Central Divisions. This created an odd number of teams in each league's playoff tournament, so a fourth playoff team was added. It was called the "wildcard", patterned after the National Football League's playoff system of including the best non-divisional winner (by win-loss record) in the playoffs. This created additional regular-season races as well as further augmenting post-season income. It also had the inevitable effect of playing the game's prime event in the latter part of October, with weather often much colder and harsher than in the early part of the month, especially in the Midwest and Northeast.
Under the current format, normally the division-winner with the highest winning percentage in the league faces the wildcard in the best-of-five first round, or Division Series, and the two remaining teams face each other in the first round. However, if both the wildcard qualifier and the best divisional win-loss record come from the same division (which has happened frequently), the wildcard instead plays the division winner with the second-best record in the first round while the remaining two teams face each other. The winners of the two Division Series play in the League Championship Series for the right to play in the World Series.
In case two teams tie for the fourth playoff spot in a league, a single-game "wild-card playoff" is required to determine the final qualifier.
Although the current structure was established in 1994, the players' strike canceled the post-season events that year. Playoffs with the current structure were first played in 1995.
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