One and Done: New 1-game wild-card playoffs certain to draw attention, but are they fair?

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Atlanta Braves\' Chipper Jones takes a break in the dugout batting practice at Turner Field Thursday, Oct. 4, 2012, in Atlanta. The Braves take on St. Louis Cardinals in the NL wild-card baseball game on Friday. (AP Photo/Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Brant Sanderlin) MARIETTA DAILY OUT; GWINNETT DAILY POST OUT; LOCAL TV OUT; WXIA-TV OUT; WGCL-TV OUT

By sometime Friday night, either Chipper Jones will be out of baseball or the defending World Series champion Cardinals will be out of the playoffs.

One and done.

A pair of wild-card matchups — St. Louis at Atlanta, then Baltimore at Texas — to decide which teams advance to the next round. Part of the new, expanded post-season format, where 162 games, six months of grinding and upward of 50,000 pitches get boiled down to nine all-or-nothing innings.

Dramatic? Certainly. Fair? Well, depends on who you ask.

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