Following last year’s takeover and realignment of the minors by MLB, Triple-A was the only level of minor league play that did not have a post-season (it kinda did, but not really. See here). This year sees the return of a post-season to Triple-A, with a new playoff format: The Triple-A Triple Championship Weekend.

The Las Vegas Aviators will host the inaugural Weekend, set for September 30 – October 2, perhaps as a balm for losing out on the 2020 Triple-A National Championship Game.

Here’s how it will work: the division winners of the Pacific Coast League will play a single game on Friday night to determine the league champion. The International League will do the same on Saturday night. On Sunday the two league champs will play a winner-take-all game to crown the Triple-A Champion.

I don’t love that these contests are only one-game affairs, it takes a series to truly determine the better team (and even that can be a crap shoot in a lot of ways). On the other hand, the Triple-A title hasn’t been decided by a series since 2000, so that’s nothing new.

It’s great to see a postseason of any kind for Triple-A, the last one was in 2019. Of course, what we really care about is whether there will be a game ball commissioned. The last word from MLB was that no special event gamers would be made this season but that was prior to this announcement, so we can hope? Stay tuned…