Do MLB baseball teams that finish the season over .500 earn a bonus?
I recall reading somewhere that there is a financial incentive to MLB teams to finish over .500, even if they don’t make the playoffs. I can’t find any more details, however. Thanks in advance!
None that I’ve ever heard of.
There is, however, a bonus pool, derived from postseason gate receipts, that is distributed to the eight playoff teams and any teams that finish second in their division but do not advance to the postseason.
The pool is divided thusly (each team then distributes its dividend into player shares, partial shares, and cash awards, by whatever the players decided in late August):
World Series winner — 36%
World Series losing team — 24%
LCS losing teams — 24% (12% each)
Division Series losing teams — 12% (3% each)
Non-playoff second place teams — 4% (1% each, though I suppose it gets sub-divided if there’s a tie in the standings).
Prior to the three-division format introduced in 1994, MLB’s postseason pool was distributed as deeply as the third-place teams in each of the four divisions. I don’t know what the exact breakdown was, but probably similar to the current formula.
I’ve never heard of that. I know of playoff shares but I’ve never heard anything that I can recall about a .500 record share.
No
They do not.