In North American professional sports leagues, "wild card" refers to a team that qualifies for the championship playoffs without winning their specific conference or division outright. The number of wild card teams varies. In most cases, the rules of the league call for the wild card team to survive an extra round or to play the majority of their postseason games away from home. Although the exact rules among the leagues differ, they all generally agree that the wild card team (or teams, as in MLB, NFL, and NHL) are the ones with the best records among the teams that did not win their divisions; these teams usually finish as the runner-up to their division winners. The term "wild card" does not apply to postseason formats where a set number of teams per division qualify. Former examples include: the
American Football League's 1969 playoffs (qualifying the top two finishers from each division), the
National Basketball Association's 1967-through-1970 playoffs (top four finishers from each division) and 1971–1972 playoffs (top two finishers in each division), and the
National Hockey League's 1968–1974 and 1982–1993 playoffs (top four finishers from each division) are not true wild card formats. When a wild card playoff format is used, the number of teams in a division that qualify is not fixed; a set number of teams from each division automatically qualify(ies), but (an) additional team(s) also qualify(ies), based either on league record or conference record.
Major League Baseball In
Major League Baseball (MLB), the wild card teams are the three teams in each of the two leagues (
American and
National) that have qualified for the
postseason despite failing to win their
division. Those teams in each league possess the three best
winning percentages in their league after the three
division winners. The wild card was instituted in MLB in 1994, but implemented for the first time in 1995, after both leagues reorganized into three divisions, with one wild card team per league advancing to the
Division Series along with the three division winners. In 2012, the system was modified to add a second wild card team per league and pit each league's wild card teams against each other in a
play-in game – the
MLB Wild Card Game – the winner of which would then advance to the Division Series and play the division winner with the best record. The two teams with the best records outside of the division champions advanced to the wild card game. The system was changed again in to add a third wild card team from each league, along with replacing the play-in game with two three-game series in each league. The division winner with the worst record in each league would now play in the wild card round, while the other two division winners would continue to have a bye.
Wild card World Series champions •
1997 Florida Marlins •
2002 Anaheim Angels •
2003 Florida Marlins •
2004 Boston Red Sox •
2011 St. Louis Cardinals •
2014 San Francisco Giants •
2019 Washington Nationals •
2023 Texas Rangers Other wild card World Series participants •
2000 New York Mets •
2002 San Francisco Giants •
2005 Houston Astros •
2006 Detroit Tigers •
2007 Colorado Rockies •
2014 Kansas City Royals •
2022 Philadelphia Phillies •
2023 Arizona Diamondbacks National Football League In the
National Football League (NFL), since , each of the two conferences sends three wild card teams along with four division champions to its postseason. The first round of the playoffs is called the "wild card round". In this round, each conference's division champion with the best regular-season record is awarded a first-round bye and granted automatic berth in the "Divisional Round". The four division champions are seeded from #1 through #4, while the three wild card teams are seeded #5 to #7; within these separations, seeding is by regular-season record. In the "wild card Round", the #7 team plays the #2 team, #6 plays #3, and #5 plays #4. In the "Divisional Round", the lowest-remaining seed plays the #1 seeded team, while the other two wild card winners face-off against each other, with the higher seed hosting. The higher-seeded teams have home-field advantage in both rounds and the "Conference Championships".
Background The NFL was the first sports league to use the wild card format. The decision to implement a wild card coincided with the completion of the
AFL-NFL merger in 1970. Prior to the merger, the right to compete in the postseason for the NFL title was restricted to division/conference champions. Until 1967, a
tiebreaker game was played to resolve a deadlock for first place in either of the two conferences. When the league expanded to 16 teams that year, it realigned into four divisions and expanded the playoffs to two rounds. Tiebreaker games were eliminated in favor of the use of performance-based criteria to determine division champions. The rival
American Football League (AFL), which reached a final size of ten teams in two divisions, continued to restrict its postseason to division winners until the 1969 season, the AFL's last as a separate league. The change came largely in response to criticism from NFL loyalists following the
New York Jets' upset win in
Super Bowl III, who argued that the Jets had an "unfair" advantage since, having won the
Eastern Division outright, they were the only pro team with a bye in the divisional round (the
Western Division title having been determined by a traditional tiebreaker, played the same weekend as the NFL's divisional round, between the
Kansas City Chiefs and the
Oakland Raiders). The AFL later agreed to expand their playoffs to include division runners-up and implemented tiebreakers, thus in 1969 the runners-up played the winners of the opposite divisions for the right to contest the AFL Championship Game. The Chiefs, despite being AFL West runners-up, nevertheless won the
last Super Bowl prior to the merger. In 1970, the merged league realigned into two conferences of thirteen teams each, with three "old-line" NFL teams joining the AFL teams in the
American Football Conference (AFC), and the remaining NFL teams forming the
National Football Conference (NFC). The decision to make the conferences equal in size meant they could not feasibly align into anything except three divisions of four or five teams in each conference. This led to a debate as to how the postseason of the merged league should be structured. Both the NFL and AFL playoff formats of 1969 had attracted fierce critics. The NFL format was criticized for its ability to cause a team tied for first overall in the league to miss the playoffs (this happened once, in 1967, when the
Baltimore Colts missed the postseason despite a .917 winning percentage after losing a tiebreaker to the
Los Angeles Rams). The AFL's 1969 playoffs were criticized by NFL purists for breaking with longstanding tradition, also, due to the fact that they allowed runners-up to qualify no matter how much disparity existed between the divisions, the AFL playoff structure could allow a mediocre team to qualify – this did occur when the
Houston Oilers, a .500 team, finished second in the Eastern Division – the Oilers were throttled in the playoffs 56–7 by the Western champion
Oakland Raiders. Despite Kansas City's upset wins over the Raiders and
Minnesota Vikings, some purists argued for the tradition of having only division champions contest the playoffs to continue. Had they prevailed, the post-merger NFL playoffs would have consisted of six teams and might have eventually evolved to closely resemble the playoffs of the modern
Canadian Football League, with the regular season champion of each conference earning the right to host the championship game against the winner of a game between the champions of the other two divisions. However, the old-line NFL owners, who still expected their teams to dominate the merged league for at least the first half of the 1970s, thought a repeat of the 1967 Colts-Rams fiasco would be very likely under the new alignment combined with a six team format. Furthermore, the modern principle that home field advantage and byes should be awarded to the teams with the best records had still not yet been firmly established – tradition at the time dictated that home field advantage rotate between divisions and/or conferences regardless of record. In any event, most owners in both conferences wanted to keep the even four-team playoff field in each conference. This was established by having the three division champions in each conference joined by the best second-place finisher in the conference.
History As with much of the NFL's nomenclature, the "wild card" was not initially referred to as such and was instead referred as the "Best Second-Place Team" (or sometimes simply as the "Fourth Qualifier"). The media, however, began referring to the qualifying teams as "wild cards". Eventually, the NFL officially adopted the term. For the
1969 AFL playoffs, a "crossover" format was used such that the division winners played the runners up in the opposite division. This was done in part because division rivals had already played each other twice in the regular season and also in part because the AFL did not want the playoff games to be confused as "division championship games" – by keeping division rivals separate in the opening playoff round, the league left fans in no doubt that the regular season division winners were the only true division champions, even if a runner-up eventually won the league title. The NFL kept this principle in place by stipulating that a wild card team could never face its own division champion in the divisional round. Following the implementation of the
AFL–NFL merger prior to the 1970 season, from
1970 to 1974 the NFL used a rotation to determine which teams hosted playoff games, and which teams played which other teams. From
1975 to 1977, the divisional playoffs featured the #1 seed hosting the "wild card" team, and the #2 seed hosting the #3 seed unless the #1 seed and wild card team were divisional rivals; in that case, the #1 seed hosted the #3 seed and the #2 seed hosted the wild card team. The "wild card" team in each conference was the team with the best record in its conference excluding the #1–3 seeds. The number of wild card qualifiers was expanded to two per conference in
1978 – the divisional winners were granted a
bye week while the wild card teams, seeded #4 and #5, played each other in a "wild card game" with the #4 seed having home field advantage. Since there were two wild card games, one per conference, the phrase "wild card round" came into use. During this time, the #1 seed hosted the winner of the #4 vs #5 wild card game, while the #2 seed played the #3 seed. However, the rule that teams from the same division could not play each other in the divisional round continued, so if the #1 seed and the winner of the #4 vs #5 wild card game were in the same division, then the #1 seed played the #3 seed, while the #2 seed played the #4 vs #5 winner. To address the oddity of one wild card team per conference hosting a playoff game (albeit in an earlier round) while one division winner per conference did not automatically have the right to host a playoff game, the playoffs were expanded again to three wild cards per conference in
1990 (for 12 teams total) with the lowest-ranked divisional winner losing its bye but gaining the right to host a playoff game. Following the addition of the
Houston Texans in 2002, the league added a fourth division to each conference. The league decided not to change the number of playoff teams, and thus the number of wild card qualifiers was reduced to two per conference. In
2020, the playoffs returned to three wild cards per conference, or 14 teams total. The term "Wild Card Round" continues to be used for the opening round of the playoffs, even though this round has involved both division winners and wild card teams since 1990. As of the
2021–22 playoffs, there has never been a meeting of two wild card teams in the
Super Bowl; the closest that came to happening was in the
2010–11 playoffs, when the Green Bay Packers and New York Jets went on Cinderella runs after finishing as the second wild card team in each of their conferences (the NFC and AFC, respectively); the Packers won the NFC Championship Game and went on to win the Super Bowl, while the Jets'
Cinderella story ended with a one-score loss to the Steelers in the AFC Championship Game. From
2002 to 2019, the only way a wild card team could host a playoff game within their respective conference (
Super Bowls are considered neutral site games regardless of home venue) would be for both wild card teams to reach the Conference Championship Game by each winning two road playoff games: • The No. 5 seeded wild card wins @ the No. 4 seeded division winner in the wild card Round and wins @ the No. 2 seeded division winner in the divisional round • The No. 6 seeded wild card wins @ the No. 3 seeded division winner in the wild card Round and wins @ the No. 1 seeded division winner in the divisional round The No. 5 seeded wild card would host the No. 6 seeded wild card in the Championship Game. Since
2020, it has been possible for a wild card team to host a Divisional Round playoff game. This requires that all three wild card teams (seeded 5–7) win their wild card games on the road since teams are re-seeded. The matchups in the divisional round would be: • The No. 7 seeded wild card @ the No. 1 seeded division winner • The No. 6 seeded wild card @ the No. 5 seeded wild card
Wild card Super Bowl champions •
1980–81:
Oakland Raiders–
Super Bowl XV •
1997–98:
Denver Broncos–
Super Bowl XXXII •
2000–01:
Baltimore Ravens–
Super Bowl XXXV •
2005–06:
Pittsburgh Steelers–
Super Bowl XL •
2007–08:
New York Giants–
Super Bowl XLII •
2010–11:
Green Bay Packers–
Super Bowl XLV •
2020–21:
Tampa Bay Buccaneers–
Super Bowl LV Other wild card Super Bowl participants •
1975–76:
Dallas Cowboys-
Super Bowl X •
1985–86:
New England Patriots–
Super Bowl XX •
1992–93:
Buffalo Bills–
Super Bowl XXVII •
1999–2000:
Tennessee Titans–
Super Bowl XXXIV The 1980 Raiders, 2005 Steelers, and 1992 Bills tied for first in their division but lost a tiebreaker. While not a wild card team, the
1969 Kansas City Chiefs were the first
non-division winner to win the
Super Bowl. They finished second in the Western Division of the
American Football League, and in that season, the last before the merger, the AFL went from having its two division winners meeting for the league title to adding a second round in which the second place team in each division qualified for the post-season. These teams played cross-division in the semifinal round. Thus the Chiefs, who finished second in the West, defeated the East Division champion
New York Jets in the AFL semifinals and then defeated the West Division champion
Oakland Raiders to advance to
Super Bowl IV, where they beat the
Minnesota Vikings. Because the term "wild card" was not instituted until the following year, the Chiefs are not included in the above list, but are recognized as the first team to win the Super Bowl without winning a division title.
National Basketball Association Although the
National Basketball Association (NBA) includes wild card teams in their playoff structures, the term "wild card" is seldom used; instead, each playoff team is most commonly denoted by its seeding position within the conference. Before the
2006–07 NBA season, the NBA seeded its teams with the division winners automatically receiving seeds 1–3. Until 2015, the NBA seeded the three division winners and the wild card team with the best record by regular-season record. This meant that the wild card with the best record got a seed as high as #2 (if that team is in the same division as the team with the best record in the conference); however, the next four wild card teams were still limited to the #5 through #8 seeds. This change was made to ensure that the two best teams in each conference cannot meet until the conference final, and also (allegedly) to try and eliminate incentives for a playoff-bound team to
deliberately lose games at the end of the regular season in order to "choose" a higher-seeded team that has won fewer games (and, due to the unique home-court rules of the NBA, possibly gain home-court advantage for that series). The notion of "wild cards" was essentially abolished in the
2015–16 NBA season, as changes made prior to the season meant the top eight teams in each conference qualified regardless of divisional rank, with the seeded teams ranked by percentage. The only particular advantage to winning a division now was that a divisional title served as the first tiebreaker for qualification seeding purposes. Unlike some other leagues, there is no tie-breaker advantage at all to finishing in any divisional rank lower than first – meaning (for example) that while a division winner
will automatically win a tie-breaker over another division's runner-up, a division runner-up
will not automatically win a tie-breaker over teams finishing third, fourth or fifth in other divisions. The new format means it is possible for an especially weak division to send
no teams (not even its champion) to the NBA playoffs. In the
2022–23 season, the Southeast Division champion
Miami Heat did not qualify directly to the
NBA playoffs but earned the no. 8 seed in the Eastern Conference through the
play-in tournament, which is more fully described below. In the
2024–25 season, the Southeast Division champion
Orlando Magic did not qualify directly to the
NBA playoffs but earned the no. 7 seed in the Eastern Conference through the play-in tournament. It remains possible for an NBA division champion to miss the playoffs or miss the postseason, including the play-in tournament, altogether, but, as of the start of the
2025–26 season, this has not yet occurred. In the NBA, the winner of the #1 vs. #8 series goes on to face the winner of the #5 vs. #4 series, while the winner of the #2 vs. #7 series faces the winner of the #6 vs. #3 series. The winner of the #1 vs. #8 series will usually play against a wild card team in the conference semifinals; this is arranged deliberately to reward the #1 seeded team by giving it the most winnable matchups in the first two rounds, although this is not always the case in event of an upset because the NBA never re-seed teams following the first round. For instance, if the #6 seed upsets the #3 seed and the higher seed wins the remaining first round matchups within the conference, the #1 seed would face the #4 seed, while the #2 seed would face the #6 seed in the conference semifinals. As of the
2020–21 NBA season, the number of teams that qualified for the postseason expanded to ten teams per conference, and the NBA play-in tournament, which the league distinguishes from the NBA playoffs, was adopted in its current format, after a modified version was used the previous season due to the
COVID-19 pandemic. This is similar to the first two rounds of the
Page–McIntyre system for a four-team playoff. The #9 seed hosts the #10 seed in an elimination game. The #7 seed hosts the #8 seed in the double-chance game, with the winner advancing as the #7 seed. The loser of this game then hosts the winner of the elimination game between the 9th and 10th place teams to determine the #8 seed. The NBA's regular playoff format then proceeds as normal.
National Hockey League In the
National Hockey League (NHL), the first, second, and third place teams in each division qualify for the playoffs automatically, and two additional teams, regardless of divisional alignment, also qualify by having the best records among the remaining teams in the conference. These teams are referred to as the wild cards. In the first round, the division champions play the wild cards, while the second and third placed teams in each division play each other; therefore the bracket is fixed, like the NBA. Home-ice advantage is given to the higher seed in the first two rounds, with the better regular season record being used in the
conference finals and
Stanley Cup Final. The NHL's current format is similar in some respects to the "cross-over rule" used by the
Canadian Football League since 1997 in that it the format emphasizes intra-divisional ranking and brackets in the playoff structure and yet allows two teams from one division to qualify for the playoffs at the expense of the two teams finishing with worse records and in the same divisional ranks in another division. The main difference is that the CFL only allows the lowest ranked playoff qualifying team from a division to cross over into the other division's playoffs, whereas in the NHL it is possible for either wild card team to "cross over" to the other division, or even (in cases where four teams qualify from each division) for the wild card teams to swap divisional playoff brackets. Also, unlike the CFL the NHL does not require the second wild card qualifier to have an outright better record than a superior-ranked team in the other division – in the event of such a tie at the end of the NHL season standard tie-breaking procedures are used to determine playoff qualification. From
1999 until
2013, three division champions within each conference were seeded no. 1 through no. 3, based on their regular-season records. Among the remaining teams within each conference, five additional teams with the best records are awarded seeds no. 4 through no. 8. The division champions (the first through third seeds) and the non-division winning team with the best record (fourth seed) were given home-ice advantage in the opening playoff series, in which they face the eighth-seeded through fifth-seeded teams, respectively. However, the playoff format differed slightly from that of the NBA. In the NHL, the highest-remaining seed of the first round played the lowest-remaining seed of the first round in the next round of the playoffs. For example, if the #1, #4, #6, and #7 seeds win their respective first round series, then the second round of the playoffs matched the #1 seed (highest) versus the #7 seed (lowest), and the #4 seed (2nd highest) versus the #6 seed (second lowest). Home-ice advantage in each NHL playoff series prior to the Stanley Cup Final was granted to the higher seed, even if the wild-card team had a better regular-season record. For the Final, the team with the better record receive home-ice advantage. In 2019, the playoffs were expanded to the top seven teams in each conference, with only the conference regular season champion receiving a first-round bye. 2023 and hereafter sees only the eighth seed hosting the ninth-seed while the top seven seeds earned a prelim-round byes. The playoffs had expanded to nine teams per conference.
Canadian championship curling Curling Canada introduced wild card teams starting with the
2018 Scotties Tournament of Hearts and
2018 Tim Hortons Brier. The change was made as part of a wider set of changes which expanded the tournaments to 17 teams and eliminated the unpopular pre-qualifying tournaments. From 2018, the round robin stage of the Tournament of Hearts and Brier will consist of two
seeded "pools" of eight teams as opposed to the old format consisting a single group of twelve teams. This allows the main tournament to include "Team Canada" (either the defending champions or, when the champions decline to or are unable to defend their title, the runners-up) and teams representing all fourteen constituent associations representing the ten provinces and three territories plus
Northern Ontario. The remaining two participants in the tournament are the wild cards, which compete in an MLB-style play-in game prior to the main tournament to determine the sixteenth team in the main tournament. Just as is the case with MLB division titles, the format is designed to give teams an incentive to win their provincial championships. The wild cards are the top two teams in the
Canadian Team Ranking System (CTRS) standings that did not win either the previous year's tournament or their respective provincial or territorial championship. The top ranked of these two teams receives the
hammer (last rock) to start the game. The CTRS standings are also used to determine the seeding of all teams in the main tournament, with one important caveat – for the purposes of seeding the round robin pools and so as to allow the main round robin schedule to be drawn up prior to the wild card game, the ranking of the top wild card team is the ranking that is used for seeding purposes regardless of who wins the game. Whereas teams in the Tournament of Hearts and Brier are traditionally referred to by their respective province or territory (other than Northern Ontario and Team Canada), the team that wins the wild card game is referred to as the "wild card" for the duration of the tournament. As is the case with Team Canada, the wild card retains that designation even if the team that is representing the same province or territory as the wild card team is eliminated prior to the wild card team. With the introduction of pools, the round robin portion of the Tournament of Hearts and Brier now consists of two stages. The top four teams in each pool qualify for the second stage, formally known as the "Championship Pool." Unlike most tournaments which use a similar format, teams carry over their entire round robin records from the preliminary stage as opposed to only those results against teams that also qualify. This ensures that each Championship Pool team still plays eleven games that count for the purposes of determining playoff qualification. The format is designed to ensure that a competitive team fills the wild card slot – due to the significant disparity in playing caliber between the top teams of Canada's fourteen member associations, it is widely expected that the wild card will consistently come from one of the provinces with the toughest fields in the playdowns, and that it will consistently be a championship contending team. The format was changed for the 2021 curling season due to the
COVID-19 pandemic. For at least that year, tournaments will expand to eighteen teams each. Three wild card teams will gain direct entry into the main draw, which expanded to pools of nine teams each. Additional wild card berths are granted if the defending champion does not play and/or a member association does not enter a team (this occurred, for example, in the
2024 Scotties Tournament of Hearts when
Nunavut withdrew) As a result, teams that advance to the championship pool will play twelve round robin games instead of eleven. To accommodate the expanded round robin schedule, the playoffs will revert to the old three team, two game format thus eliminating the page playoff and quarter-final round. Beginning in 2024 wild card teams are no longer designated "Wild Cards" in the draw or standings and have the right to represent their member associations on the same basis as the team advancing from playdowns.
Canadian Football League While the
Canadian Football League does not officially use the term "wild card" to denote any playoff qualifier, its
crossover rule acts similar to a wild card in many respects. Calls to change the CFL's playoff format came about soon after the CFL finished its evolution from two regional conferences, which were originally the
Interprovincial Rugby Football Union in the East and the
Western Interprovincial Football Union in the West. Although the CFL was officially founded in 1958, its constituent sections did not fully merge until 1981. At the time, it was agreed that three teams from each division would qualify, regardless of overall league standings. This quickly proved controversial, as a wide disparity in playing caliber had emerged between the East and West divisions. Since the league had also implemented a fully balanced schedule (each of the nine teams played each opponent once at home and once on the road), this disparity (made even worse by the fact the West had one more team than the East) was fully exposed in the standings – in each of the first three seasons of the new format, the fourth place team missed the playoffs with records as good as 9–7 in the West, while in the East records as bad as 3–13 were good enough for third place and a playoff berth. In 1981, even the fifth place Western team's record of 6–10 was good enough for outright possession of sixth place overall. In 1986, the playoff format was changed. The new format the fourth place team in one division to qualify if it finished with an outright better record than the third place team in the other division. The Eastern owners agreed in exchange for expanding the schedule to 18 games, and also with a stipulation that the qualifying fourth-place team would stay in its own division for the playoffs. As a result, the change introduced the possibility of a four team bracket in one division and a two-game total point series in the other (the two game total point format was nothing new in Canadian football – it was commonly used until the early 1970s). It also introduced the possibility of the first place teams losing their traditional byes based on results elsewhere in the league. This occurred in 1986, when the 11–7
Calgary Stampeders qualified in place of the 4–14
Montreal Alouettes. The Alouettes folded before the start of the following season. Although it is highly questionable whether a 1986 playoff appearance would have saved the floundering Montreal franchise, the CFL quickly re-instated the traditional playoff format for the 1987 season. It also moved the
Winnipeg Blue Bombers (the West's easternmost team) to the Eastern Division. This balanced the divisions both in numbers as well as, to a considerable extent, in playing caliber, and the reduction in teams also caused the schedule to be changed to emphasize more divisional games. As a result, the three top finishers of the two divisions finishers always had the six best league records from 1987 up until the start of the league's
U.S. expansion experiment, which started in the 1993. The current rule was adopted after the league re-activated the Alouettes and reverted to an all-Canadian alignment in 1996. It allows the fourth place team of one division to "cross over" and take the place of the third place team in the other divisional bracket, provided the fourth place team has more points (i.e. an outright better record) than the third place team. Since the cross over team enters as the third place team, it never receives home field advantage in the playoffs, even if its record is better than that of one or both of the qualifying teams in the other division. As of 2023, all teams to qualify under this rule have crossed over from the Western Division to the Eastern bracket, although there have been a handful of occasions where a fourth placed Eastern team was in mathematical contention for a Western cross-over berth late in the season. Cross-over teams have advanced as far as the Eastern Final, but as of 2023 have never advanced to the
Grey Cup game. There is no provision for a fifth placed team in one division to cross over in place of the other division's runner-up, even if it has a better record; in 2018 the
Edmonton Eskimos finished fifth in the West with a 9–9 record and missed the playoffs while the
Hamilton Tiger-Cats finished 8–10 and qualified as Eastern runners-up. Thus, it is theoretically possible (but it has not yet occurred) that all four Eastern Division teams could reach the playoffs, but not for all five Western Division teams. == Professional tennis ==