The wild card was established for Major League Baseball's playoffs in 1994 with the intention of helping the best teams that did not win their division to still have a chance to win the World Series. The restructuring of both the American and National Leagues from two divisions each to three made it necessary to either give one team a bye in the first round of playoffs, or create the wild card for the best second-place team. In addition, the wild card guaranteed that the team with the second best record in each league would qualify for the playoffs, even if they were in the same division with the team having the best record. Beginning in 2012 a second wild card team was added to each league. The two wild card teams in each league face each other in a one-game playoff, the winner advancing to meet the number one seed in the Division Series. As of 2018, the AL East has produced 20 of 31 wild-card teams; the AL West is second with seven teams, while the AL Central has qualified four wild-card teams. The Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees have been a wild-card qualifier a record seven times, while the Chicago White Sox are the only AL team to have never qualified as a wild-card.
AL wild-card qualifiers by year
As of 2015, two AL wild-card teams went on to win the World Series, two teams won the AL pennant but lost the World Series, and six other teams won the division series but lost the championship series.
Team names link to the season in which each team played
** In, the Texas Rangers and the Tampa Bay Rays finished the season with the identical records of 91–71. A tiebreaker was held and the Rays won it 5–2 over the Rangers to capture the second Wild Card berth.
Most AL wild-card appearances
Year in which the Wild Card qualifier won the Wild Card playoff is listed in bold.
Year in which the Wild Card qualifier lost the Wild Card playoff is listed in italics.
Teams' ALDS records as AL wild-card qualifier
Teams' ALCS records as AL wild-card qualifier
Teams' World Series records as AL wild-card qualifier
