Major League Baseball considering expansion, radical realignment

[tony d]

I think we see all 4 sports leagues with 32 teams within the next few years. Not sure if I like losing the AL and NL though for MLB. Expansion to Montreal would be great.

 

[KevFu]

I really do love your insightful posts. I personally love the layout. I think Montreal is a lock in an expansion. What if Mexico City/Monterey/San Antonio was the other team?

Thanks. I don't think they's go Mexico for a variety of reasons (currency, security).

If it was San Antonio instead of Portland, I'd put San Antonio in the CBL instead of NYM or WAS; and slide COL to the PCL.

(When I originally wrote this up, it was before reading that Portland was being mentioned as in the mix. I had CHC-STL-MIL-CIN || PIT-PHI-ATL-Charlotte )

I completely get the reasoning, but I hate the division you've given the Phillies. I can't envision a scenario where I have a reason to care about the Reds, the Braves are the rivals I least like caring about, and the Pirates... well, OK, that one makes sense.

... They're also a traditional rival in a way the Braves aren't really; we only hate the Braves because of the way the 90s played out.

I get that. But how much of that is because you're just used to the last 25 years of these divisions?

I grew up with STL-NYM-CHI-PHI-MON-PIT in the NL East. Hell, the Mets/Phillies have really only been "Rivals" from 2005-2010, when it was Reyes-Wright-Beltran vs Rollins-Utley-Howard

STL and CHC were the Mets rivals from 1984-1989. The the Pirates got good, then the divisions changed and it was time for us to hate the Braves. Now we hate the Nats because they crushed us in the regular season the last couple years with Harper. Give me a couple years, and I'll probably hate Hoskins and you'll hopefully hate Rosario.

 

[ponder719]

I get that. But how much of that is because you're just used to the last 25 years of these divisions?

I grew up with STL-NYM-CHI-PHI-MON-PIT in the NL East. Hell, the Mets/Phillies have really only been "Rivals" from 2005-2010, when it was Reyes-Wright-Beltran vs Rollins-Utley-Howard

STL and CHC were the Mets rivals from 1984-1989. The the Pirates got good, then the divisions changed and it was time for us to hate the Braves. Now we hate the Nats because they crushed us in the regular season the last couple years with Harper. Give me a couple years, and I'll probably hate Hoskins and you'll hopefully hate Rosario.

Eh. I'll dispute the Mets/Phillies rivalry being that short-lived, because it was always bound up in our Pavlovian hatred of anything and everything New York. Mets fans might not have cared so much, but it was more fun to see the Mets lose than any team other than the Yankees. My recollection, other than that the Phils were generally terrible most of my life (I started paying attention to baseball around 1988, when I was 5), was that we hated the Mets and the Pirates, and whoever was good at the time was kind of a rotating rival. If the Braves weren't a) in-division, and b) obnoxiously good throughout the 90s, I wouldn't have cared about them in the slightest. Nothing about Atlanta makes it a natural rival for Philadelphia the way New York, Boston, or Washington are. If the Braves were in the division, I'd hate them because they were in the division, but I'd rather watch games against teams I want to hate, rather than ones I feel obliged to, and given the schedule as you've laid it out, I'd get a lot more games against teams I don't care about, and nowhere near enough against those I do.

That aside, the overall structure makes sense to me, and it's just a quibble on which teams make the most sense together. Again, looking at it from the other league's perspective, if we're abandoning the 15/15 split we currently have, Texas, Florida, and Georgia all make a good bit of sense together as regional rivals, and with DC the next closest team, that works logically, too. Canada I can't wrap my head around being in the otherwise Southeastern league, but you have to draw the lines somewhere. I just wish the league didn't seem locked in on Portland, because from a rivalry and alignment perspective, New Orleans or Charlotte would make a lot of things fit more comfortably here.

 

[KevFu]

Dilbert, when I read your first post about the Braves, I thought "he's 35 or younger."

It's funny to me how I want baseball to go back to an expanded version of 1986-1992. Four divisions. LCS+WS. And when I started posting on a Mets board all the way back in college in 1996, everyone agreed with that. Now I posted a new 8-8 NL and everyone's like "Ugh! Why change it?!?!" I think people just don't like change.

 

[Gnashville]

I have no problem with expansion to 32 but I have a Huge problem with eliminating the National and American leagues. 2 16 team leagues with 2 division is the way to go. Little to no inter-league play. Get the League Championship series off of stinking FOXsports1 and TBS and back on real channels.

Manfred should be fired for his stupid ideas. The "automatic" Walk is horrible. The idea of putting someone on 2nd base in extra innings is awful.

 

[Melrose Munch]

I support this. It's 2017 and Montreal and Vancouver are great choices. More playoff games = more $$$

 

[Melrose Munch]

Agreed. Ive always felt Vancouver has been the most ripped off city for pro sports.

Your city leadership is the problem. If Gregor would do more then look at the mirrors in his house Vancouver would have an MLB and NBA team. Theleague would have already granted seattle a team if they had a partner. And the diamondbacks are having stadium issues, but Vancouver isn't playing attention.

 

[Zegras Zebra]

I'm honestly not a baseball person, but it does not make sense that the AL has the DH and the NL does not. The MLB should just choose to keep it or not, and then both leagues have the same set of rules and strategy. I liked KevFu's division alignment, as it seems reasonable. Montreal is an obvious choice for expansion, and I would assume there are 5-6 markets which would make sense if they had an ownership group and stadium available.

 

[Melrose Munch]

Vancouver should be all over this.

 

[KevFu]

You've posted this idea a few years back I believe, and I really like it compared to the scrapping the NL and AL altogether. My only adjustments would be these:
American League: BAL, BOS, NYY, TOR || DET, CWS, MIN, CLE
National League: CHC, STL, MIL, CIN || NYM, PIT, PHI, ATL
Pacific League: SFG, LAD, SDP, ARZ || SEA, OAK, LAA, Portland
Continental League: TEX, HOU, COL, KCR || MIA, WAS, TB, Montreal

I'm not sure if your 4 team divisions meant anything, but I kept them in tact and adjusted within.

COL is out of place because of Portland. As Glacial said, one team for "Carolina" would probably make the most sense. And my concept was originally drawn with COL in the PCL; CIN where COL is; and Charlotte where CIN is.

As for some of the other observations... My primary concern was less about the groups "fitting together" geographically, but more about "How do we make the fourth group A THING instead of just 'all the new teams' or 'those who get screwed" ?

The Pacific League has their specialized time zone. That's the Western Expansion of Baseball.
The AL & NL have their "tradition. Old school. How it used to be from 1901 to 1957" thing going. The NL vs AL thing always separated the local rivals (CHI-CHI, NY-NY, LA-LA) and was more Regional Rivals (NY vs BOS, PIT vs CIN)
The Continental League is built on the hybrid: the opposite of the AL/NL regional rivals. Pairs of rivals in their own geographic area: HOU-TEX, MON-TOR, MIA-TB. Nats as descendants of Expos, and Mets as The Godfather of the league, who had to create it to get back into baseball.

That's what it boils down to. There's NO GOOD WAY TO DO THIS. They're going to screw something up:
4-4-4-4: Saves NL/AL tradition, but waters it down. Ruins the playoffs by copying the NFL. Don't make things much better for TV start times. Schedule Fairness still a joke.

Radical realignment DESTROYS tradition and the playoffs just for TV purposes. And those effects WILL WEAR OFF. It sounds cool to have rivalries like NYY-NYM 18 times a year. But it ruins the "Circle the date" special series feel. (HOU-TEX drew 11,000 less per game in 2016 when both teams were GOOD; compared to when Houston lost 107 games in the NL, but they only made ONE appearance at the other park).

Something in between Preserve the longest traditions; take those with a massive need to sacrifice tradition for money (Pacific) and those without much tradition and do the best we can.
In 1903, American League baseball came to New York. A sportswriter said "Can the New York American team be as good as John McGraw's 'giants of the National League'?"
The New York American League Baseball Club = Yankees/Yanks
The New York National League Baseball Club = Giants
And Brooklyn National League Baseball Club = Dodgers/Bums

When NL ball returned to New York for 1962, the team wanted a team name that would FIT IN with those origin stories. Short for sportswriters, seemed like it was from the golden era of New York baseball they wanted to recapture. So the fans would feel like it was NATURAL to follow them. They picked "Mets" because it SEEMED like the same origin stories of the other three.

And that's what I was trying to do with the Continental. I was trying to make what's TOTALLY UNNATURAL for Major League Baseball (radical realignment) seem like it was the NATURAL evolution -- from the time when we had two leagues of 8, separate and in the the Northeast, playing a balanced schedule -- to now having 8 teams in the Pacific/Mountain time zones, and teams in Canada and the South. The Continental came into existence when the Giants/Dodgers/A's moved West. It became the fourth major league. It doesn't really look cohesive, because they had to fill in underserved areas. But they did it with rivals to help travel.

The teams in the Continental League don't "Belong" together. But it's NEVER worked that way in baseball! You had MIL in the AL East and MIN/CWS in the AL West. You had STL/CHC in the NL East and CIN/ATL in the NL West. There was a good reason for CIN/ATL & STL/CHC (Wrigley not having lights). I'm using "what might have been" with the PCL and CBL as my "Wrigley Field" to explain why the alignments weird.


And my || Division groups were for two reasons: I'd be okay with one division, only 4 teams make the playoffs. But I understand you'd want 8 groups of 4 and have Division champs meet in the AL, NL, CBL, PCL championship round, THEN have a semifinals and then the World Series.
And secondly, they serve as the schedule groups for interleague play.

 

[Brick City]

I do not think I am overstating it in saying that the backlash to abolishing the AL and NL will be enormous across all age groups. Fans identify with them; heck the MLB has been running an AL fans vs NL fans ad throughout the playoffs. The league pennants, while not what they used to be, I would argue are still the most valued of the runner up titles in sports.

They're courting fan rebellion with abolishing the leagues imo. I'm not opposed to change, but that hardly means all change is for the better.

 

[AdmiralsFan24]

I went back to see why the frack a 1.5 million market like SLC (and another one like Charlotte) are listed here... I see where the math geeks let them get to 2.4 million. The problem: both markets are reaching too far out to encompass what are really small towns at more than 30 miles away rather than suburbs. Counting on people to get home from SLC to Provo and Ogden and then turn right back around, good luck with that.

OK, while I think Charlotte's been playing with a bit of fuzzy math themselves, thing is, the 10+ million of the TV market in the Carolinas has always been something on which some MLB honchos have been ready to pounce. Only issue; a new AAA park finally got built in uptown Charlotte in the last few years. That makes the larger investment a little harder to achieve.

Who says that people who live in Provo or Ogden work in SLC? And why would they have to go home before a game all the time? And Charlotte doesn't participate in "fuzzy math." The federal government defines these things.

 

[CHRDANHUTCH]

I have no problem with expansion to 32 but I have a Huge problem with eliminating the National and American leagues. 2 16 team leagues with 2 division is the way to go. Little to no inter-league play. Get the League Championship series off of stinking FOXsports1 and TBS and back on real channels.

Manfred should be fired for his stupid ideas. The "automatic" Walk is horrible. The idea of putting someone on 2nd base in extra innings is awful.

Interleague play, actually starts where, Gnashville, at Spring Training.

 

[edog37]

Find baseball insufferably boring, so any reduction in schedule is good. If it went away altogether, I'd be okay with that also....

 

[Gnashville]

Interleague play, actually starts where, Gnashville, at Spring Training.

Spring training doesn’t count. I wish that baseball would get rid of interleague. No one cares about a Mets-Twins series in July. It has run it’s course and should go back to 2 separate leagues playing against themselves and make the All Star game and World Series interesting again.

 

[No Fun Shogun]

So, if I read everything right, MLB's open to expansion but talk about undoing the NL and AL system is mostly just a hypothetical idea that had been brought up by someone outside the game, right?

I've been following baseball for essentially my entire life, and I'll flat out say that I would sooner anticipate a third league being added to Major League Baseball via massive expansion than I'd expect to see the NL/AL distinction being done away, and that's even if the DH was added to the NL or removed from the AL so that the rules were 100% the same.

As for reducing the schedule, I'm fine with that, but then again if they just want the season to end sooner while keeping the same gate they could always just schedule a doubleheader either every two weeks or every month for each team to cut back the schedule by a week or two. Expansion of the playoff format seems tricky, as even three-game series for play in teams while division winners get byes could easily ice the resting team.

 

[IU Hawks fan]

Scheduled DHs will never be a thing again. Players hate them and would never approve a CBA that includes them.

 

[Melrose Munch]

So, if I read everything right, MLB's open to expansion but talk about undoing the NL and AL system is mostly just a hypothetical idea that had been brought up by someone outside the game, right?

I've been following baseball for essentially my entire life, and I'll flat out say that I would sooner anticipate a third league being added to Major League Baseball via massive expansion than I'd expect to see the NL/AL distinction being done away, and that's even if the DH was added to the NL or removed from the AL so that the rules were 100% the same.

As for reducing the schedule, I'm fine with that, but then again if they just want the season to end sooner while keeping the same gate they could always just schedule a doubleheader either every two weeks or every month for each team to cut back the schedule by a week or two. Expansion of the playoff format seems tricky, as even three-game series for play in teams while division winners get byes could easily ice the resting team.

No this writer is well sourced. This is probably coming from the Manfred camp. The mention of Montreal alone tells me its real.

I do not think I am overstating it in saying that the backlash to abolishing the AL and NL will be enormous across all age groups. Fans identify with them; heck the MLB has been running an AL fans vs NL fans ad throughout the playoffs. The league pennants, while not what they used to be, I would argue are still the most valued of the runner up titles in sports.

They're courting fan rebellion with abolishing the leagues imo. I'm not opposed to change, but that hardly means all change is for the better.

People under 35 wont care.

~~~~~~~~

East: Boston, Baltimore, both New York franchises, Miami, Philadelphia, Tampa Bay and Washington.
Central: Atlanta, Cleveland, Detroit, Minnesota, Montreal, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati and Toronto.
Midwest: Both Chicago franchises, Colorado, Houston, Kansas City, Milwaukee, St. Louis and Texas.
West: Anaheim, Arizona, Los Angeles, Oakland, Vancouver, San Diego, San Francisco and Seattle.

Slight modifications to the original proposal. Vancouver instead of Portland, New York teams and Boston in the east and Atlanta, Cincinnati and Pittsburgh in the central.

 

[No Fun Shogun]

Eh, I still have a hard time imagining a scenario where MLB does anything that massive, well-sourced or not. Even if someone from the Manfred camp wants it doesn't mean that the actual owners are at all interested, which nothing I've heard has lead me to believe that they are wanting the AL/NL split done away or radically altered aside from AL bosses wanting the NL to adopt the DH.

Also, as a 32-year old, I can guarantee you that there are plenty of baseball fans under 35 that would care.

 

[Bjorn Le]

Spring training doesn’t count. I wish that baseball would get rid of interleague. No one cares about a Mets-Twins series in July. It has run it’s course and should go back to 2 separate leagues playing against themselves and make the All Star game and World Series interesting again.

The thing is I think yours is a minority opinion. Interleague play is usually cited as something that Selig got right. No, people might not care about a Mets-Twins series, but people also don't care about a Mets-Ray series. Or an Orioles-Athletics series. That's not a problem with interleague, and it's not smart to have 32 teams in your league but having only half that number available as opponents for all but two of your members in a given season (those two being the Pennant Winners).

Eh, I still have a hard time imagining a scenario where MLB does anything that massive, well-sourced or not. Even if someone from the Manfred camp wants it doesn't mean that the actual owners are at all interested, which nothing I've heard has lead me to believe that they are wanting the AL/NL split done away or radically altered aside from AL bosses wanting the NL to adopt the DH.

Also, as a 32-year old, I can guarantee you that there are plenty of baseball fans under 35 that would care.

I definitely think this is coming from Manfred's camp, he doesn't seem to care as much about heritage as others. But I do agree that it's unlikely that this does end up happening.

 

[Hire Sather]

I've come to accept that the DH is coming, but I cannot accept my Mets being in a division with Cleveland, Minnesota, Toronto and the Tigers. Absurd.

 

[blueandgoldguy]

If the expansion fee is 1 billion.... how is Montreal a lock? Dont know who would put up the 2.25 billion cad (1.25 cad expansion fee + 1 billion for stadium) required for a Montreal baseball team.

Point well taken regarding the expansion cost, but it will not cost close to a billion for a stadium. It will cost about $500 - $550 million Canadian to build an outdoor 35,000 seat stadium in Montreal.

 

[Gnashville]

The thing is I think yours is a minority opinion. Interleague play is usually cited as something that Selig got right. No, people might not care about a Mets-Twins series, but people also don't care about a Mets-Ray series. Or an Orioles-Athletics series. That's not a problem with interleague, and it's not smart to have 32 teams in your league but having only half that number available as opponents for all but two of your members in a given season (those two being the Pennant Winners).

Oh I think my opinion is shared more than what you think. Interleague play was a gimmick and serves no purpose now.
The best scenario would be 32 teams 2 leagues and 4 divisions.
AL East
Yankees
Red Sox
Blue Jays
Orioles
Rays
Indians
Tigers
Expansion team or White Sox

AL West
Expansion Team or White Sox
Royals
Twins
Rangers
Astros (should go back to the NL but whatever)
Angels
Mariners
Athletics

NL East
Mets
Braves
Marlins
Reds
Pirates
Phillies
Expos
Nationals

NL West
Cubs
Cardinals
Rockies
Brewers (should be in the AL but whatever)
DiamondBacks
Dodgers
Giants
Padres

162 game Schedule
12 games interdivisional (84 games)
9 games out of division (72 games)
6 interleague games vs rival (Mets-Yankees) (Expos-Jays) act
Start the season 2 weeks earlier or have Sunday Double Headers

156 game Schedule
12 games interdivisional (84 games)
9 games out of division (72 games)
Start season 1 week earlier

Playoffs
4 wild card teams playing best of 3 series (all 3 games at higher seed)
then divisional winners vs Wild Card best of 5
LCS best of 7
WS best of 7

Phase out the DH in 5 years and get rid of the stupid intentional walk rule (lob up 4 pitches).

 

[Bucky_Hoyt]

I would say the purpose of interleague play is to showcase players or teams that half of the league's cities would never see otherwise.

For example, I am a long-time Cubs fan (since I was 12) and the closest city to travel to, to see them play live for me, was Seattle. Meaning interleague was likely my only chance.

There have also been arguments about the NHL not having teams play at least 1 game a season against teams in the opposite conference. And this did happen for a few seasons and flopped because people want to see the teams or showcased players.

For Interleague play's future, I would say that it is more likely you will see more games against the other league in time rather than less. It's been in the making for over a decade now.

As for DH in the NL, won't really bother me but do prefer the NL game. Heck, seeing Arrietta and Lester hit homers has been a treat.

As for Vancouver as expansion candidate, I don't think it would work. No ownership group is going to fork over 2+ billion (franchise fee and retractable roof stadium). With MLS and CFL, I think they're at capacity for Summertime sports spending for a metro of their size.

Also the population is going broke due to the housing bubble and lack of major corporate employers. I would hope one day they got back a AAA team -- they could upgrade the Nat to a 10k stadium.

Still iffy about Montreal too. Yes there was bad ownership but the Expos franchise had MANY MANY bad years at the gate long before Brochu and Loria. Personally, I think they get a relo of either the A's or Rays. They'd be much better off in the AL anyway against Toronto, Boston, and the Yankees in terms of fans showing up.

As for expansion candidates maybe Sacramento as their AAA team has done well. Could also see Charlotte even with the newly built minor-league park. Look no further than Atlanta to see a city discard two stadia that were barely 20 years old.

 

[Kimi]

Completely aside, but I find the DH rule really interesting. You have a rule that produces two different results depending on the level of play. In the professional game you have it so that you avoid having the pitcher bat (as they are a relatively bad batter), but at lower levels you use it so that your pitcher can bat while not pitching (as they are often the superior athlete). It's kinda paradoxical, which makes it funky when ideally in sports you have the same rulebook producing the same results for all levels of play.

It's also interesting that they invented an entire new player, when you can achieve the desired result by just having one less batter (the pitcher) in the batting order. (I don't know the intricacies of baseball well enough to know if that has any knock on effects else where in the game, I only watch for a few weeks after the summer cricket season has ended each year.)