Expansion and Realignment

The topic of expansion in Major League Baseball has been bounced around a good bit lately. This topic distracts from discussing the elephant in the room (not the Athletics mascot). The labor dispute between players and owners , or millionaires and billionaires, is looming at the end of this season. If they don’t get that worked out, it won’t matter if there are 2 teams or 50. The game will be on thin ice. I’ll have more to say about that as the year goes by, but for now I’ll stay with the topic of expansion.

The proposal involves adding two teams to provide for an even number in each league. I am absolutely in favor of this, but I would also include a realignment to address some other issues. For the purposes of this discussion, I am going to add the 2 new franchises in Nashville (Stars) and Salt Lake City (Utah Buzz, to recognize that state’s nickname, “The Beehive State”) Next, I will eliminate the current AL and NL structure and replace it with a geographical alignment. Here’s my proposed configuration:

Eastern Conference

Northeast Division - Boston, NY Mets, NY Yankees, Toronto

Mideast Division - Cincinnati, Cleveland, Detroit, Minnesota

Atlantic Division - Baltimore, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Washington

Southeast Division - Atlanta, Miami, Nashville, Tampa Bay

Western Conference

Midwest Division - Chicago Cubs, Chicago White Sox, Milwaukee, St Louis

Southwest Division - Arizona, Houston, Kansas City, Texas

Pacific Division - Las Vegas*, LA Angels, LA Dodgers, San Diego

Northwest Division - Colorado, San Francisco, Seattle, Utah

*assumes the A’s really move to Vegas

Each team would play 12 games against their division (6 home and 6 away) 36

6 against the rest of their conference (3 and 3) 72

3 against the other conference (alternate home and away annually 48

Total 156 games

If they insisted on keeping the schedule at the current 162 games, they could add 2 more games against their division, but I would shorten it to 156. Then I would have each division winner and four wild cards enter the playoffs seeded according to record.

Traditionalists will hate this proposal. I am by nature “old-school”, but I believe it is time to make some changes. This would create new, more intense rivalries and decrease travel expenses. It would also re-establish some of the intrigue of fewer regular season meetings of World Series foes. It would also eliminate the possibility of two New York teams meeting in the Series. All the more reason!

I know this would never be approved - it makes too much sense. Of course, the people who run baseball have never asked for my input before. Why would they start now?

This is one man’s opinion - what’s yours?