For the sake of anyone who isn’t immediately familiar with the current MLB division alignment, here’s an image that shows the present landscape. West: Diamondbacks, Dodgers, Giants, Padres, A.L. You read those right. For the purposes of my realignment scheme, I am going to assume that the Rays stay put in Tampa and that Montreal and Portland are the two expansion cities. teams and the Rockies would switch to the A.L. Not only will we get to see more of these intrastate rivalries, but travel is cut down dramatically. Maybe not so much. Let us know! He grew up in the sport as a catcher with great coaches who taught him to love and respect the game and the team. These are just two of a myriad of possibilities that we could see with expansion and league realignment. South” here only has two truly “southern” teams — the terminology is simply to be consistent with the N.L. Here's what you need to know about the KBO, told to USA Today's Bob Nightengale on Tuesday. Major League Baseball hasn’t expanded since 1998, but if there is MLB expansion, here are seven potential cities for new teams. Rather, the conversation was directed toward MLB expansion to 32 MLB teams, complete league realignment, and Wild Card expansion. This would help create a new Canadian rivalry, Toronto vs. Montreal. Samson briefly touched on the topics and said none would happen until the Oakland Athletics and Tampa Bay Rays each sort out their stadium current situations. Still, I’ll repeat that I believe no one wants more than 10 percent of the schedule played against an in-city rival. East: Mets, Nationals, Phillies, Pirates, N.L. A few more thoughts about MLB expansion and realignment. People moan about everything, but, hey, at least they care. One of the major changes you’ll notice is that the Houston Astros are grouped in the South division with the likes of the Miami Marlins, Atlanta Braves, and Tampa Bay Rays. 3) Move Minnesota to West Conf. Imagine how giddy he'd look, though, if this potential modern realignment, coupled with expanded playoffs — something else that's being discussed — is a hit within baseball and becomes permanent? So we’re likely not going to have any expansion for at least eight more years. Rather, the conversation was directed toward MLB expansion to 32 MLB teams, complete league realignment, and Wild Card expansion. Based on the hypothetical realignment told to USA Today's Bob Nightengale on Tuesday, not only would the Subway, Freeway, Windy City and other regional series become more meaningful, but baseball could also have these division races in 2020: East: Yankees-Rays-NationalsCentral: Braves-Twins-CardinalsWest: Astros-Dodgers-Athletics. Scheduling divisions like this is another story, and I’ll get to that in a future part of this series. This is how the new format might look. clubs would remain in the “new” American League. MLB Expansion/Realignment Proposal #2. Let's go through some of the reasons this plan makes sense as more than just a one-year wonder: Selig's 1997 proposal, introduced as part of negotiations related to the 1998 expansion, included four regional divisions rather than the three reportedly being discussed now, but the team groupings were largely the same. When the owners and players compare notes in CBA negotiations afterward, they ought to agree that it's good business to embrace at least some of the changes. If these three divisions become the norm, then teams will inevitably separate and the races will just become . West: Angels, Athletics, Mariners, Portland, There would be a fair amount of league-swapping in this setup to help make the alignment geographically compact. I can’t speak for fans in the other two-team markets (New York, Los Angeles, the San Francisco Bay area), but I think I speak for most people in Chicago when I say that absolutely no one here wants to see (about) 18 Cubs/White Sox games a year. Longest flight: Toronto to Boston (1 hour, 45 minutes) The new-look AL East ditches the geographical outlier Tampa Bay Rays and in turn becomes MLB’s most pain-free travel divisions. Former What else, realistically? MORE: Starving for baseball? . Most of them just want baseball, whatever the format. Two of those three are expansion teams, though, with shorter histories in their current league, and the benefit here is that none of these divisions would have more than one hour’s difference between any of the cities, and five of the eight would be within a single time zone. Maybe the schedule wouldn't work over a full season. I tried to group teams together within geographical regions to minimize travel, because we know that a 162-game season is grueling and travel catches up with a lot of teams over the course of a season. Those sorts of rivalries, as well as other current divisional rivalries such as White Sox/Twins, Dodgers/Padres, Nationals/Phillies, Cardinals/Brewers, Cubs/Brewers and Rangers/Astros, have meaning to fans. The field could remain at 10, but that would require, say, giving first-round byes to the division winners and three wild-card teams. Let me be clear. races. The impetus to finally “get around to it” on MLB expansion, realignment and scheduling came from this Jayson Stark article at The Athletic, posted Wednesday. teams. The 2020 MLB season is becoming as much of a research project as a sporting competition. Rather than the three divisions that we have now, I’ve broken the American and National Leagues into four divisions. Do you have a question for the podcast? alignment I’m proposing.). My feelings? Baseball is a constantly-changing game. podcast) last Thursday and the conversation turned to a major overhaul in Major Charlie Blackmon: Your Red Carpet BFF at the ASG, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWGsYBbi6Jo, Podcast Episode Forty-Eight: Fantasy Pitching, Podcast Episode Forty-Seven: Ideas Not Plans, Podcast Episode Forty-Six: 2002 World Series Game 6, Podcast Episode Forty-Five: MLB Season Proposals. This is a bit different than the ideas I put forth in the previous articles in this series, but I think this one gets the geography better: N.L. Here’s a good realignment which keeps geography close, preserves traditional rivalries and keeps most of the current N.L. South: Braves, Marlins, Orioles, Rays, N.L. Throw out fans' reactions. Do you think Bud Selig is trying to contain a smile or a wry chuckle right now? Yes, the Astros and Dodgers would be division rivals again after 27 years, which means they'd see enough of each other in the proposed 100 or 110-game regular season for LA to settle scores over 2017. Central: Brewers, Cardinals, Cubs, Reds, N.L. We’ll save Wild Card expansion for another day. 2) Equally intermix 4 AL & 4 NL teams in each division (to balance DH rule). There will be more division games on the schedule with double the amount of teams to play within a given division. Show full articles without "Continue Reading" button for {0} hours. This would require MLB to make a sweeping declaration regarding the designated hitter, re-think playoff structure, and overhaul division scheduling. Sure, New York state may have two baseball teams already. Upgrading them to division games would add tons of heat, especially in a year when the New York, LA and Chicago teams all have eyes on the playoffs. This should help to cut down on some of that wear and tear that happens in August and September. The first you’ll see is division realignment within each league. Despite the current landscape of the game with proposed rule changes and debating stadium netting, neither topic was broached. teams would stay put in this scheme, and 13 of the current 15 A.L. For the sake of fun, the two expansion teams I’ve included are my dream expansion cities (highlighted in red): Montreal, Quebec and Portland, Oregon. Downsides? A recent article in Baseball America suggested MLB is considering an expansion to 32 teams and a 156-game schedule. If a baseball fan from 1920 were suddenly to materialize at a ballgame in 2020, he or she would definitely recognize the game being played on the field — nine fielders, nine hitters, three outs per inning, four balls for a walk, three strikes for an out, etc., but would also note many differences. Mexico’s capital city could become the third MLB expansion team located internationally, behind the Toronto Blue Jays and Montreal Expos. This is an extreme yet encouraging talking point given the typical doomsday talk about the state of baseball that typically graces radio airwaves. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. The West divisions are tightened up a bit geographically and limited almost entirely to states on the west coast, with the Arizona Diamondbacks as the only exception in the NL West. Teams: Baltimore Orioles, Boston Red Sox, New York Yankees, Toronto Blue Jays. No team wants to play a one-game series if it can avoid it. Like us on Facebook to see similar stories, Herd immunity strategy endorsed by White House a 'ridiculous' way to stop COVID, say scientists — it will just kill people, Fast Food May Be Your Only Dining Out Option Left, Experts Warn. I thought I’d try to tackle some of the other things in Stark’s article, and I’ll begin today with MLB expansion and realignment, always a touchy subject. Fans would take that. 4) AL teams keep DH, NL teams … This argument makes more sense in the short term. (Thanks, Jayson, for giving me at least a week’s worth of topics to write about!). This is a reasonable thing to want to do; it not only cuts costs but would help player rest. Lastly, this alignment would preserve the following divisional rivalries: Cubs/Cardinals, Dodgers/Giants, Yankees/Red Sox. I’ve already written one article here on something Stark noted, the universal designated hitter. This is an extreme yet encouraging talking point given the typical doomsday talk about the state of baseball that typically graces radio airwaves. The Rays and Orioles would become N.L. The second half of the season will be easier on teams as they likely won’t have to travel quite as much as they would have had to with previous league designations. This is the first major difference from the current MLB model with East, Central, and West divisions. like October 17, 2017 6:15 … and A.L. I have previously written on this topic here, here, here and here, so you might think I don’t have anything more to say on it... but of course I do!