Baseball Realignment

This past week the commissioner of baseball, Rob Manfred, said the league is exploring the possibility of expansion, adding two teams, and then giving baseball a transformative realignment. This likely would eliminate the two leagues that have been the cornerstone of baseball for a hundred years.

I have always thought of myself as a baseball purist. This is the greatest game ever invented and why they keep messing with it confounds and angers me. At least it used to. When the national league adopted the designated hitter a few years ago that was the last vestige of times gone by and I reluctantly went along with the changes.

Then more changes came to pass and guess what, I kind of like them. I love the pitch clock, I like the challenges, I really like the three batter minimum for relief pitchers, and the only one I'm on the fence with is the ghost runner in extra innings but it happens so infrequently that it isn't that big of a deal.

Anyway, while my two favorite teams, the Cubs and the Padres, are in the middle of a summer swoon I thought I would take a crack at my choice for expansion cities and realignment because I know Rob will be calling for my advice shortly like he always does.

EXPANSION CITIES

I feel that Charlotte and Portland are two cities that deserve to get major league baseball. They both sustain teams from other sports already and they would bring some regional rivalries into the game. Since we no longer have American and National leagues I have named the two leagues that will replace them as the AARON and CLEMENTE leagues.

AARON LEAGUE

Northeast - Toronto, Boston, NY Yankees, NY Mets

Coastal - Baltimore, Washington, Philadelphia, Charlotte

Southeast - Atlanta, Tampa, Miami, Cincinnati

Mideast - Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Detroit, Chicago White Sox

CLEMENTE LEAGUE

Midwest - Chicago Cubs, St. Louis, Milwaukee, Minnesota

Central - Colorado, Kansas City, Texas, Houston

Southwest - San Diego, Arizona, LA Dodgers, LA Angels

West - Portland, Seattle, San Francisco, Las Vegas (formally Oakland)

Teams would play the following schedule:

2 games against each team in the other league - 32

(Teams would alternate home games each year)

6 games against each team in their league - 90

12 games against each team in their division - 36

Total games played 158

This schedule would keep the competition fair as each team would play every other team.

Each division winner would qualify for post season and the four next best records in each league would be the wild card teams.

Some have suggested that there should be four divisions with eight teams in each instead. My realignment would look like this:

AARON LEAGUE

RUTH DIVISION - Toronto, Boston, NY Yankees, NY Mets, Baltimore, Washington, Philadelphia, Charlotte

WILLIAMS DIVISION - Atlanta, Tampa, Miami, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Detroit, Chicago White Sox

CLEMENTE LEAGUE

BANKS DIVISION - Chicago Cubs, St. Louis, Milwaukee, Minnesota, Colorado, Kansas City, Texas, Houston

KOUFAX DIVISION - Portland, Seattle, San Francisco, Las Vegas, LA Dodgers, LA Angels, San Diego, Arizona

This schedule would look like this:

3 games against each team in the other league - 48

(Teams would alternate home games each year)

5 games against each team within your league - 60

6 games within your division - 48

Total games played - 156

Each division winner would qualify for post season and the next six best records in each league would then be the wild card teams.

While I'm not a fan of realignment I am in favor of adding two teams to make each league have sixteen teams and reduce the amount of interleague games played. This will make the all-star game and the World Series more interesting because fans will not have seen the other leagues teams nine times already.

Maybe I'll just save some time and email Rob this today to avoid having to wait for his call.