Selig's proposed realignment

I think the 14-16 split is okay. I just wish they would go back to 2 divisions in each league, that way you have a pennant race. It wouldn’t bother me if they kept interleague play to a minimum.

slight hijack:
I’ve heard rumors that the Expos might move to DC. Anyone else heard this?

The Expos have been rumored to be moving to DC or Northern Virginia for most of the 1990s and now into the 2000s.

Since no baseball team has moved since 1972, I wouldn’t hold my breath.

I didn’t propose “contraction” as a necessary option, but in choosing the Expos, I thought it was the least viable franchise from historical fan support, drawing power, and market participation, team strength, etc. Every team goes through its cycles, but it seems the Expos are one of those teams that never get over the hump, even when they have a competitive team. If there is any current franchise that deserves “death,” I suppose they’re the ones, but I don’t necessarily advocate it. (Plus, its hard for the citizens of Canada to lobby our legislators to revoke baseball’s anti-trust exemption). Heck, if we based survival upon on the field performance, the Cubs would be the ones that would have to go!

I don’t think 4 team divisions would necessarily make for poor pennant races. With in imbalanced schedule, the competition within a division should equalize somewhat. If there is one division that has a runaway, there is a possibility of races in three other divisions within the league. Plus, if your “weighted” schedule had each league with two conferences, each conference with two divisions, the competition between the two intra-confrence divisions would be more heated as well. I think it could work if the schedule makers were smart. 4 team divisions used to work in the NFL in the early 70s after the AFL/NFL merger. It could work in MLB.

The rumors regarding the relocation of the Expos are legion. I think the Lords of Baseball are both loathe to offend the Canadians, as well as they would rather expand again and get the entrance fees a couple more teams would bring. The relocation of the Twins is also an almost annual rumor. Years ago, the Twins were always going to Tampa. Now its the Carolinas. I recall when the Padres were almost relocated to D.C., and, of course, the White Sox came within an eyelash of going to St. Petersburg.

As for future expansion sites, I find it hard to ignore both Carolina and Northern Virginia. Nashville is OK, too, but in the course of my travels still doesn’t feel like a major league city (of course, I don’t think Tampa-St. Pete is a major league city either, and the attendance at Devil Ray games seems to bear that out). Memphis is definitely a second tier city. Other spots might be Buffalo (though close to Toronto), Indianapolis, New Orleans, and New Jersey.

Three divisions of five teams in each league sounds good to me. Somebody will have to move, be it the Diamondbacks or Astros. At present I don’t much care which because I live in an American League city (more on that below). Eliminate one playoff round. I think there are too many and it causes the playoffs to drag on.

The Expos should absolutely move to DC/Northern Va. The lack of support they are getting in Montreal is appalling. They are the only major league franchise whose games are not broadcast on radio or television. Plus, their attendance is in the major league basement. It’s a shame too, because they’ve fielded some really good teams. I contend that the Expos would have reached the 1994 World Series and probably won had not the players’ strike pre-empted it. In addition, I support the move to DC because some regional competition would very likely spur my beloved hometown Orioles into turning around their recent history of mediocrity. It would also be nice to have a local National League team.

Mmm…actually, I believe they are the only team that doesn’t broadcast in English. And all Quebecois speak French, even the Anglophiles (as I understand it from Anglophile Quebecois friends), so I find this bit of trivia generally misleading.

Sorry SoxFan, but the difference between a 14-16 game NFL schedule and a 162 game MLB schedule means that a 4 team division just isn’t very likely to produce a good, tight pennant race, given the normal deviation in quality of teams in the entire league.

I have to respectfully disagree. I particpate in a fantasy/simulation league (a computer simulation using all-time great players) where there are 3 divisions of 4 teams each. Its a 162 game schedule, and has historically produced decent pennant races in 2 out of 3 divisions regularly. (Its an unbalanced schedule, by the way). I don’t see why “real life” ball couldn’t work the same way.

Even in the old 2 division, 6 team per division set up the NL and AL had for nearly 20 years, there often weren’t pennant races in each division. Indeed, the pennant race that would have been in a one-division league was split between two divisions. The playoffs then helped heighten excitement, but it wasn’t like the traditional pennant races of the old 8-team league format.

I am sympathetically with you,though, and prefer a return to 8 team leagues and a 154 game schedule.

Ahh, the 8-team league theory! I suppose baseball was only a real game when it was played east of the Mississippi (except for the two teams in St. Louis).

Nothing better to broaden the sport’s appeal than by having the game played in fewer cities.

The extra round of playoffs are here to stay as the owners need the revenue.

It’s far more practical to come up with a workable plan for 30 teams than to start pining for the “good old days”.

The quality of baseball played now is far superior to that played during the 16-team setup.

What I heard was that even their French language broadcasts were exclusively on the internet, although I must say up front that I haven’t investigated this and could well be mistaken. Please correct me if I’m wrong.

CKAC AM 730
Jacques Doucet, Rodger Brulotte and Alain Chantelois calling the play by play.

Bob T said:

Ahh, the 8-team league theory! I suppose baseball was only a real game when it was played east of the Mississippi (except for the two teams in St. Louis).


Ah, but this is not what I said. Baseball was a real game when it had real league loyalites and played a balanced 154 game schedule where real, long-standing rivalries could be established. If you read my original post in this thread, I did propose a very workable plan to re-institute the 8 team league format on a regional basis (it would require 2 more expansion teams, something the owners would not balk at). It would still include the extra tier of playoffs. It would,however, require the radical restructure of baseball and the elimination of what we currently know of as the NL and the AL. A lot baseball “purists” are against that.

I would argue that the quality of baseball played today is really not a whole lot different than during the 16 team set-up. Improvements in technology and training on and off the field may have produced marginally better athletes, equipment, and media communication, but the game hasn’t changed all that much. Indeed, one could logically argue that the game as played in the late 60s and early 70s was as good as baseball has ever gotten in terms of great players and memorable competition.

I take umbrage at your assertion that my advocacy for the 8-team set-up somehow makes me a vaccuous nostalgist. I believe baseball needs to re-kindle a sense of competition and rivalry for all the participants in the professional game, not just the Yankees and the Dodgers, the teams with superstation t.v. deals, or whoever happens to be in first place in a given season. I believe history has shown us that the kind of competition the 8 team league (or division if you will) makes that work the best. I believe that restructuring in on a regional basis will help foster that competition better than other proposeals.

Baseball has always been unique among professional sports in that the particpants in the post season have always truly been championship caliber. To preserve this in the ever expanding markets of MLB while fostering a sense of rivalry and competition will be a daunting task. I give Selig credit for trying. But, as this thread bears out, his proposal leaves most fans flat.

This is slightly off point, but the current schedule definitely has quirks. For example, the White Sox & Oakland As play each other 9 games this season, with 6 of them in Oakland. The Sox play 10 - 13 games against each of the other AL teams.

Squooshed wrote:

I had no idea Selig had any kind of training in Specific Impulse calculations or orbital dynamics. :wink:

And so it is. It also seems odd that the Sox have played the lion’s share of thier road games already, and have finished the season series with the Yankees in the third week of june, and only have 3 games left with Cleveland.

Another bizarre offshoot of the need for interleague play. Bah, humbug!

rickjay suggested a realignment option of expansion of two more teams (for a total of 32 MLB clubs) and having 4 divisions of 4 teams each in both leagues. The more I think about that system, the more I think it meets the expectations of more fans than not. I also think its workable within the current scheduling framework.

Aside from aligning the teams a little differently than he suggested (of course, depending on where the expansion teams are placed and whether Arizona and Tampa Bay change leagues), this format would work well with the current 162 game format.

Each league would group its 4 divisions into two conferences of two divisions each. E.g., the “Eastern” conference might have an “Atlantic” and “Southeast” division, while the “western” conference would have a “central” and “Pacific” division.

Let’s say the Chicago White Sox were placed in the new AL Central, which is in the AL Western Conference. The schedule would be as follows:

14 games against each of the 3 teams in its own division;
10 games against each of the 4 teams in the other division in the conference;
8 games against each of the teams in the other conference;
6 games against each of 4 teams from the other league.

If my math is correct (and it may not be) that’s 162 games.

This allows for more competition within a division and conference, while maintaining at least 8 dates with the rest of the league. It also keeps the current trend of interleague games with a particular division in the other league. As Kyla suggested, I’d like to see this rotate year to year, so the schedule would allow a look at every team in the other league over a 4 year period.

The calendar could reflect the sense of the pennant races the way it used to when the 2 division format was first used, and the last weeks of the season could exclusively feature competition within each division. It also allows for interleague play to be scheduled in a block the way Selig seems to want it, so it won’t interefere as much with the intra-league pennant races.

Playoffs would be best of 5 at the conference level, and best of 7 for the LCS. No wild card necessary!

I find this a little more palatable because it reaches a compromise with the traditionalists who hate the wild card and like the old AL/NL set up, while creating more competition within a division. In this scenario, the White Sox might only play traditional rivals like the Yankees, Red Sox, and Tigers 8 times a year, but the rivalries with teams in the same division (I would estimate it would be the Twins, Royal, and Rangers) would heat up because of more familiarity. The Indians were never considered a rival until we wound up in the same division. (Of course, they also started to play well about the same time too!) Consequently, the old rivalry with the A’s from the 70s and early 80s went away when we were no longer division rivals.

Can we forward this to Selig’s office?

>but it seems the Expos are one of those teams that never
>get over the hump, even when they have a competitive team.

Heh… course, when they do pump it up for a year and find themselves in first place… it’s time to cancel the post-season!

No fans have been screwed harder by the management of a professional sport than those of the Montreal Expos.
=-=-=-=-=-
BB&G
the Holy Avenger

SoxFan59 said

Sorry SoxFan, but I’m still not convinced that 4-team divisions is the way to go. A computer league in which every team is stocked with all time greats is by definition a tightly competitive league, as opposed to real life, in which the quality of the teams is more like to differ. Having 8 4-team divisions is a recipe for having 7 of the 8 pennant races over by the All-Star break.

PatrickM said:

Sorry SoxFan, but I’m still not convinced that 4-team divisions is the way to go. A computer league in which every team is stocked with all time greats is by definition a tightly competitive league, as opposed to real life, in which the quality of the teams is more like to differ. Having 8 4-team divisions is a recipe for having 7 of the 8 pennant races over by the All-Star break.
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While it is a computer simulation, the league i participate in does not have “every team stocked with all time greats.” There’s a salary cap, and the game is set up to turn on the strategy of using marginal players of the past to fill out your roster. Heck, we’re at mid season, and my team is 15 games out in last (4th) place. But each of the 3 divisions has a closely contested race between the top two teams (no more than 6 games seperates first and second place in each division, one division is a 2-game difference, the other 4) and if I were in one of the other divisions, I’d be 21 games out. This scenario is usually borne out. Occasionally, one of the divisions is a runaway, but that usually guarantees one other will have a close race because of the equities of the schedule.

This is the case in the current MLB set up, and was the case when there were only 4 divisions. I don’t know what your definition of a “pennant race” is, but let’s say a finish of 8 games or less for the second place team is considered a “race,” (this is arbitrary I know) and what are the results?

From 1969 to 1988, with 2 divisions in each league, we had a “race” a total of 59 times. That a divisional pennant race 78% of the time, with 2 divisions of 6 or 7 teams.

From 1950 to 1968, using the same criteria, we had a “race” a total of 28 times. That’s a 78% success rate as well, with only 1 division in each league of 8 to 10 teams.

From 1930 to 1949, there was a race a total of 25 times, or a 67% success rate.

From 1910 to 1929, there were 22 races, a 58% rate.

From 1901 to 1909, there were 12 races, a 75% rate.

I know figures lie and liars figure, and it probably depends on where you draw the line as to how the numbers skew. (I end at 1988 because my edition of “Total Baseball” ends there).

But in similar time frames, the odds that there would be a close race in your league or division did not change at all between 1950 and 1988. And this includes a time when baseball added 10 additional teams and split into 2 more divisions. So even though you added more teams and increased the number of possible pennant races by a factor of 2, the percentages did not change. Meaning there were actually MORE exciting pennant races (if you consider a finish of up to 8 games out “exciting”) than when there were only two “divisions.”

You folks who are better at mathmatical logic can cut this theory down, but why would we not excpect this ratio to remain with a further split of divisions? That is, if 70 to 78% are the odds, there will be a likely close race in 3 of each league’s 4 divisions.

Also note that the the lowest average (from 1910 to 1929) was 58%. Even there, the odds are great that we could expect a good race in as few as two and as many as three divisions in each league. That sounds like pretty good odds for an exciting season for somebody’s division, and not the horrid prediction Patrick foreshadows for MLB with 8 4 team divisions.

The suggestion I made in my last post (having more intra-divisonal games) helps mediate some of your concerns.