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| Is geographical realignment in Major League Baseball's future? It would only help the game |
In this post, I want to take a look at the possibility of division realignment in Major League Baseball. The MLB, similar to the NFL and unlike the NBA and NHL, is based on the traditions of the American and National Leagues, where geography is not the basis for each of the leagues. The NBA and NHL split their leagues into two "eastern" and "western" conferences, with divisions grouping the nearest geographic rivals. MLB's divisions do create geographic rivals, but most teams are not in the same division as their nearest physical rival (i.e. Mets-Yankees, Dodgers-Angels, Cubs-White Sox, Orioles-Nationals, etc.) Sure, regional rivalries against the Yankees and Red Sox exist for the Orioles, but wouldn't playing teams from Washington, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh with regularity be even better? In a league that struggles to fill its stadiums to capacity (outside of the major population areas of New York, Boston, Philadelphia and occasionally a few others), nightly attendance could increase across the league if the Orioles are playing more Tuesday night games against the Nationals rather than the Oakland Athletics.
Next season, the Houston Astros will be moving to the American League West, which will cause a chain of events. Each division will now have 5 teams, and the American and National Leagues will each have 15 teams. This means that interleague play will occur every day of the season, amplifying the DH vs. no-DH rules of both leagues. My thoughts are, why stop there? Now baseball traditionalists (and trust me, I'm usually one of them) will hate the idea of scrapping the traditions of the American and National Leagues and starting from scratch, but if baseball wants to continue to draw fans to its stadiums and maintain interest throughout the season, my proposal would help accomplish that goal:
