MLB is going to be 32 teams, with two new expansion franchises coming in the next five to seven years, give or take.
The commissioner, Rob Manfred, has signaled a willingness to reconfigure the leagues to be more geographically consistent, a la the NBA, which has Eastern and Western conferences, and to deviate from the decades-old 162-game schedule, both as approaches to reduce the wear and tear on players.
The devil is going to be in the details – as in, exactly how is this going to look when we get to 2030 to 2032, or thereabouts?
I’ve got some thoughts.
Realignment
If we’re going to go with two 16-team leagues – with four four-team divisions – based on geography, here’s what I’d propose.
American League
- Northeast: Boston Red Sox, New York Yankees, New York Mets, Philadelphia Phillies
- Southeast: Atlanta Braves, Nashville*, Tampa Bay Rays, Miami Marlins
- Central: Pittsburgh Pirates, Baltimore Orioles, Washington Nationals, Raleigh*
- Midwest: Cincinnati Reds, Cleveland Guardians, Detroit Tigers, Toronto Blue Jays
National League
- Northwest: San Francisco Giants, Las Vegas A’s, Colorado Rockies, Seattle Mariners
- Southwest: San Diego Padres, Los Angeles Dodgers, Los Angeles Angels, Arizona Diamondbacks
- Central: Houston Astros, Texas Rangers, Kansas City Royals, St. Louis Cardinals
- Midwest: Chicago Cubs, Chicago White Sox, Milwaukee Brewers, Minnesota Twins
I’m going with Nashville and Raleigh as my expansion cities.
Try as I might, I don’t see a way to balance out east and west without putting both of the expansion teams in the east.
Apologies to the folks in Portland and Salt Lake City on that one.
Regular season schedule
With four-team divisions, and 16-team leagues, here’s how I’d do it.
- Divisional play: 72 total (24 games against each of the three division opponents)
- Non-divisional in-league opponents: 72 games (six games, two three-game home-and-homes, against each of the other 12 league opponents)
- Intraleague: 12 games (a single three-game series against each of the teams in one division of the other league, rotating through every four years)
- Total: 156 games
Regular season TV
I’d continue the ongoing Sunday night package, with one exclusive national TV game every Sunday night in the regular season, through the first week of September.
On Mondays, I’d limit the overall league schedule to two games – one in each league, the game in my new eastern-based American League starting at 7 p.m. ET, the nightcap in the western-based National League starting at 10:15 p.m. ET – through the first week of September.
What I’m giving us here: the return of Monday Night Baseball.
Everybody else gets Monday night off, with three-game series beginning on Tuesday.
The four teams playing on Monday night get three-game series that end on Wednesday, with Thursdays off.
I cut this off at the first week of September to accede to the reality of not wanting to put these broadcasts up against the NFL.
I’d be perfectly fine with 22 Sundays and 22 Mondays from April 1 to Sept. 1 where I get to be the primary sports TV offering, with a run of weeknights and weekends in October for my playoff inventory.
Playoffs
The four division winners and two teams with the best records as second-place finishers as wild cards make up the six-team playoff fields in each league.
The first round, which includes the two wild-card teams and the division winners with the third- and fourth-best records, is a quick best-of-three, each series starting on the Monday after the end of the regular season, so, a quick turnaround.
The division winners are the hosts for all three games in the first round.
The second round and subsequent rounds are best-of-seven.
The low seed among the first-round winners plays the division winner with the best record in each league in the second round, with those top seeds getting the advantage of an extra home game – i.e. five of the seven possible, with the first three games being played at the top seed’s home stadium.
The division winner with the second-best record gets the customary one extra home game among the seven possible games advantage in the second round.
The extra-home-game advantage is not provided in the League Championship Series or World Series.
Advantages
My 156-game schedule gives us six games a week for 26 weeks, so we can start, as we used to, in the first week of April, and still end in the final week of September, with breathing room.
Travel is not the drain that it is in the current coast-to-coast leagues format.
Intraleague play is limited, giving us more of the mystique of the past, with a good chance that the two league champions have not met in the regular season.
The emphasis on playing games in the division gives us more local rivalries.
For example, for my two local teams, Washington and Baltimore, fans get to see the rivals eight different times each season – four three-game series at home, four three-game series on the road.
Disadvantages
The only one I can think of is, I’ve completely and totally wasted my time with this exercise.
It makes too much sense, and things that make too much sense don’t get done.
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Chris Graham
