re: Manfred: Realignment and expansion on the table

Another pointless move by Manfred. Baseball is rooted in tradition. These guys are multi-millionaires taking chartered jets. Saving on travel doesn’t drop much more in the bucket for these owners, and it’s not worth it when you lose traditional rivalries. It’s a system that is no longer broken with the expanded Wild Card. Keep the old AL/NL breakdown, as there’s nothing wrong with it. Change for the sake of change will only alienate viewers.

As for SLC…pretty sure they just opened a new ballpark this year. I think it’s in the suburbs though, so who knows how it was paid for.

Nashville voters may not want to be taken to the cleaners again either.

San Antonio is closing in on a new downtown ballpark for Double A and possible Triple A, and a new Spurs arena and Alamodome renovation are on top in some massive project that’s in the works right now. I think they are out.

Who does that leave? Portland? Maybe Austin? Orlando?

If expansion takes place they'll have to add at least 8 minor league teams and possibly 10 if the new teams are in AAA cities. I wonder where the new teams would come from?

I'm in favor of realignment if it gets the Astros back to a division with majority CST teams, even if it means keeping the little brothers of Arlington around. Having 30% of the schedule start games at/after 9pm is obnoxious.

MLB is being killed from within.

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MLB is being killed from within.

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This is absolutely true. There were a bunch of cheap owners that decided to use COVID as the excuse to cut out minor leagues and put hard caps on the number of players allowed in the minors. And it's having negative effects on player development and the game at the highest level.

I think what you'll see is further consolidation of minor league teams.

Where in the past teams had 6 sometimes 7 levels of minors they will further reduce down to where organizations have only 3 levels. I think teams will start to shift drafted high school & low-level players into independent or combined organizations but still under contract with the MLB team. I also see them going to a model where a player can be drafted out of high school or underclass and still continue to attend college.

Not to dissimilar to how hockey operates.

I don't like it one bit. That's a big NO from me dawg.

And Salt Lake is too small in population to support an MLB team. Colorado, Arizona and now Las Vegas negate that. And while they are further away - SF and Seattle pull some of that.

As much as I detest the Dodgers and Padres... they need to stay in a division with SF.

Postseason, especially the WS, was more dramatic when you had teams that never faced each other that season.


Do away with interleague play and keep divisions the same.

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How many ideas do you have? The only way to shorten the season without removing games is more doubleheaders or fewer off days.

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Playing double headers every other Saturday, where each team has one road and one home DH a month.

I did the math one time, and it ended up cutting down close to 2 weeks of the season. So to make it more palatable for the players to agree to scheduled double headers, shorten the season by 10 days and give the other saved dates as off days. I know it's not a lot, but it could be a start toward the discussion of fewer games. 158 vs 162, along with the other changes and you've cut two weeks of the schedule.

But the owners would need to agree. That's why they'd host one per month on a Saturday and be able to market it as an all day event. So many of them own all the places around the parks now that it could be a net positive despite losing unique playing days.

The players union would get a lot of extra guaranteed game checks for the extra guy that gets to be called up for those games.

It's not perfect, and I'd imagine there are a lot of things I haven't considered. But MLB isn't exactly lighting the world on fire with great ideas lately, so what the hurt in mentioning something like this.