Kevin Kiermaier gets a 6/$50M+ extension with the Rays, buying out all 3 arb years and first 3 FA years

Don't look now, but the Diamondbacks and Rays will each begin their 20th seasons of play this April.

Which probably means another round of expansion is just around the bend.

http://www.si.com/mlb/2016/04/22/mlb-ex ... e-portland

When MLB does expand (because I think this is a when-not-if proposition), I think the two best and most available markets will be Montreal and Portland. But how do you realign? It opens up a lot of possibilities. I figure there would be some significant league switching. Or you could drop the leagues altogether - since they are essentially fictional vestiges now anyway - and re-align along strictly geographical lines.

Thinking about 8 4 team divisions, and keeping the AL/NL structure, I guess you'd get something like this:

AL North East
Cleveland
Detroit
Toronto
Montreal (expansion, placed here for rivalry purposes with Toronto)

AL East
New York
Boston
Baltimore
Washington (from NL, for rivalry purposes)

AL Central
Chicago
Kansas City
Minnesota
Milwaukee (from NL)

AL West
Oakland
Los Angeles
Seattle
Portland (expansion, placed here for rivalry purposes)

NL East
Philadelphia
New York
Atlanta
Miami

NL Midwest
Cincinnati
Chicago
St. Louis
Pittsburgh

NL Mountain Southwest
Arizona
Texas (from AL)
Houston (from AL)
Austin/San Antonio (Tampa Bay relocated)

NL West
San Francisco
San Diego
Los Angeles
Colorado

The advantage here is that you largely retain the league structure, most traditional rivalries are preserved (Yankees/Red Sox, Cubs/Cardinals, Dodgers/Giants), and restores certain "traditional" markets to their "correct" leagues - Milwaukee back to AL (I know it was NL before that), Houston back to NL, Washington back to AL. Texas moves to the NL to maintain the Texas rivalry with Houston, and you solve the Tampa Bay problem by moving to the, I believe, more baseball-ready Austin/San Antonio area.

Of course, you could go radical realignment and do a full-on geographical thing, regardless of league:

Great Lakes
Montreal (expansion)
Toronto
Detroit
Cleveland

East
Boston
NY Yankees
NY Mets
Philadelphia

Southeast
Baltimore
Washington
Atlanta
Miami

Midwest
Pittsburgh
Cincinnati
Minnesota
Kansas City

Mississippi Valley
Chicago
Chicago
St. Louis
Milwaukee

Southwest
Texas
Houston
Arizona
Austin/San Antonio (moved from TB)

California
Los Angeles
Los Angeles
San Francisco
Oakland

West
Portland (expansion)
San Diego
Seattle
Colorado

Works out pretty well, most choices here were made either to preserve existing or "natural" rivalries (i.e., it might have made more sense geographically for a division of LA-LA-SD-AZ, but keeping the Giants & Dodgers together, and the Athletics with the Giants and Angels with the Dodgers makes "natural" rivalry sense), and again moving TB to Austin/San Antonio not only solves a distribution problem in terms of divisions but also the real-world problem of what to do with that franchise.

Please never become commissioner.

WheelsFellOff wrote:Please never become commissioner.

I wouldn't sweat it, but regardless, expansion and eight four team divisions are pretty much inevitable so the options after that aren't infinite.

Unless they expand the playoffs to an NHL-like half-the-teams-make-postseason I don't see them going to four divisions. The wild card has been wildly successful and I'm not sure how they'd format a playoff to maintain that intrigue.

If they do expand to 32, 3 unbalanced divisions per league is a little awkward. I don't like an 8 team playoff though. I like how it is now. I do think the one thing really hindering expansion might be resistance to cities ponying up for new stadiums.

More teams = smaller chance to win title. It's bad enough as it is.

Tacos>>>

BigEd76 wrote:the stuff Lehigh Valley gets into....smh

Gotta love that they have a Hispanic guy dressed in the taco uniform.

I still think that the Pirates should be in the National League east. I miss that rivalry. Let's get the Braves the fuck out of our division. I don't care if it doesn't make sense. Tim Allen.

Rev_Beezer wrote:I still think that the Pirates should be in the National League east. I miss that rivalry. Let's get the Braves the fuck out of our division. I don't care if it doesn't make sense. Tim Allen.

I do miss that rivalry, but you have to admit it was a little weird when Cincinnati and Atlanta were in the West while St. Louis and Chicago were in the East.

Reports are out that the Pirates' Kang was denied a work visa. Three DUIs in a year.

Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos.

rolex wrote:Reports are out that the Pirates' Kang was denied a work visa. Three DUIs in a year.

what about kodos?

WfO voted for him

Bucky wrote:WfO voted for him

middle america? that's how we got the guy we got now.

he SAID not to blame him!!

Tigers are trying to convert Anthony Gose into a pitcher