Because I Can

From the looks of things, the Florida Marlins are likely moving to either Las Vegas, Nevada or Portland, Oregon. They want a baseball-only stadium, and frankly they do not have the following in Florida for the city of Miami to build them one.

If they want an exciting stadium, they should put it in Vegas. They could do all kinds of crazy things, like have the monorail take you right to it (a la Disneyworld), have a high-capacity dome, sell reasonably-priced concessions, etc. And they could play in Trump stadium. Given its tourist attraction status, the Vegas location would benefit greatly from a more gimmicky stadium, and would thus be even more fun to watch.

In Portland, though, they could not only develop a greater following (with a larger overall population). And the city has proven they can support a professional sports franchise with the Blazers, whereas Vegas currently holds the Dodgers' AAA affiliate. Also, Portland's location could give a view of the Willamette - or moving away from central Portland, Columbia - river, where such an option is not so easy in Vegas, if a waterside view is prefered.

Regardless, the team will no longer remain in the National League's "East" division, save for a farce similar to that which put the Atlanta Braves in the West division until the advent of the Central division, but would move to the National League West. The obvious initial solution then to merely put the Pittsburgh Pirates in the East, since they are east of Atlanta. This still leaves 5 teams in the East, 5 in the Central, and 6 in the West. But that would be odd with the American League having 5 teams in the East, 5 in the Central, and only 4 in the West.

The revolutionary, and yet blatantly obvious solution is to put the Colorado Rockies in the American League, West division. What is blatantly obvious about this is that the Rockies, with their mountain air, have a great hitters' park, and the American League caters more to offense with the Designated Hitter position. What is revolutionary about this, though, is that it will force the league to schedule interleague play thoughout the season, since there would then be an odd number of teams in each league.

To put this in perspective, the Dodgers are scheduled for 5 3-game interleague series in 2006, most of which are in the months right before the all-star break, which would be 15 games. This new schedule would create the need for either 4 or 6 interleague series, and for the purposes of this idea, it will be 6. This will create 2 3-day stretches where each team plays in interleague. In each occurance, the pairing will be the same, with all NL teams getting home field advantage the first time and all AL teams getting it the second time. Then there will be one weekend in which 9 teams will play interleague series while 6 series between major intra-division rivals take place, which can be known as "super rivalry weekend." These rivalries will vary year to year, but will always include Yankees-Red Sox and Dodgers-Giants.

Summarizing, the current layout looks like this:

National League

East
Braves
Mets
Marlins
Nationals
Phillies

Central
Astros
Brewers
Cardinals
Cubs
Pirates
Reds

West _ _
Diamondbacks
Dodgers
Giants
Padres
Rockies

American League

East
Blue Jays
Devil Rays
Orioles
Red Sox
Yankees

Central
Indians
Royals
Tigers
Twins
White Sox

West
Angels
Athletics
Mariners
Rangers

Whereas my new proposal would look more like this:

National League

East ____________ Central _____________ West _ _
Braves__________ Astros ____________ Diamondbacks
Mets ___________Brewers ____________Dodgers
Nationals________Cardinals____________Giants
Phillies__________ Cubs ___________Marlins (new name likely)
Pirates __________Reds ______________Padres

American League

East_____ ________ Central _____________ West _ _
Blue Jays _________Indians ____________ _Angels
Devil Rays ________Royals ______________Athletics
Orioles __________Tigers _____________ _Mariners
Red Sox __________Twins ______________Rangers
Yankees _________White Sox ____________Rockies

Each team will play 21 games against each of the other teams in their division, 6 games against each of the other teams in the league, and 18 total interleague games, consisting of at least one series against each team in the corresponding division of the opposite league. For example, the Yankees would play the Braves, Mets, Phillies, Nationals, and Pirates in interleague play. To recap, that is

Division Play 84 games
League Play 60 games
+ Interleague Play 18 games
Total 162 games

Which adds up to a full season.

Granted, there are winners and losers in this deal. The losers would be the four original NL West teams, the four original AL West teams, and arguably the Pirates (although they would no longer have the Cubs, Astros and Cardinals, the Braves, Mets, and Phillies, and maybe even Nationals might give them a hard time). The winners of this, by a greater margin would be the AL East, whichever new city gets the Marlins, and the Colorado Rockies, who would be given a chance to be legitimate competitors. Fans of baseball, though, would also see a more competitive major league system (except possibly the NL East, with the Pirates and Nationals as questionable contenders), an overall improvement in the division setup, and the home to a DH who's close to retirement but just not quite ready to go yet (Frank Thomas? Mike Piazza? Larry Walker's return from retirement?), especially one who wants to work on a home run total.

So when the Marlins decide they want to move West, I will be sending a letter to Bud Selig's office.

Labels: MLB