NL - 16 teams
AL - 14 teams
Especially with the 4 team AL west and the 6 team NL central, this really isn't fair. How can baseball fix this?
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NL - 16 teams
AL - 14 teams
Especially with the 4 team AL west and the 6 team NL central, this really isn't fair. How can baseball fix this?
{ 17 comments… read them below or add one }
They should either…….
Add 2 more teams to the AL so both leagues have 16 teams each with 32 total teams. After that the divisions would be realigned into 8 divisions with 4 teams each.
Or one of the teams in the NL Central should be moved to the AL West so its even both with the leages at 15 each and the 6 divisions with 5 teams each. The only problem would be the scheduling. There would have to be an interleague game going on everyday or a few of the teams would have to sit out with no one to play.
Either way, Its better than having such unfair division alignments.
they should send the phillies to the AL
MLB should move the Brewers back to the AL and stick the Royals in the AL West. Selig has actually proposed a plan to fix this problem, though. It sounds interesting, but I don’t know if it would work. Selig has suggested that teams be able to change their divisions based upon their records, kind of like the way they do it in European soccer leagues. It wouldn’t solve the mismatched number of teams issue, but it would prevent one good team in a division just beating up on the weaker division members.
in the end of the year they all play 162 so it’s just that the nl has more diversity and rare four game series….i don’t think adding some more expansion expansion teams would be that bad though…and the funny thing is that they’ll all get to win a world series before the cubs
why does it need to be fixed?
in the end the teams in the same divisions all play the same amount of games against the same teams. i don’t see how it isn’t fair.
It will be the AL’s turn to get at least a franchise. They are the junior circuit so they are in line for one or two more franchises. I wouldn’t be surprised if Mexico City received one since Canada has theirs.
maybe put more teams in the AL? i get the 10 ponts for bestest answereer!! yes!~!
That’s actually a common misconception. You see, all teams play 162 games in a season. Having an extra team in a division doesn’t lessen the chances of each team winning it, if a team is good enough to win ball games they will be above those who aren’t.
take the Reds, they fight against 5 other teams for the NL central division…
take the Rangers, they fight against 3 other teams for the AL West division…
but, both teams are winning their division… because of their records alone.
Example: Lets randomly take the Brewers and move them into the AL West, now, how exactly does this help the odds of any other teams who aren’t in first place? It doesn’t!
It might not be time for an expansion team. Consider the current economy.
Interestingly enough….all teams in the AL West and I think all of the teams in the NL West..yep, they all won divisional titles, so that’s really what you want. It’s no fun being in division dominated by 2-3 teams.
It raises another question of what do you do with franchises like KC and Pittsburgh….possibly relocate….but the Pirates have a long history, it probably wouldn’t work.
But I think the idea of mixing up the divisions, as mentioned above, is a good idea.
Obvious options include:
A. expand the AL.
B. contract the NL.
C. realign.
However, MLB prefers this option:
D. Do Nothing, and let the symmetrists complain all they want, to willfully deaf ears.
MLB does care about fairness, but not nearly as much as it cares about money (it IS a business), and options A, B, and C have nil profit motives. (Option A will, in better times, but not now.)
You should explain why this isn’t fair, since almost nobody else has a problem with it.
Do?
About what?
Why is this inane question asked here? Over and over.
Besides, this unfairness, is only in your flawed thinking, anyway.
Yawn. This question is boring.
Two choices –
1. Expand by two more teams – economically not possible
2. Contract two teams – pick ‘em.
Each league HAS to have an even number – otherwise, there will always be one team without an opponent for three days OR interleague play has to be scheduled during the entire season.
Don’t understand why it’s not fair with the AL West and NL Central. The AL East has five teams – yet O’s and Jays fans complain it isn’t fair they are in the same division as Yankees and Red Sox. Sometimes life isn’t fair.
Nothing needs to be “fixed” but whenever baseball expands again they’ll add two teams to the AL. They might go to four divisions of four teams each and eliminate the wild card team from the playoffs, but will probably go with two five-team divisions and on six-team division on each league.
There is absolutely nothing unfair about a four team division and a six team division. Winning a division is not a random event, it’s about putting the best team together and winning the most games. If there is a divisional imbalance, the wild card slot will compensate for that.
Nothing needs to be done- no matter how you align teams, someone is going to have a better record than a team that makes the playoffs, and they’re going to sit at home in October. When the economy improves, and baseball decides to expand again, the next two teams will be in the American League. Until then, nothing drastic needs to happen.
The only real, fair alignment would be to put all 30 teams into one big league, get rid of the differences in the AL and NL (either adopt the DH for all or do away with it for all- different argument for another time), and take the top 8 teams and send them to the playoffs. If you were to do that today, you’d have the Yankees, Rays, Twins, Phillies, Braves, Reds, Giants, and Rangers in, with the Red Sox, Padres and Rockies on the outside fighting for the 8th spot.
Nothing needs to be done.
Milwaukee used to be the Milwaukee Braves (NL) and then they became the Brewers after the Seattle Pilots (AL) relocated. Milwaukee isn’t a historical AL town.
What I think needs to change is the over scheduling of division games. The SF Giants play 44% of their games against NL West teams. That’s boring!!! That’s also unfair to all teams because what happens in the playoff race when a division has two really crappy teams? A team in that division battling for the Wild Card spot has an edge because of more games against those crappy teams.
Not every division gets to have the hapless Pittsburgh Pirates and impotent Washington Nationals to beat up on year after year.
Really, they don’t need to do anything.
Aside from the occasional numbers-minded fan on Yahoo! Answers, I haven’t noticed any complaints about this. I haven’t heard of any MLB owners, managers or execs complaining. And MLB is making plenty of money under the current system.
This isn’t an unusual situation. It’s happened in baseball several times before. Most recently, from 1977 through 1992, there were 14 AL teams and only 12 NL teams. It worked just fine back then until MLB decided to expand into Florida and Colorado, which equalized the leagues again.
If baseball really felt the need to even out the divisions, they could expand again and add two more AL teams. Then MLB could have 4, 4 team divisions in each league. But again, I don’t hear any real cry for this to happen, so I wouldn’t hold my breath.
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