Expansion and Divisions

[notin]

47 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

How about 3 x 10 team divisions?

EAST: TOR, BOS, NYY, NYM, PHI, BAL, WSH, ATL, TBR, MIA

CENTRAL: PIT, DET, CLE, CIN, CWS, CHC, MIL, MIN, STL, KCR

WEST: HOU, TEX, COL, AZ, LV, SEA, SFG, LAD, LAA, SDP

4 games vs non div teams (4 x 20=80)

9 games vs div team (9 x 9= 81)

1 game vs closest record previous season.

 

4 eight team divisions. (AL East, AL West, NL East, & Electric Blueberry)

Each league sends two division winners plus 4 wild card teams to the postseason.  Division winners get a first round bye.

Done.

[UtahSox]

4 hours ago, moonslav59 said:

They could go 14 team playoffs, where the top 2 teams get a rest.

definitely could go to 14. I like the idea of 12 still Division champs get byes

[notin]

1 minute ago, UtahSox said:

definitely could go to 14. I like the idea of 12 still Division champs get byes

14 teams?  I love baseball but we cannot have the postseason running into Advent!

[moonslav59]

I do feel like playing 162 games needs to count for something more than picking the top 50% of teams, and you know the way the set up the format with 32 teams and 16 making the playoffs, a team with a losing record will make the playoffs too often. Why play 162, if a losing team makes it?

[UtahSox]

1 hour ago, Old Red said:

Yes you’ve heard my point, and reasoning many times after all the times you’ve whined, and cried how the Red Sox have to play in the Big Bad AL East, so we agree on that. Kind of Chicken-little. 🤓

all teams are not created equal.....

yankees (2nd in revenue)

Bluejays (6th in revenue)

Mets (owner is awesome)

Phillies (7th in revenue)

Red Sox (4th in revenue) 

This would not be fair..... especially if you play more division games than out of division games.

[UtahSox]

55 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

How about 3 x 10 team divisions?

EAST: TOR, BOS, NYY, NYM, PHI, BAL, WSH, ATL, TBR, MIA

CENTRAL: PIT, DET, CLE, CIN, CWS, CHC, MIL, MIN, STL, KCR

WEST: HOU, TEX, COL, AZ, LV, SEA, SFG, LAD, LAA, SDP

4 games vs non div teams (4 x 20=80)

9 games vs div team (9 x 9= 81)

1 game vs closest record previous season.

 

They never ever would change it without expansion.... and I'm 99% sure league expands to 32 by 2032

[UtahSox]

47 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

Baseball would be a better game, if they downsized.

Eliminate TBR, OAK/LV & PIT (or MIA?)

Have a nice player dispersal draft or the 120 players on those 3 teams' 40 man rosters, where the bottom 9 teams pick first round, then middle 9 teams, then bottom 9 again, then top 9, middle 9, bottom 9. Repeat. (Bottom 9 get 6 picks each, middle 9 get 4, top 9 get 2 and the rest are free agents) How to divide up their minor league players would be interesting, too.

3 divisions of 9:

TOR, BOS, NYY, NYM, PHI, BAL, WSH, ATL, MIA

DET, CLE, CIN, CWS, CHC, MIL, MIN, STL, KCR

HOU, TEX, COL, AZ, SEA, SFG, LAD, LAA, SDP

Schedule:

4 games x 18 non div teams= 72 games

11 games x 8 div teams= 88 games

2 games vs ???

 

what is happening here? now we just contracted? LOL moon 

[moonslav59]

2 minutes ago, UtahSox said:

what is happening here? now we just contracted? LOL moon 

We have 3 teams that suck, never spend and hardly anybody watches them play.

[UtahSox]

2 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

We have 3 teams that suck, never spend and hardly anybody watches them play.

How much of that has to do with ownership vs "the need to contract the league?" 

Rays their stadium sucks can't find a new one. (move team???) Pirates and A's just have crappy owners.

 

Like I said before I'm 1000% sure expansion is more likely than contraction.

[notin]

10 minutes ago, UtahSox said:

all teams are not created equal.....

yankees (2nd in revenue)

Bluejays (6th in revenue)

Mets (owner is awesome)

Phillies (7th in revenue)

Red Sox (4th in revenue) 

This would not be fair..... especially if you play more division games than out of division games.

AL East should be Red Sox, Yankees, Orioles, Blue Jays, Guardians, Tigers, Brewers, and Rays.

Like pre-Selig, but with Tampa!

[moonslav59]

6 minutes ago, UtahSox said:

How much of that has to do with ownership vs "the need to contract the league?" 

Rays their stadium sucks can't find a new one. (move team???) Pirates and A's just have crappy owners.Like I said before I'm 1000% sure expansion is more likely than contraction.

Zero chance they contract.

Baseball would be better, if they did.

[notin]

Four 8-teams divisions

AL East - Boston Red Sox, New York Yankees, Baltimore Orioles, Tampa Rays, Cleveland Guardians, Milwaukee Brewers, Detroit Tigers, Toronto Blue Jays

AL West - Chicago White Sox, Kansas City Royals, Las Vegas Athletics, Seattle Mariners, Anaheim Dog s***, Texas Rangers, Minnnesota Twins, Salt Lake City Choir

NL East - New York Mets, Philadelphia Phillies, Atlanta Braves, Miami Marlins, Pittsburgh Pirates, Washington Nationals, Cincinnati Reds, Charlotte Overdraft Fees.

Electric Blueberry - Los Angeles Dodgers, San Diego Padres, San Francisco Giants, Chicago Cubs, St. Louis Cardinals, Arizona Diamondbacks, Colorado Rockies, Houston Astros…

[notin]

40 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

We have 3 teams that suck, never spend and hardly anybody watches them play.

Let’s have five!!

Reportedly Manfred is trying to work out some sort of revenue-sharing deal where all teams pool their TV money and it gets divided up among the league.  I assume putting out proposals the wealthier owners will absolutely hate is an indication he plans to retire soon anyway…

[notin]

1 hour ago, moonslav59 said:

Baseball would be a better game, if they downsized.

Eliminate TBR, OAK/LV & PIT (or MIA?)

Have a nice player dispersal draft or the 120 players on those 3 teams' 40 man rosters, where the bottom 9 teams pick first round, then middle 9 teams, then bottom 9 again, then top 9, middle 9, bottom 9. Repeat. (Bottom 9 get 6 picks each, middle 9 get 4, top 9 get 2 and the rest are free agents) How to divide up their minor league players would be interesting, too.

3 divisions of 9:

TOR, BOS, NYY, NYM, PHI, BAL, WSH, ATL, MIA

DET, CLE, CIN, CWS, CHC, MIL, MIN, STL, KCR

HOU, TEX, COL, AZ, SEA, SFG, LAD, LAA, SDP

Schedule:

4 games x 18 non div teams= 72 games

11 games x 8 div teams= 88 games

2 games vs ???

 

And either one team gets a day off every day. Or every day some team has to play two different teams…

[UtahSox]

3 hours ago, notin said:

Four 8-teams divisions

AL East - Boston Red Sox, New York Yankees, Baltimore Orioles, Tampa Rays, Cleveland Guardians, Milwaukee Brewers, Detroit Tigers, Toronto Blue Jays

AL West - Chicago White Sox, Kansas City Royals, Las Vegas Athletics, Seattle Mariners, Anaheim Dog s***, Texas Rangers, Minnnesota Twins, Salt Lake City Choir

NL East - New York Mets, Philadelphia Phillies, Atlanta Braves, Miami Marlins, Pittsburgh Pirates, Washington Nationals, Cincinnati Reds, Charlotte Overdraft Fees.

Electric Blueberry - Los Angeles Dodgers, San Diego Padres, San Francisco Giants, Chicago Cubs, St. Louis Cardinals, Arizona Diamondbacks, Colorado Rockies, Houston Astros…

Your AL West would be the g5 conference division….. no automatic bye for AL West winner and only a playoff spot if power ranked within top 12 teams.  
 

[mvp 78]

13 hours ago, moonslav59 said:

I do feel like playing 162 games needs to count for something more than picking the top 50% of teams, and you know the way the set up the format with 32 teams and 16 making the playoffs, a team with a losing record will make the playoffs too often. Why play 162, if a losing team makes it?

Bring back the 154 game seasons! 

[mvp 78]

Send the Astros back to the NL where they belong. 

[moonslav59]

13 hours ago, notin said:

And either one team gets a day off every day. Or every day some team has to play two different teams…

Good point.

It would have to go to 28 (or 26) teams.

4 divisions of 7 looks nice.

[notin]

10 hours ago, UtahSox said:

Your AL West would be the g5 conference division….. no automatic bye for AL West winner and only a playoff spot if power ranked within top 12 teams.  
 

So the Salt Lake City Choir owner is a cheap SOB, too?

[notin]

1 hour ago, mvp 78 said:

Send the Astros back to the NL where they belong. 

And bring the Brewers back to the AL where they belong…

[notin]

50 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

Good point.

It would have to go to 28 (or 26) teams.

4 divisions of 7 looks nice.

I doubt there will ever be contraction.  Maybe we can combine some teams., like  the Pittsburgh-Cleveland Pirate Guards and the Baltimore-DC Oriole Nation.  
 

Or the New York-Tampa Famous Original Rays (Will only JoeBrady get that joke)?

[UtahSox]

2 hours ago, notin said:

So the Salt Lake City Choir owner is a cheap SOB, too?

I mean fingers crossed…. I can’t have SLC Choir boys outshining my big spending, magnanimous, transparent ownership group. That would be a kick in the nuts. 

[JoeBrady]

On 2/19/2026 at 11:50 AM, UtahSox said:

A low salary floor(effecting 2-3 teams max) + stronger penalties for extreme spending. He said they dont see deferrals disappearing — they’re too embedded now.

I never thought about it, but that's a good bargaining point.  $125M would currently cover 6 teams and $150M would cover 11 teams.  If they kept it to $125 floor, you'd have almost no teams voting against it. 

On the high side, you have 5 $300M teams, with two being fringy.  If you added another 125% penalty for > $315M, you likely only lose 3 votes.  The league probably passes it, and the players might not care enough to suffer the poor optics.

[Michigan Adam2]

20 hours ago, jad said:

No way!  i actually want to see ohtani, betts, dela cruz, and i'm hardly alone in this. i don't want to see extra games against baltimore  or tampa bay instead.  Getting rid of interleague play is so so 70s.  (Who was that sanctimonious a-h who vowed to spend his entire life after retirement fighting to get rid of interleague play?  ...  brett butler.)

Who said no interleague play?  The 4 divisions is simply record comparison for playoffs/no playoffs. There should easily be a NFL style inter league rotation to change things up. 

[mvp 78]

37 minutes ago, Michigan Adam2 said:

Who said no interleague play?  The 4 divisions is simply record comparison for playoffs/no playoffs. There should easily be a NFL style inter league rotation to change things up. 

I'd prefer no interleague play. 

[JoeBrady]

22 hours ago, notin said:

Do we really need more 82-80 teams making the postseason simply because the rest of the teams in their geographic area are even worse?

More divisions allow to better match small market and big market teams.

[moonslav59]

6 hours ago, notin said:

And bring the Brewers back to the AL where they belong…

While you're at it, send the Astros back to the NL.

[JoeBrady]

6 hours ago, notin said:

Or the New York-Tampa Famous Original Rays (Will only JoeBrady get that joke)?

I never understood Original Rays.

[moonslav59]

4 minutes ago, JoeBrady said:

I never understood Original Rays.

The "Devil Rays?"

[Duran Is The Man]

3 hours ago, mvp 78 said:

I'd prefer no interleague play. 

the traditionalist in me doesn't like inter-league play, but the fan in me likes limited IL play.