The sport of baseball has changed a lot under MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred, with the institution of the pitch clock, the ban on field trips, the ghost runner and, starting next year, the automatic ball-strike challenge system. What he announced Thursday could be the biggest change yet.
Speaking on WFAN’s “The Carton Show,” Manfred discussed the possibility of MLB expanding to 32 teams, after nearly three decades of 30 teams. The commissioner seemed more than open to the idea, saying several cities wanted an MLB team.
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“When people want your product, you have to try to find a way to sell it to them,” Manfred said. “It’s pretty basic.”
It’s not too new. Manfred has been flirting with the idea of ​​expansion for years and just months ago declared plans to select two expansion cities ahead of its planned retirement in 2029. It got interesting, however, when Manfred made it clear that he intended to realign the league once both teams were on board.
So say goodbye to the American and National League, and hello to the East and West league, or whatever MLB wants to call it.
Among the reasons given by Manfred for this change is the ease of movement of players:
“It does a lot for us from a format standpoint. You would realign yourself, you would do it along geographic lines, which could take a ton of the travel burden off players.
“Remember, we ask our players 162 times in 186 days. So most of the travel is between 162 and 186, right? So you can eliminate a lot of that travel, make it less painful, which would be a good thing in terms of player health and safety.”
The MLB has been made up of the American League and the National League for 125 years. They were once very separate leagues, with separate governance systems, regulations and officiating crews, but that line was dissolved in 2000 under former commissioner Bud Selig to become more like the rest of the sports industry.
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Manfred’s other argument was how some playoff series would align better in terms of time for fan bases (i.e. East Coast fans wouldn’t have to stay up late to watch an ALDS game on the West Coast):
If you play geographically, we get to the playoffs. You know we have these four window days that I love, right? You have four baseball games a day, it’s awesome. But when you think about the fans in each market, you always find yourself, because of the way we’re set up, you know, you get Boston versus Anaheim in one of the early rounds. So you’ll either be too late for Boston fans, or you’ll be too early.
So if you realign geographically, you’ll be more like other sports where you play in the East in the World Series and the West in the World Series. And that 10 o’clock game on the West Coast, which is sometimes a problem for us, becomes a prime time game on the West Coast for both teams playing. This therefore has many advantages.
Manfred added a vision of eight divisions of four teams and separation of teams within the same city.
What would that look like? To do a quick mock-up, let’s just say the two growing cities are Nashville and Portland. If we try to create eight geographically distinct divisions with no teams in the same city, while trying to preserve some top-tier rivalries, we might get something like this:
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West: Seattle Mariners, Portland, San Francisco Giants, Los Angeles Dodgers
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Southwest: Los Angeles Angels, San Diego Padres, Las Vegas Athletics, Arizona Diamondbacks
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South: Texas Rangers, Houston Astros, Colorado Rockies, Kansas City Royals
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Midwest 1: Minnesota Twins, Milwaukee Brewers, Chicago Cubs, St. Louis Cardinals
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Midwest 2: Chicago White Sox, Cleveland Guardians, Detroit Tigers, Cincinnati Reds
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Northeast: New York Yankees, Boston Red Sox, Toronto Blue Jays, Pittsburgh Pirates
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Mid-Atlantic: Washington Nationals, Baltimore Orioles, New York Mets, Philadelphia Phillies
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Southeast: Atlanta Braves, Nashville, Tampa Bay Rays, Miami Marlins
Please note: this is absolutely not a serious attempt to create permanent, harmonious divisions for MLB. There are obvious problems. It’s just meant to show how different things could be if Manfred were serious. And my condolences to the Pirates if these divisions come to fruition.
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This may not be the only major change he’s considering in MLB’s structure, as Manfred was also asked about the in-season NBA Cup tournament. He didn’t deny that his office had discussed some sort of MLB Cup, but seemed hesitant given some obvious downsides:
“We’ve talked about split seasons, we’ve talked about in-season tournaments. We understand that 162 (games) is a long time. I think the difficulty of accomplishing those kinds of events in season, you almost inevitably start talking about fewer games in the regular season.
“It’s a much more complicated thing in our sport than in other sports, because of all our records throughout the season. You’re playing with something that people are very interested in.”
Manfred also confirmed that he still intends to retire when his contract ends in January 2029. His successor could find himself managing a very different league.
