Readers' Thread: Realignment

By Paul Semendinger

August 24, 2005

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Here's a fun exercise.

Suppose you were hired by Rob Manfred to design the realignment plan for baseball comprised of eight four team geographic divisions (which would include two expansion franchises).

How would you design this system? (EJ and I discussed some ideas with this as a fun exercise on the SSTN Podcast last Monday.)

Here is a schematic I came up with:

1. Yankees, Mets, Red Sox, Blue Jays

2. Pirates, Phillies, Nationals, Orioles

3. Marlins, Rays, Braves, Nashville or Charlotte (expansion)

4. Giants, Padres, Dodgers, Angels

5. Mariners, A's, Diamondbacks, Portland or St. Lake City (expansion)

6. Royals, Rockies, Rangers, Astros

7. Twins, Brewers, Tigers, Guardians

8. Cardinals, Reds, Cubs, White Sox (*Corrected from earlier)

Share how you would format the leagues...

(For this exercise don't debate the proposal. We'll have plenty of time in the coming years to debate all of this. Instead the task today is that you were hired to design the new format. In this scenario, the debate on this proposal is over and it's a done deal.)

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