The divisional rivalries that defined MLB for about 40 years.
His realignment plan, farted yesterday, would replace the current divisional structure with money-saving geographical boundaries. For example, MLB's proposed Eastern Division would include the Yankees, Mets, Phillies and Redsocks - four powers, playing each other incessantly.
Think of it. Rivalry games, again and again, Yanks v Mets... again and again... until the playoffs, when they play each other again and again - except for that rare season of box office villainy when a team gets eliminated. Every game, every series, is Michigan v Ohio State, USC v UCLA, SUNY Cortland v Ithaca College, Jesus v Allah, Bezos v Musk, peanut butter v jelly, onion rings v French fries, Jerry v Dino, Katy v Taylor (wait, didn't that beef cool?)
Seriously, why play KC, when you can endlessly restage the Subway Series? The Yankees-Mets will save millions in travel costs, merely by staying home. Who cares about the Baltimore rivalry? That's the John McGraw era, or Brooks Robinson? Boog Powell? Tony Tarasco? Who cares? Today, what's important is squeezing every thin dime from baseball history. Toronto and Tampa? So long.
We can all get Manfred's rationale, as we understood his 2020 rule change, stocking the extra-innings with phantom base runners. Or his 2023 ban of the defensive over-shift, or the pitching clock. Why not change divisional boundaries? Have the Yankees play the Mets 16 times. It'll make money. Isn't that Manfred's job? You're damn tootin', it is!
Right now, he's painting his Mona Lisa - a payroll cap that would turn billionaire owners into trillionaire owners, who never lose leverage in bidding wars for free agents. Manfred's job is to let the players play and the owners own - a system where everybody will get rich, well, except for maybe the fans, and those Third World 15-year-olds who blow out their shoulders: Manfred should wish them luck on their journeys into gang warfare.
By whoopie-cushioning his new plan, Manfred is reminding us that The Big Wheel will keep turning, with or without you and me. It never stops, never will. It's hard to imagine that the NL lasted 120 years without the DH, which it adopted in 2022.
Now, every winter brings rule changes - committee-designed tweaks to raise scoring, shorten the game, or just to see WTF will happen if you enlarge the bases. Did Aaron Judge's HR record need an asterisk because infielders could no longer play in short LF? Just wondering...
Should we care about Manfred's plan, which is targeted for 2028? It probably won't affect me. I'll either be dead or blogging from a gramps home, wondering if creamed corn is on the menu - and of course it will be!
By then, Manfred will have imposed three winters worth of changes. Every December will mean a tweak or two, and whatever happened in the past - that's history, figuratively and literally. In baseball, only one rule is sacred:
Nothing must stand in the way of the owners making money.
Jeez, did I just figure that out? Am I an idiot or what?
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23 comments:
HEY !
Did yah know that you, or me or anyone can ear creamed corn through a boba straw !?!
The future is gonna be AMAZING !
Selig: "I can ruin baseball."
Manfred: "Hold my beer!"
Ear = Eat
Oh the corns’
So sweet
From it’s ear
Into yours
Everything winds up
Down in the pooper
What a tool.
Power or Hand ?
His next "innovation" will be an MLB Cup in season tournament modeled after the NBA Cup with the Finals played in Las Vegas once that stupid stadium is finished.
Write it down.
Actually, I’m open to realignment depending on how it shakes out. Why do we need to play AZ or CO at all? How are Tampa & Toronto actual rivalries? Wouldn’t you rather see more games against Boston and fewer against Seattle? My fear is that it will lead to more teams being added to the playoffs.
Manfred is an asshole.
Boone, on the other hand, is an idiot.
Mmm...creamed corn! Uhuhuhuhuh!
Actually, like 999, I am less upset about rivalry games than I am about destroying what remains of the old AL-NL difference. I hate the idea of making baseball like every other sport—and that's what Manfred is hellbent on doing...
I’m trying to get my head around this new proposal. As far as I can tell there are two main incentives for the owners. Travel Savings and more games in Prime Time.
Travel Savings
More regional games means less travel but here’s a question. Are the teams taking the train now? Because plane flights are plane flights and the teams still have to stay in hotels so is this just an hours in the air thing?
Plus, right now, once a team is in a region they play several games there like when the Yankees play Detroit and then Chicago and then KC.
So how is that so different from Playing Boston and then Philly. I guess they save on the Mets.
Fewer games at 10 PM
OK. This is actually good but they’re probably going to have a scheduled NFL style where they play the other divisions on a rotating basis so there will still be games from the West Coast.
Unless they do the East/West Division thing and we go back to the old NL/AL where the Yankees don’t play any teams in the West until the World Series.
Of course that means that Yankee fans in the West, like me will never get to see them live again but fuck us right? We’re not where the money is.
The rest of it is a lot more sketchy
Expansion
The talent pool is already too diluted and the quality of play truly sucks. Adding two more teams just exacerbates this problem .
The Divisions
Using the map that El Duque provided...
There are going to be eight divisions with four teams each. Hey, the four-team division works in football! But football teams only play 17 times a year. Keeping interest high. The team you root for only plays once a week, unless they’re popular then they might have play Sunday, Thursday, and then the following week’s Saturday game right around Week 16. The NFL are assholes too.
The construction of the divisions seems problematic.
The East (The Big East?)
NY Yankees
NY Mets
Philly
Boston
That's a tough division. Conversely there’s the…
The Atlanta Braves Win Every Year Till the End of Time Division
Atlanta
Tampa Bay
Miami
Nashville
Uh... can anyone say 125-win season in perpetuity. The Braves, two teams that won't spend, and an expansion team?
What about the…
The Non-Competitive Competition Division
Cleveland
Pittsburgh
Washington
Baltimore
Wake me up when the season is over.
The whole thing stinks.
...What's more, every single "innovation" of Manfred's betrays "MLB's" lack of confidence in itself (or in its "product," as corporate tools like Manfred like to call it). Soon, of course, they will add his "golden at-bat" and "swing-off" endings to games, and an MLB Cup, as Doug fears...
Great points, Doug! And what's more...HTF can you realign and NOT have Chicago in the same division with Milwaukee and Detroit? How can St. Louis NOT be in the same division with KC?
And just to clarify on the Banana: nothing against them. They're an independent team, playing ball much as storied novelty teams from the past—such as the House of David—used to play. Good on them. Just no reason why something like this has to be in the majors. But it will be. Or something worse.
Again, this is all making me really hope for the Great Baseball Implosion next year. I truly hope all of "MLB"—that awful, corporate branding name is the capper—goes kablooey. Owners and players can't agree, season is canceled, no agreement reached. Major-league cities reclaim the stadiums they subsidized, by eminent domain if necessary, and look to somebody to start over.
No more Rob Manfred. No more Steinbrenners. No more Brian Cashman, the Sad-Eyed Clown.
Hey, I can dream, can't I?
And if they're going to blow it all up anyway...
One more thing: Manfred's plan would be the end of the Subway Series. Forever.
Seems stupid overall. One idea is to make baseball the one and only traditional pro sport. Let pitchers hit. Move some of the outfield walls back. Revert rules to as they were pre-DH... let's say the mid 60s.
And substantially less use of analytics, if not an outright ban. Hard to enforce.
But we could have the New York Marathon! Plus, "The Amtrak Series'!
The SD/LAA/LAD/SFG AKA the Traffic Division could have Exhaust Month! or Smoggy September! The marketing possibilities are endless.
Right now, it does seem that at least part of the 2027 season will be lost to a lockout. A lockout, not a strike.
Destroy all tradition in this most traditional of games. All these fascist greedheads bound to lose.
Manfred, a major, nerd, putz and geek is planniong to retire. Thann we will get another nerd. putz and geel. Ther game of Baseball sucks thanks to this boz and the cheapskate owners, whose only concern to make money. The owners will never open their books. So we get the free pass runner on second, realignment, NHL where everyone will make the palyoffs and the golden atbat. Fuck you putz Manfred.
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