If you thought the potential introduction of a second wild card in each league was a good but poorly thought-out idea, just wait until you hear about the league’s supposed plans for realignment.
Actually, you don’t need to hear much more because that is all there is to the plan. MLB wants to do some sort of realignment… that’s all. Great plan, Bud. Glad we were able to have this talk.
While I do appreciate the Commissioner’s attempts to inject some new and radical ideas into the sport, I would appreciate it a lot more if he would put some extensive thought and planning into those ideas before he unleashed them on the baseball-loving public. First it was playoff expansion and now realignment. Both are big, bold objectives and both were proclaimed to be inevitable despite absolutely zero concrete plans for how they would be implemented.
News of plans for potential realignment broke over the weekend and all it has done is spark rampant speculation all over the baseball blogosphere.
Will they really even out the leagues, 15 teams a piece?
If so, what NL team will head to the AL? The Astros? The Marlins? The Diamondbacks?
Will the division structure persist? Will they narrow down to two per league? What if they eliminate divisions altogether?
Does this mean we will have to deal with constant interleague play?
What about the balancing of the rest of the schedules and all of the rivalries the old system had worked to create?
That’s a whole lot of questions that need to be answered. As for the answers… yeah, not so much with the answers.
Now, I have a hard time believing that the big wigs in the league office are really so short-sighted as to suggest a potential major change without first thinking it through. More than likely, the league is “leaking” notions like a second Wild Card and realignment because they want to gauge the public reaction before they even try and expend brain power on figuring out the best implementation strategy for their plans.
If the public scoffs at the idea, the they scrap it. No harm, no foul. But if they accept it, then they might even go so far as to dictate how realignment gets put into effect by talking about it endlessly sports radio or, I don’t know, writing blog post after blog post about the idea. Oh, Bud Selig, you are as crafty as you are poorly dressed.
However, I think the Old Car Salesman might’ve outsmarted himself this time. It seems obvious that expanding the playoffs and realigning the league would go hand-in-hand and with the league’s publicly professed desire to add that second Wild Card as soon as next season, they haven’t left themselves a lot of time to pick that right path to realignment. This isn’t as simple as carving out a few extra days for an extra playoff round, the entire MLB schedule stands to be turned on its ear, especially if they abandon the unbalanced schedules. A number of teams aren’t going to like playing more games in distant time zones at the expense of games against their regional, divisional and traditional rivals (though I think most of us secretly will be glad to see the Yankees and Red Sox play each other less often). Whether or not the public gives realignment a thumbs up isn’t going to make the owners feel better about a potential dent in their TV revenue.
One yet to be determined owner is going to be especially pissed once Selig hands down from on high the mandate to pack up his roster and prepare them to move to the American League where they’ll suddenly need a DH. It may be one spot in the lineup, but with so little time to prep for the big league shift, it could adversely effect the team’s chances for being competitive once they make the jump.
What really drives me crazy though is that the realignment shouldn’t even be something that gets decided in the court of public opinion like this. Realignment would not even be on the table if not for the addition of a second Wild Card in each league. That additional playoff team exposes the inequity in the 16-14 league split. It is one thing to have each division winner and one wild card from each team make it, but add that second wild card and it is plain to see that it isn’t fair for 5 out of 14 teams to make the post-season when only 5 of 16 make it in the other league. Going to 15 per side just makes thing even and should be instituted whether the fans find it an easy pill to swallow or not. That’s exactly why we not only shouldn’t be hearing about this plan now, but we shouldn’t be hearing about it in such an infantile stage.
Big ideas are great, Mr. Selig. Just keep them to yourself until you actually know how to put them into effect.
