From: dxf12@po.CWRU.Edu (Douglas Fowler)
Newsgroups: rec.sport.baseball
Subject: Re: Inevitable changes
Date: 1 Oct 1992 22:20:43 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH (USA)
Reply-To: dxf12@po.CWRU.Edu (Douglas Fowler)
NNTP-Posting-Host: slc12.ins.cwru.edu


In a previous article, zuhars@madrone.eecs.ucdavis.edu (Gary Didi Seven Huckabay) says:

>Ken "They don't call me overnight for nothin'" Emery writes:
>>I think if anything major is going to be done on the restructuring 
>>of baseball the national and american leagues should be junked and 
>>and 4 regional leagues should be set up.  They should have 8 teams 
>>each and play 154 game schedules.
>
>Sounds reasonable, but I would like to see at least SOME crossover in
>terms of scheduling...and a league consisting entirely of western
>teams is eventually going to suffer in terms of revenue.
>
>How about this:
>
>	West          Midwest         South          East
>      California      Chicago         Atlanta      New York
>      Oakland         St. Louis       Tampa        New York
>      San Diego       Kansas City     Miami        Boston
>      Seattle         Minnesota       New Orleans  Pittsburgh
>      Portland        Cincinnati      Charlotte    Philadelphia
>      Chicago (AL)    Cleveland       Houston      Toronto
>      Los Angeles     Detroit         Texas        Montreal
>      Bay Area II     Milwaukee       Phoenix      Baltimore

     Sounds good, except you have 4 new teams in 1 division.  Also, I'm
a little perplexed at where this 2nd Bay Area team comes in, and where Denver
has gone.  I don't think New Orleans would support a team right now - they
drew very poorly for expansion games in the mid-70s.  Here is the framework
I would have, with the leagues as they now stand but moved around a bit,
and each team playing the ones in the other division 8 times, for 64 games,
and the ones in its own division 14 times, for 98 games: (Forgive the fact
this isn't alphabetical, I type them as I think of them):
     AL East      AL West              NL East         NL South
  New York       California           New York        Atlanta
  Boston         Oakland              Chicago         Houston
  Cleveland      San Diego            Philly          Texas
  Buffalo        Phoneix              Pittsburgh      Tampa Bay
  Detroit        Seattle              Chicago         Charlotte
  Toronto        San Fran Giants     Cincinnati       Phoneix
  Milwaukee      Los Angeles          Minnesota       Washington
  Montreal       St. Louis             Kansas City    Baltimore

     The Tampa and San Fran. teams could, of course, be reversed.  I also
like your idea of revenue sharing.  I think my way would develop some
new rivalries while keeping the leagues more intact, though some teams
would change leagues.  I'd do whatever I could to keep the Dodgers and
Giants together if they stayed on the West coast, but if the Giants move
it'll be hard to keep the rivalry going, anyway.  But, imagine a Dodger-
Giant World Series.
     One problem is that it's hard to create a scenario where there is at
least one division of all medium-to-small market teams.  Gary's may be
better suited for that, I don't know.
-- 
Doug Fowler: dxf12@po.CWRU.edu      :    "Every baby born into the world is
Real home: Canton, Ohio             :  finer than the last."--Charles Dickens
 Trying to follow in the path of our :     "A baby is an inestimable
Lord;anything close will be a success:  blessing and bother."--Mark Twain
Newsgroups: rec.sport.baseball