Baseball realignment

[terp_fan99]

I think this article is exactly right in what baseball should do about their so called "Tampa Bay" problem. Rather than Bud Selig getting super crazy and implementing a floating realignment idea that ruins the game even more, why doesn't he just go back to how baseball was for the first 60 years when there was just the AL and the NL without divisions? Here's a part of the article that summarizes what they should do:

http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/news;_yl...lignment042010

If Major League Baseball is serious about competitive balance, it needs to scrap divisional realignment and embrace something far more drastic.


Unalignment.


Get rid of divisions. Get rid of unbalanced schedules. Get rid of inequality.


It’s quite simple. Make two leagues, the American and National, with no geographical split. The AL has 14 teams and the NL 16 or, for true equitability, each league goes with 15 and baseball turns interleague play into a season-long event. Either way, the teams with the four best records in each league make the playoffs.


Short of a salary cap, to which the players’ union will never agree, bringing socialism to alignment is the clearest way. Treat every team as equally as possible when it comes to scheduling, travel and pathway to the postseason.


This is not a novel concept. ESPN’s Buster Olney floated something similar. NBC’s Craig Calcaterra agrees with the concept. It has support – albeit silent – from players, managers and executives throughout the game. It’s a significantly better idea than the so-called floating realignment that allows teams to change divisions based on their predicted competitiveness. It’s better than simply adding another wild-card team, which creates two problems: a postseason that could stretch closer to Thanksgiving than Halloween, and a less meaningful regular season.


The plan takes the best part of the NBA and NHL’s postseason structure – the rewarding of the best-performing teams, division be damned – and applies it without the interminably of those leagues’ playoffs.

Thoughts?