If Major League Baseball were to realign into the proposed two leagues of 15 teams each which National League team would move to the American League?
To quote William Tasker, writer of the Flagrant Fan blog, “the idea that the (Houston) Astros are the only logical team to jump to the AL is ridiculous. This whole thing is starting to annoy me.”
And he is right. Why is Houston being seemingly railroaded into the American League? People say it’s because they’d have a rivalry with the Texas Rangers. Well based on that logic there’s plenty of teams that would have rivalries based on geography if they changed leagues.
Some that come to mind are: Florida and Tampa Bay; San Francisco and Oakland; Kansas City and St. Louis; Washington and Baltimore; Pittsburgh and Cleveland; Cincinnati and Cleveland; not to mention the cities of Los Angeles, Chicago and New York who share two teams each.
Houston is also currently on the market as owner Drayton McClain tries to sell off the team. Would it be fair to a future owner to have the outgoing owner decide the long-term fate of the franchise he no longer wants to control?
So it got me to thinking after Tasker said “wouldn’t if be fairer to have one of the newer teams switch like Arizona?” Yes it would.
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Moving Florida to the AL would make some sense as they would have Tampa Bay as a rival, while Arizona or Colorado moving would go a long way in cutting down some of the heavy travel distances that western clubs like Seattle and Oakland endure each season.
But to me Washington makes the most sense. It would have a built in rivalry with Baltimore plus D.C. has always been a traditionally American League city as the two incarnations of the Washington Senators (1901-60; 1961-71) were American League teams before becoming the Minnesota Twins and the Texas Rangers.
Tradition, after all, was the reason Bud Selig was more than willing to move his Milwaukee Brewers to the National League in 1998 when the Arizona Diamondbacks and Tampa Bay Rays came into being. Selig felt Milwaukee was traditionally a National League city because of the 13 seasons the Braves spent there after moving from Boston and before going onto Atlanta. Well if 13 years is a tradition then 70 years as an American League city must count for something.
Another reason for moving Washington is they are a fairly new club, having come to fruition when the Montreal Expos moved to the Capital for the 2005 season, while Houston has been in the National League since 1962 when they started as the Colt .45’s.
In the end I don’t think it makes much of a difference who moves but to some of us fans it makes more sense to have a newer club switch leagues.
