Want to add Hartford and Montreal to existing MLB setup

[jg2977]

I want to add two teams to the American League so that both the AL and NL have the same number of teams. I want the cities to be Hartford and Montreal. How would you realign the divisions so that this works?

What I was thinking was to move the Houston Astros to the AL West. This would form a geographic rivalry with the Texas Rangers. I could put Montreal in the AL East so that they could play with Toronto, and Hartford to the NL East so that they could play with the Mets.

This would make the MLB Setup look like this:

AL East
NY Yankees, Boston, Baltimore, Tampa Bay, Toronto, Montreal

AL Central
Cleveland, Minnesota, Chi White Sox, Kansas City, Detroit

AL West
Texas, Houston, Oakland, Anaheim, Seattle

NL East
NY Mets, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Florida, Washington, Hartford

NL Central
Chi Cubs, St. Louis, Milwaukee, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati

NL West
Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco, Arizona, Colorado


If I wanted to promote geographic rivalries even more, I could put Baltimore and Washington in the same division, and Tampa Bay and Florida in the same division, I suppose.

[TribeFanInNC]

With that setup (having odd no of teams in each league), you would need to have a balanced interleague schedule or at the very least constant interleague where teams play more random interleague teams. That would be a mess IMO.

You really need to add both teams to the AL, maybe shifting KC to the West and maybe Toronto to the Central, then both expansions to the East.

Personally, I would pick at least one different city that you could add to the West.

[silvam14]

Going by what TribeFan said, maybe swap Either Hartford or Montreal with, say Vancouver, and you could be golden

[phenom]

Put 'em both in the AL West.

Signed,

Gary Bettman

[TribeFanInNC]

Oh wait, I just realized I miscounted. Disregard my above post. What you did was fine.

[matches malone]

When I expanded I ended up moving the Astros to the AL Central. Creates a natural rivalry with the Rangers. (My expansion teams were in Mexico City and Edmonton, and they went in the NL Central and AL West, respectively.)

[mgom27]

Northeast-Mets,Yankees,Red Sox,Blue Jays,Hartford and Montreal
Altantic-Pirates,Phils,Baltimore and Nats
Southeast-Braves,Rays,Marlins

Midwest Houston,KC,Texas,Colorado and St.Louis
Central White Sox,Cubs,Tigers,Reds,Brewers,Indians and Twins
California LAD,LAA,Padres,A's and Giants
West Seattle and Arizona

It would be uneven. I would put a team in where Teams have been rumroed Orlando,Las Vegas,Monterrey,Mexico and maybe New Orleans,Charlotte,P.Rico and Hawaii.

Maybe you can post a file of it when your down/ Which one are using?

[jg2977]

Originally Posted by mgom27

Northeast-Mets,Yankees,Red Sox,Blue Jays,Hartford and Montreal
Altantic-Pirates,Phils,Baltimore and Nats
Southeast-Braves,Rays,Marlins

Midwest Houston,KC,Texas,Colorado and St.Louis
Central White Sox,Cubs,Tigers,Reds,Brewers,Indians and Twins
California LAD,LAA,Padres,A's and Giants
West Seattle and Arizona

It would be uneven. I would put a team in where Teams have been rumroed Orlando,Las Vegas,Monterrey,Mexico and maybe Dallas,New Orleans,Charlotte,P.Rico and Hawaii.

That's actually pretty cool, having an East and West Conference like the NBA and NHL. I think I'm going to try that.

You said to maybe add Dallas, but they already have a team with the Texas Rangers. Isn't Arlington, where the Rangers play, only about 30 miles away from Dallas?

[lynchjm24]

Sir do you miss the Adams Division?

[jg2977]

Originally Posted by lynchjm24

Sir do you miss the Adams Division?

Yes, and I also miss the Patrick, Norris, and Smythe, as well as the Wales and Cambell Conferences.

[Stealcompany]

Yet again, Hamilton gets stiffed for a team

[satchel]

Originally Posted by jg2977

Isn't Arlington, where the Rangers play, only about 30 miles away from Dallas?

It doesn't feel 30 miles away—it's all one big city.

[fhomess]

Personally, I've never been a big fan of putting teams from the same city in the same division or even in the same league, unless there's more than 2 teams in the city. It just doesn't seem realistic for a modern style league where you have teams from all over the continent. MLB doesn't do this so that the fans in cities with multiple teams can experience all the players in the league. It's better business for both clubs in the city to have a completely different set of opponents.

[Muzamba]

I would suggest the following configuration if you're committed to Montreal and Hartford as your expansion teams:

AL East: Boston, Montreal*, NY Yankees, Toronto
AL Central: Baltimore, Cleveland, Detroit, Tampa Bay
AL Midwest: Chi. White Sox, Kansas City, Minnesota, Texas
AL West: LA Angels, Oakland, Seattle, Arizona^

NL East: Atlanta, Hartford*, NY Mets, Philadelphia
NL Central: Cincinnati, Florida, Pittsburgh, Washington
NL Midwest: Chi. Cubs, Houston, Milwaukee, St. Louis
NL West: Colorado, LA Dodgers, San Diego, San Francisco

I switched the D'backs to the AL and placed Hartford in the NL. My logic here was that, since loyalties in the Hartford area are pretty evenly split between the Yankees and Red Sox, both franchises would strongly object to having a team in the middle drawing fans away. Truthfully, I can't imagine there ever actually being a team in Hartford for this reason alone. But if there HAD to be, I'm sure it would have to be in the NL.

Moving Arizona (The Rockies could be just as easily moved instead) maintains all the main interleague rivalries. Plus, it aligns Houston and Texas--the only teams from the same state that are in different divisions within their respective leagues--and sets them up for an annual rivalry.

You might also consider switching Atlanta back to the NL East and place Washington in the NL Central, if you want to maintain the Braves' Northeast rivalries and align the Nats to face the Orioles every year. (EDIT: I went ahead and did this in the above layout)

Having said this, I would agree that there are probably at least a dozen more practical locations for expansion teams than Hartford (unless you're from that area and want a team in your hometown, which I can certainly understand.) But I also think putting a team in one of the oft-mentioned western cities (Portland, Las Vegas, San Antonio, Vancouver, etc.) would be more realistic and easier to align correctly. And even though MLB probably wouldn't return to Montreal before the above cities, or eastern locations like the Carolinas, New Jersey, or P. Rico (sorry, couldn't resist ) I do still think Montreal is a viable location if the league were to expand. They may have lost the Expos, but they did support them for several decades. Plus, they're now the largest metro area in the US or Canada without a MLB franchise.

Anyway, that's my . Good luck!

[mgom27]

The Central and Midwest you have wouldn't happen in real life.
Lets try one with Ramdomized Cities.

[Muzamba]

Originally Posted by mgom27

The Central and Midwest you have wouldn't happen in real life.
Lets try one with Ramdomized Cities.

I'm curious as to why you don't think this would happen in real life. If you look at the NFL, for instance, teams are not always placed in the ideal division, geographically speaking. (Just look at the Cowboys in the NFC East instead of the South or even West.) In fact, I would argue that a league with perfectly-aligned divisions would not necessarily happen in real life. Granted, MLB did a pretty good job of realigning after the '90s expansions. However, with the 2 cities we're working with here, it's unlikely that some of the established intra-divisional rivalries would be broken up just to ensure a correct geographical configuration. As I said, I think there are better choices for expansion cities than Hartford and probably more realistic options than Montreal. But if these are the locations, I really think this would be the ideal alignment... except that now I really think I should've switched Atlanta and Washington. Again, not geographically ideal, but it makes more sense to keep the Braves/Mets intra-division rivalry and Nats/Orioles interleague rivalry intact.

Btw, I just realized that this configuration places all the teams in each division in the same time zone, except for Arizona and Colorado since they're the only 2 in the Mountain Zone.

[bwburke94]

Some online baseball sims (like Hardball Dynasty at Whatifsports.com) have a 32-team setup, so people would have to modify the MLB setup. Any one of those proposals would work here as well.