The All-Star Break, a Perfect Time to Discuss MLB’s Idiocy
The AL squad won the All-Star game. This means that the Tigers will again have home field advantage in the World Series. (Any other representative of the AL would also have the same advantage.) This is because the All-Star game decides home field advantage for the World Series. This of course, makes perfect sense. Why shouldn’t an exhibition between an odd array of players decide who has a definitive advantage in the series which determines the World Champion? What better system could there be? Interestingly, this is actually an improvement over the old system. Before Bud Selig decided to make the All-Star game matter (It counts, we swear!) the home-field alternated between leagues. Because nothing says world class competition like taking turns. “No National League representative, the American League representative went first last year, you go ahead and take your turn.” But it’s not like there is an obvious better solution. If only there was a way to quantify how well a team did during the regular season, then MLB could reward the team that outperformed the other. Sadly, until some great mathematical mind comes along with such an algorithm that can quickly identify regular season success, the system we have remains the our best choice.
Oh well, maybe there is no easy answer to home field, but there’s definitely some other issues in Major League Baseball that makes me feel like I’m taking crazy pills.
Divisional Alignment - There are thirty teams in Major League Baseball. MLB is then split into two leagues. Each league is then further separated into three division. So, naturally, each league would have fifteen teams in five-team divisions. But that would make perfect sense, and we cannot have sensibility in Major League Baseball. And so, the NL Central has six teams and the AL West has four. Besides being utterly, utterly, utterly stupid, it’s also unfair. To win their division, an NL Central team has to be better than five other teams. An AL West team has to be better than only three. And one of those teams it the Rangers!
Now, this problem might have the simplest solution of all. Move a team from the NL Central to the AL West. Viola, balanced divisions! My vote for the realigned goes to the Astros. There is already a Texas team in the AL West, so, geographically, it makes sense. It would create an instant intra-division rivalry with the Rangers. The addition would go as smoothly as a league chance could, and the removal wouldn’t take much away either. The Astros have no natural rival in the NL Central, nor any real history. Send them West.
(Option 2. Move the Marlins to Portland and the AL West, and move Pittsburgh to the NL East.)
Update: Some have voiced concerns that two 15-team leagues would necessitate “continuous interleague play.” As Major League Baseball has already added interleague play, I don’t see how more of it would be a real big problem. Really, if the notion of interleague play gets you all in a tizzy, you probably shouldn’t read the next proposal.
The DH - The most difficult part of the transition for the Portland Marlins or the Houston Astros would be adjusting the roster to play with a designated hitter. NL teams aren’t equipped with the usual immobile lumber-wielder. That is, they don’t have a designated hitter player, because the NL has no designated hitter position. Now, the virtue or lack thereof of the DH has been discussed in bars and forums and movies. I personally have no stance on the designated hitter. The problem isn’t whether the DH is the right or wrong thing for baseball, my problem is that that two different sets of rules certainly is. The differences between leagues has been essentially nullified with inter-league play and free-agency, except for that one biggest difference. In one league, the pitcher hits and in the other, he doesn’t. Whether the pitcher should hit, that’s up for debate. Splitting the rule between leagues, that’s not debate. That’s just wrong.
Someone somewhere said something about fence-sitting and how it’s not good. That person was very right. The DH is a polarizing rule, but that doesn’t mean that the MLB can get away with splitting the difference. Many rules are polarizing. Many people dislike the NFL’s downfield contact rules. Most hate the NBA’s non-enforcement of traveling. Hockey people might not like something about hockey, probably. Maybe it’s icing. Who knows? Anyways, in each of these instances, the leagues don’t choose to enforce the rule in one conference and not the other. They pick a rule, one rule, no matter the rule and enforce it league-wide. Major League Baseball should do the same.
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1 opinion for The All-Star Break, a Perfect Time to Discuss MLB’s Idiocy
The Pick To Click’s Quick Fix — July 12, 2007 » The Pick To Click
Jul 12, 2007 at 3:23 am
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