Potential Destinations For New Expansion Teams

There isn't any talk of expanding Major League Baseball to 32 teams anytime soon but we here at The Greedy Pinstripes like to be ahead of the curve. I was bored the other day and got to thinking about potential city landing spots for any hypothetical expansion teams. I believe I came up with a few interesting spots that could support a Major League Baseball franchise.

Major League Baseball seems destined to have a team in Mexico before it is all said and done with the emergence of the Mexican League and the influx of players from Mexico over the past few years. While Mexico City has the population to support a franchise it is nearly 1,000 miles away from it's closest MLB franchise in the United States. Enter Monterrey, Mexico which is right across the border of the United States and Mexico and could easily be protected and support a franchise in my opinion.

There are also rumors circulating that MLB may be headed back to Canada and Montreal specifically. Putting a franchise back in Montreal could work if it's done right and that plan would have to include a new stadium deal. The Montreal and Toronto rivalry would automatically be born, especially if an AL East team like the Rays were to relocate there, and the league would extend its global reach. If Montreal could not build a new stadium for the team then Vancouver could be a viable second option for MLB.

If the league wants to keep their teams domestic then cities who have popular and successful NBA, NHL, or NBA franchises come to mind in Indianapolis, Charlotte, New Orleans, and Portland. Portland would give the Seattle Mariners a travel break every once in a while and a true rival in the West. Charlotte and New Orleans have booming economies and no legitimate MLB franchises close by to have a true fandom for. Indianapolis supports the Indiana Pacers and the Indianapolis Colts pretty well and could be the perfect addition to a Central Division for either league.

This is not based on any rumors, speculation, etc. this is just for fun so take it as that. It's the offseason when everything is not so realistic and not so active. Have fun with it and add your location ideas in the comments section.

Potential Destinations For New Expansion Teams

There isn't any talk of expanding Major League Baseball to 32 teams anytime soon but we here at The Greedy Pinstripes like to be ahead of the curve. I was bored the other day and got to thinking about potential city landing spots for any hypothetical expansion teams. I believe I came up with a few interesting spots that could support a Major League Baseball franchise.

Major League Baseball seems destined to have a team in Mexico before it is all said and done with the emergence of the Mexican League and the influx of players from Mexico over the past few years. While Mexico City has the population to support a franchise it is nearly 1,000 miles away from it's closest MLB franchise in the United States. Enter Monterrey, Mexico which is right across the border of the United States and Mexico and could easily be protected and support a franchise in my opinion.

There are also rumors circulating that MLB may be headed back to Canada and Montreal specifically. Putting a franchise back in Montreal could work if it's done right and that plan would have to include a new stadium deal. The Montreal and Toronto rivalry would automatically be born, especially if an AL East team like the Rays were to relocate there, and the league would extend its global reach. If Montreal could not build a new stadium for the team then Vancouver could be a viable second option for MLB.

If the league wants to keep their teams domestic then cities who have popular and successful NBA, NHL, or NBA franchises come to mind in Indianapolis, Charlotte, New Orleans, and Portland. Portland would give the Seattle Mariners a travel break every once in a while and a true rival in the West. Charlotte and New Orleans have booming economies and no legitimate MLB franchises close by to have a true fandom for. Indianapolis supports the Indiana Pacers and the Indianapolis Colts pretty well and could be the perfect addition to a Central Division for either league.

This is not based on any rumors, speculation, etc. this is just for fun so take it as that. It's the offseason when everything is not so realistic and not so active. Have fun with it and add your location ideas in the comments section.

Nuggets From Rob Manfred’s Press Conference

Rob Manfred met with the media and the Baseball Writers Association of American for a little question and answer session before last night’s 86^th annual All-Star Game in Cincinnati and more than a few interesting nuggets came of the session.

• First and foremost the most asked question was whether Manfred would reinstate Pete Rose from the permanently ineligible list and Manfred confirmed that no meeting had happened or is planned at this time regarding Rose and his reinstatement application. Manfred wants to first fully go over all the evidence from the 1989 investigation and all the information that has come to light since before meeting and making a decision.

• No change to address the safety of the fans at ball parks and potentially adding nets to protect the fans have been discussed at this time. MLB plans to meet to address these concerns but no changes, if any, will be implemented before 2016. Around that same time the Commissioner’s domestic abuse policy should be finalized and ready to roll out as well.

• Teams will not have medical information released about players before the MLB Draft. The fans aren’t likely to see any postseason expansion in MLB any time soon either according to Manfred. Manfred is, however, open to expanding MLB at some point in the future if the opportunity presented itself and mentioned bringing a team like the Montreal Expos back to Canada in specific.

My Plan to Expand MLB to 32 Teams: Part 3

The biggest hurdle would be the obvious realignment in the divisions and who would go to this newly created division, a division I will call the North Division. I use the term "north" as a general term and tried to do the best I could with it, it's not perfect and could definitely use some tuning, but I feel like this may be the best bet right now. Each division technically will "lose" a team and teams don't get much more north than the Expos in Montreal or the Toronto Blue Jays so there's your first two teams. The Minnesota Twins are the northern most team in the central and are who I transferred from that division. The west division would give up the Seattle Mariners who are the northern most team in the AL West.

See below for the complete division breakdown for the American League:

American League East:

New York Yankees
Boston Red Sox
Baltimore Orioles
Tampa Bay Rays

American League Central:

Detroit Tigers
Cleveland Indians
Chicago White Sox
Kansas City Royals

American League West:

Texas Rangers
Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim
Houston Astros
Oakland Athletics

American League North:

Toronto Blue Jays
Seattle Mariners
Montreal Expos
Minnesota Twins


The National League was a little more difficult when trying to move teams to a North Division. The New York Mets are the most northern team in the NL East but the whole rivalry and such with the Yankees I decided to keep them there and move the Philadelphia Phillies. I should have moved the Mets with the logic from the American League, I get that and agree with you, but there is a method to my madness. In the central things got pretty confusing as I transferred the new Cuban team that is yet to be named to the Central and moved the Milwaukee Brewers and Pittsburgh Pirates to the North. I really wanted to move the Cuban team to the National League East but I could not justify moving any of the Braves, Mets, Nationals, and the Marlins from the division so I decided to go as close as I could with the Central Division.  The San Francisco Giants leave the NL West Division and move to the NL North Division since they are the northern most team in the NL West finishing off the realignment.

See below for the complete National League division breakdown:

National League East:

Atlanta Braves
New York Mets
Miami Marlins
Washington Nationals

National League Central:


Cincinnati Reds
Chicago Cubs
St. Louis Cardinals
Cuban Team - Still Unnamed

National League West:

Colorado Rockies
Los Angeles Dodgers
Arizona Diamondbacks
San Diego Padres

National League North:

San Francisco Giants
Milwaukee Brewers
Philadelphia Phillies
Pittsburgh Pirates

It's not perfect, it may not even work, but this is my detailed plan to expand two more teams into Major League Baseball. Love it? Hate it? Let me know in the comments section below: Thanks for reading.

My Plan to Expand MLB to 32 Teams: Part 2

What lucky cities would be presented with the new franchises you ask? I'm glad you asked! Again, as I said yesterday this is all extremely hypothetical and for fun so bear with me. I was personally upset when the Montreal Expos were owned by Major League Baseball, disbanded and then became the Washington Nationals so for nostalgia reasons mostly, and because I think the economy around Major League Baseball is a whole lot stronger nowadays and I think the city of Montreal could support it, let's bring back the Montreal Expos. Canada needs another team and frankly could support one easily in my opinion.  It was Montreal or another New York team (homer), maybe around the Buffalo or Syracuse area in a dome, so I went with Montreal to keep from flooding the New York market.

When thinking of the second team I had to do a little research, I didn't really have past performances or nostalgia to go on this time around. I considered Oklahoma City, Norfolk, Austin, Salt Lake City, Las Vegas and Orlando and finally decided on the obvious choice these days, Cuba. Cuba’s biggest city and capitol, Havana, is a mere 85 miles from the tip of Miami adding at most an extra hours’ worth of traveling for teams in an airplane. Security would be a nightmare at first but in a totally hypothetical world how awesome would it be to see the likes of Yoenis Cespedes, Yasiel Puig, Rusney Castillo, Yoan Moncada, Jose Abreu and others head back to their mother land and the country of their birth for a three or four game series a few times a season? I’ll answer that for you, the word awesome does not describe how awesome and intriguing that would be.

It's been nearly 20 years since Major League Baseball expanded and the economy around the sport is better than ever, why not now? We're less than two years away from a new collective bargaining agreement and this would give both sides even more incentive then they already have to keep the players on the field at all costs. It technically makes less contending teams admittedly but it makes things more interesting in my opinion. Sure five or six playoff spots might not be up for grabs on the last week of the season but everything else would be far more interesting including the July 31^st trading deadline, free agency, roster alignments, Rule 5 Drafts and the MLB First Year Player’s Draft to name a few.

The biggest hurdle would be the obvious realignment in the divisions and who would go to this newly created division, a division I will call the North Division.

To be continued....

My Plan to Expand MLB to 32 Teams: Part 1

About a year ago I thought it would be fun to take a look at whether it would be a good idea for Major League Baseball, or whether it would be conceivably possible, to expand to 32 teams much like the NBA and NFL. The key word to that first sentence is that this was done for fun so if you have constructive criticism or something that I missed or that could be improved on by all means let me know in the comments section but just keep that in mind, this is all hypothetical. I felt the need to update this post with the recent events in the world surrounding the diplomatic ties between the United States and Cuba with potential exhibition games, spring training games and possibly more coming to the native island that sits just 85 miles off the coast of Miami.

My reasoning for this post was that ever since the second Wild Card in each league was added the fun has been taken out of the July 31st trading deadline. As a Yankees fan I used to constantly refresh MLBTradeRumors and such waiting to see who the Yankees would acquire or trade for every season and I used to love getting on my Playstation on August 1st and trading all the players on my MLB game to keep the rosters current (before online game play really got popular). The fun of the July 31st trading deadline has been taken out of the game because with the second Wild Card there are just too many contenders and pretenders and not enough sellers in the market.

MLB wants five playoff teams in each league and wants the television ratings that come along with it (this is a business after all) then have no fear because I have a solution. Rather than contracting teams like the Miami Marlins and the Minnesota Twins, which has been discussed in years past under the Bud Selig regime, why not add two more teams? You turn three divisions of five teams each into four divisions of four teams each and go back to a single Wild Card winner. You can always go to the eight teams making the playoffs like the NFL later on if you would like, although I don't think that works in MLB unless you want World Series games in December.

What lucky cities would be presented with the new franchises you ask? I'm glad you asked!

To be continued.....

Rob Manfred Wants a Team in Montreal

Rob Manfred is at least entertaining the idea of bringing a major league team back to the great city of Montreal with one big stipulation. Manfred said this week that Montreal would have to bring in a new stadium before getting any chance of having the sport back in the city. Olympic Stadium, the former home of the Montreal Expos, will host two exhibition games this spring between the Toronto Blue Jays and Cincinnati Reds but will have to have “an adequate facility that could support baseball over the long haul” said Manfred.

Major League Baseball is at least entertaining an idea of moving a team to Montreal or expanding the pool of teams there but would be reluctant to do so without a strong commitment from the city. Montreal has been without a major league franchise since the Expos left after the 2004 season for Washington. Montreal did draw 96,350 fans last season in a pair of exhibition games last spring with the New York Mets and the Toronto Blue Jays so the fan base and interest is there despite the Expos not drawing a million fans in any of their final seven seasons. More than 80,000 tickets have already been sold for the 2015 version of the exhibition series in a stadium that only hold 45,757 so another pair of sellouts looks imminent.

While there are no immediate plans to expand Major League Baseball from 30-32 teams the league has to use these exhibition games in non MLB cities as a starting point when they decide which city will get the new team. It may not be today, it may not be in my lifetime and it may not be ever but if MLB does move a team like the Tampa Bay Rays or the Oakland Athletics or if the league does expand to 32 teams it looks like Montreal may be the first and likeliest destination for the league.

Potential Destinations For New Expansion Teams

There isn't any talk of expanding Major League Baseball to 32 teams anytime soon but we here at The Greedy Pinstripes like to be ahead of the curve. I was bored the other day and got to thinking about potential city landing spots for any hypothetical expansion teams. I believe I came up with a few interesting spots that could support a Major League Baseball franchise.

Major League Baseball seems destined to have a team in Mexico before it is all said and done with the emergence of the Mexican League and the influx of players from Mexico over the past few years. While Mexico City has the population to support a franchise it is nearly 1,000 miles away from it's closest MLB franchise in the United States. Enter Monterrey, Mexico which is right across the border of the United States and Mexico and could easily be protected and support a franchise in my opinion.

There are also rumors circulating that MLB may be headed back to Canada and Montreal specifically. Putting a franchise back in Montreal could work if it's done right and that plan would have to include a new stadium deal. The Montreal and Toronto rivalry would automatically be born, especially if an AL East team like the Rays were to relocate there, and the league would extend its global reach. If Montreal could not build a new stadium for the team then Vancouver could be a viable second option for MLB.

If the league wants to keep their teams domestic then cities who have popular and successful NBA, NHL, or NBA franchises come to mind in Indianapolis, Charlotte, New Orleans, and Portland. Portland would give the Seattle Mariners a travel break every once in a while and a true rival in the West. Charlotte and New Orleans have booming economies and no legitimate MLB franchises close by to have a true fandom for. Indianapolis supports the Indiana Pacers and the Indianapolis Colts pretty well and could be the perfect addition to a Central Division for either league.

This is not based on any rumors, speculation, etc. this is just for fun so take it as that. It's the offseason when everything is not so realistic and not so active. Have fun with it and add your location ideas in the comments section.

My Plan To Expand To 32 Teams: Part Three

The biggest hurdle would be the obvious realignment in the divisions and who would go to this newly created division, a division I will call the North Division. I use the term "north" as a general term and tried to do the best I could with it, it's not perfect and could definitely use some tuning, but I feel like this may be the best bet right now. Each division technically will "lose" a team and teams don't get much more north than the Expos in Montreal or the Toronto Blue Jays so there's your first two teams. The Minnesota Twins are the northern most team in the central and are who I transferred from that division. The west division would give up the Seattle Mariners who are the northern most team in the AL West.

See below for the complete division breakdown for the American League:

American League East:

New York Yankees
Boston Red Sox
Baltimore Orioles
Tampa Bay Rays

American League Central:

Detroit Tigers
Cleveland Indians
Chicago White Sox
Kansas City Royals

American League West:

Texas Rangers
Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim
Houston Astros
Oakland Athletics

American League North:

Toronto Blue Jays
Seattle Mariners
Montreal Expos
Minnesota Twins


The National League was a little more difficult when trying to move teams to a north division. The New York Mets are the most northern team in the NL East but the whole rivalry and such with the Yankees I decided to keep them there and move the Philadelphia Phillies. I should have moved the Mets with the logic from the American League, I get that and agree with you, but there is a method to my madness. In the central things got pretty confusing as I transferred the Colorado Rockies to the central and moved the Milwaukee Brewers and Pittsburgh Pirates to the north. I figured this made sense since Colorado are closer to dead center of the country than the West Coast and the Pittsburgh move gives them and Philadelphia an instant rivalry. The Las Vegas Gamblers were moved to the NL West along with the Arizona Diamondbacks, Los Angeles Dodgers, and San Diego Padres. That leaves the San Francisco Giants as the odd man out and moved to the "north" as they are the northern most team in California.

See below for the complete National League division breakdown:

National League East:

Atlanta Braves
New York Mets
Miami Marlins
Washington Nationals

National League Central:

Colorado Rockies
Cincinnati Reds
Chicago Cubs
St. Louis Cardinals

National League West:

Las Vegas Gamblers
Los Angeles Dodgers
Arizona Diamondbacks
San Diego Padres

National League North:

San Francisco Giants
Milwaukee Brewers
Philadelphia Phillies
Pittsburgh Pirates

It's not perfect, it may not even work, but this is my detailed plan to expand two more teams into Major League Baseball. Love it? Hate it? Let me know in the comments section below: Thanks for reading.

My Plan To Expand MLB To 32 Teams: Part Two

What lucky cities would be presented with the new franchises you ask? I'm glad you asked! Again, as I said yesterday this is all extremely hypothetical and for fun so bare with me. I was personally upset when the Montreal Expos were owned by Major League Baseball, disbanded, and became the Washington Nationals. For nostalgia reasons mostly, and because I think the economy around Major League Baseball is a whole lot stronger nowadays and I think the city could support it, let's bring back the Montreal Expos. Canada needs another team and frankly could support one. It was Montreal or another New York team (homer), maybe around the Buffalo or Syracuse area in a dome so I wen't with Montreal to keep from flooding the New York market.

When thinking of the second team I had to do a little research, I didn't really have past performances or nostalgia to go on this time around. I considered Oklahoma City, Norfolk, Austin, Salt Lake City, and Orlando and finally decided on the biggest metropolitan area that does not have a major sports team, Vegas baby. Just for fun let's call them the Las Vegas Gamblers, a National League expansion team. I don't worry as much about the gambling and the Las Vegas city life that many do, players can gamble anywhere, players can get into things they shouldn't be getting into anywhere. Players are going to do what they are going to do whether they play in North Dakota or Las Vegas, bottom line.

It's been nearly 20 years since Major League Baseball expanded and the economy around the sport is better than ever, why not now? We're two years away from a new collective bargaining agreement and this would give both sides even more incentive then they already have to keep the players on the field at all costs. It technically makes less contending teams but it makes things more interesting in my opinion. Sure five or six playoff spots might not be up for grabs on the last week of the season but everything else would be far more interesting.

The biggest hurdle would be the obvious realignment in the divisions and who would go to this newly created division, a division I will call the North Division.

To be continued....

My Plan To Expand MLB To 32 Teams: Part One

It's a tad outdated with an old Florida Marlins logo but you get the point. 

Just for fun I wanted to take a look at whether it would be a good idea for Major League Baseball to expand to 32 teams, much like the NBA and NFL, and whether it would work or not. The keyword to that first sentence is that this was done for fun. If you have constructive criticism or something that I missed or that could be improved on, by all means let us know in the comments section. If you just want to be a douche and tell me this will never work or happen and don't have reasoning to back it up then please don't bother and derail this post, thank you in advance.

My reasoning for this post was because ever since the second Wild Card was added the fun has been taken out of the July 31st trading deadline. As a Yankees fan I used to constantly refresh MLBTradeRumors and such waiting to see who the Yankees would acquire or trade every season. I used to love getting on my Playstation on August 1st and trading all the players on my MLB game to keep the rosters current (before online game play really got popular). The fun of the July 31 trading deadline has been taken out of the game because with the second Wild Card there are just too many contenders and not enough sellers.

MLB wants five playoff teams and wants the ratings (this is a business after all) then have no fear, I have a solution. Rather than contracting teams like the Marlins and the Twins, which has been discussed in years past, why not add two more teams? You turn three divisions of five teams each into four divisions of four teams each and go back to a single Wild Card winner. You can always go to the eight teams making the playoffs like the NFL later on if you would like, although I don't think that works in MLB unless you want World Series games in December.

What lucky cities would be presented with the new franchises you ask? I'm glad you asked!

To be continued.....