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How to level the playing field in baseball

The San Francisco Giants and Oakland A's are having a slap fight over San Jose that in the long run only promises to hurt the Giants (and Sharks) and wont propel the A's into a finical power or really even move them anywhere near the top half of teams. San Jose is a desperate hail mary by the A's that will in the end only be a money grab for the owners and hurt the Giants ability to continually bring elite baseball to Northern California. The Bay Area isn't big enough for the amount of teams that currently call it home (Giants, A's, 49ers, Raiders, Warriors, Sharks) and needs to reduce by probably two to give the others a fighting chance at being elite, the 49ers move to Santa Clara helps and so would a move by the Raiders to LA but because I cant see that happening let me propose a different much more dramatic move: Send the A's back to the East Coast, specifically New Jersey. AND Move the Rays from Tampa Bay to Alabama Reason 1: Money in the North East In less than a year the New Jersey Nets will move to Brooklyn, this will reduce the number of teams in New Jersey to three (Devils, Giants, Jets) and open the ability of New Jersey adding another team. As crowded as the area would become for baseball season with the Yankees, Mets, and Phillies already in there, people in New Jersey would flock to a team the has NJ on their hats after a while if they win. Adding the A's to the area would also force the powers in the North East to compete more for the available money and the teams would probably cut spending helping the rest of baseball go against the Goliaths. Reason 2: Money on the West Coast The Giants and Dodgers have had a strange relationship for a while because of money. The Giants have always had their cash flow cut into by the A's and for a while the Dodgers were able to take advantage by spending more than the black and orange, leading to World Series wins. For the past couple of years the Dodgers have been a mess and the Giants actually spent their cash and they in turn also won a World Series. ESPN says the Yankees and Red Sox have the best rivalry in sports (because both teams are able to spend so much); so just imagine for a second if the Giants had the entire Bay Area financial power to themselves and the new Dodgers owner decided to take back the LA market from the Angels. Reason 3: Saving the Rays The Tampa Bay Rays cant compete for long in the AL East and against the (state aided) Miami Marlins. As I will explain below the best chance for the Rays is to take a huge gamble and move to an area that isn't traditional and hope they can pull off the same miracle as the OKC Thunder. If they can win early and are the only professional team around they just might have a fighting chance. Reason 4: New Divisions/ Rivals/ Playoffs This part of my argument is the most extreme, but the MLB wants to increase its playoff system and the only way I can think to make it work in the long run is new divisions, uniform rules (no DH of course) and a lot of teams jumping. So in my new baseball with the New Jersey A's and Alabama Rays; here are my new divisions: NL West: San Francisco Giants Los Angels Dodgers San Diego Padres Anaheim Angels Arizona Diamondbacks (The new NL West could also be called the California division; by adding all the Golden State teams under one roof every year would be a battle for state bragging rights, and in the years the Diamondbacks are the front runners its Cal vs Zona) NL Central: St. Louis Cardinals Chicago Cubs Chicago White Sox Cincinnati Reds Cleveland Indians (In the new NL Central the biggest debate I had was if I wanted to add the the Indians or Royals but in the end I figured letting the Tribe and Reds battle for Ohio and keeping the rivalry with the White Sox alive, outweighed the Red Birds/ Royals battle of Missouri) NL East: Philadelphia Phillies New York Mets Toronto Blue Jays Pittsburgh Pirates Washington Nationals (The NL East was one of the hardest divisions for me to keep balanced and I truly apologize to the Pirates who it seems will keep getting kicked around. This set up however does get the interstate rivalry between the Phillies and Pirates and also has NY vs DC still locked in) AL North: Seattle Mariners Colorado Rockies Minnesota Twins Milwaukee Brewers Kansas City Royals (The AL blue collar division will always be at a financial disadvantage with the other groups, however amongst themselves there is no clear superior team and the midwest battles between Colorado, Kansas City, Milwaukee, and Minnesota will be fun. Also like in the NL West those four fan bases can get together and root against liberal Seattle whenever the Mariners field the best squad) AL South: Atlanta Braves Miami Marlins Alabama Rays Texas Rangers Houston Astros (The five southern teams form a lot hostility in this set up which might finally breathe some life into southern major league baseball. It has the Texas rivalry, a new Alabama versus Georgia showdown and the Miami Marlins taking on the traditional south) AL East: New York Yankees Boston Red Sox New Jersey Athletics Detroit Tigers Baltimore Orioles (Of all the new divisions I think the history of the new AL East is one of my more proud alignments. The old Yankees/Tigers rivalry is reborn, the A's are back near their original home and it lets north easterners focus only on themselves which means the rest of us don't have too) With so many teams switching leagues an expanded playoffs and year long interleague play seem reasonable, if only to keep up old hostilities. Well thats my plan to fix major league baseball, thank you for reading any comments are welcome.

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Baseball is perfect as is.

The problem in Oakland is the stadium, the problem in Tampa is there is no interest.

Large market teams are at more of a disadvantage than any small or mid market teams, because they are now expected hand out awful free agent contracts to players around 30 years old for 7-10 years.

Small and mid market teams have successfully promoted the lie, that they have no money- and now every small, and every mid market fan believes it. Truth is they realize they can run the team at a small cost and make huge profits. Then they turn around and play the victim card to their fan base.

Every MLB team’s goal should be short term free agency deals around 2 years, possibly an option for guys 29 or older, and just buld through drafts and trades. Free agency is the worst thing for a team to use too much of. Small and mid market teams are fortunate to not have to spend in free agency like big markets are not expected to do.

The game is extremely competitive, and salary caps are overrated.

If small and mid market teams want equality, they should have to pay big market prices at the parks they (don’t) go to.

Baseball is fine. The only thing that could make it better, is contracting 2-4 teams.

The 2011 Over the Monster Gedman League Fantasy Baseball Champion

I hate free agency

by gizmosandy on Jan 1, 2012 7:32 PM EST reply actions   1 recs

And a salary floor, not a cap.

You build on failure. You use it as a stepping stone. Close the door on the past. You don't try to forget the mistakes, but you don't dwell on it. You don't let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space.
-Johnny Cash

by TheLoneDavid on Jan 1, 2012 8:25 PM EST up reply actions  

Baseball Perfect As It Is?

Not even close. Congrats to the poster on a thought provoking piece. I agree that the A’s should get out of the Bay Area.San Jose is no panacea, and it has been proven that new stadiums don’t neccesarily mean the team will spend more. Charlie Finley’s biggest mistake was giving up on KC. With that team he had coming along, KC would have been wild in the early ’70’s and late ’80’s. The Giants should have the Bay to itself. I would contract the Royals just to put the A’s back to KC. The Royals have been a joke for 25 years. Off with their heads. Tampa too.

Baseball anywhere south of the Mason Dixon line is a tough sell. This is football country. You could say the Braves made a big mistake leaving Milwaukee, a proven baseball town. What if that string of pennants happenned in Milwaukee? The place would have rocked, and there would have been no tomahawk chop. That would have been reason enough alone. They couldn’t even sell out play off games in the ’90’s. Contract the Rays and Royals without hesitation,and improve the game with the distribution of players around the game. Before Dallas showed it would support a winner, I would have contracted the Nat’s and put the Rangers back in Washington as the Senators. You would have had the last two WS in DC. How awesome would that have been? Might have even inspired Peter Angelos to restore his once proud franchise.

Since we are being radical, here is the plan. The Royals, Mariners, and Rays get the Ax. If you needed a fouth team to make it more even, I wouldnt miss the D-Backs or the Rockies. But, as is, the A’s back to KC, the Brewers back to the AL as the Seattle Pilots, the Braves back to Milwaukee,leaving Atlanta to their AAA team. Houston remains in the NL where it belongs. No more interleague play except with intra city rivals. Either the DH in both leagues or not at all. No changing leagues for traditional teams like Cleveland. The New Jersey A’s? Just doesn’t sound right. Great job, though. Baseball is in need of some serious contraction and restructuring.

by Robert57 on Jan 4, 2012 11:38 PM EST up reply actions  

This is even dumber than the original post.

You build on failure. You use it as a stepping stone. Close the door on the past. You don't try to forget the mistakes, but you don't dwell on it. You don't let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space.
-Johnny Cash

by TheLoneDavid on Jan 5, 2012 1:18 AM EST up reply actions  

I refuse to read the original post

until someone inserts some @#$%ing paragraphs.

And I don’t think Robert’s post is dumb, but I don’t agree with it.

Since we are being radical, here is the plan.

I don’t mind some radical thought. No way I would implement it, though.

Galactus does as he pleases. Because Galactus is drunk.

@#$%ing Twit: @blogtard
OTM | Silver Seven

by Bloggy on Jan 5, 2012 9:46 AM EST up reply actions  

Two things

First, I got maybe ten lines into your post before I started skimming it. You need to break up your posts into paragraphs, otherwise it’s just a pain to read through.

Second, why post this here? You didn’t really mention the Sox until your past point, and that was only to put them in a division, post this over on the A’s or Giants site.

You build on failure. You use it as a stepping stone. Close the door on the past. You don't try to forget the mistakes, but you don't dwell on it. You don't let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space.
-Johnny Cash

by TheLoneDavid on Jan 1, 2012 8:28 PM EST reply actions  

I disagree with alot of this but I'll just start with this weird A's relocation idea.

San Jose and Silicon Valley are an excellent market. There is a crap ton of money in the silicon valley and thousands of companies are headquarted there that can and would gladly provide big marketing sponsorships for the team. Not to mention thousands upon thousands of well-paid employees that work there that can afford to go to several major league games a year. So much about the game today is corporate sponsorship. The pool of companies they could pull from is sickening.

The fact that the Giants are holding the city hostage because of their Single-A team that draws approx. 2,500 per game is ludicrous. It would be great if they can get a stadium in Oakland, but San Jose would represent an equal and in my opinion superior market.

Moving to New Jersey has little chance of success…which is EXACTLY what a hail mary is by definition. It would cripple the A’s for the next decade and only POSSIBLY help them after that. They would go from competing with one team to three in a close vicinity without any major city that isn’t extremely close to those teams. The Phillies, Mets and Yankees have established fanbases that go back at least a generation or two. It would take 10 years for a New Jersey team to establish a fanbase, if not more…if they ever did.

If they move to San Jose, alot of the fans on the Oakland side of the bay who don’t LIVE in San Jose can still go to games. Actual Oakland natives (who are still less than an hour away) who are bitter might not go on principle, but folks south of the city will. None are going to cross the country. They lose their entire fanbase in the snap of a finger by going to Jersey. It’s one thing for the Rays to move, because they don’t really have much of a fanbase yet. Not the fault of the team or it’s current fans, just the way it is with a young team and a population that is alot of people who move there at an older age.

Also, out of curiosity how have the A"s hurt the cash flow of the Giants, but the Angels haven’t hurt the Dodgers cash flow?

by The Name is Dalton on Jan 1, 2012 9:14 PM EST reply actions  

Nevermind.

Your a Giants fan which completely explains this terrible idea. You hate the A’s, and have no reason to want to see them succeed. Which is why you want them to move from your area. It benefits your team.

by The Name is Dalton on Jan 1, 2012 9:34 PM EST up reply actions  

David

Give the guy credit with coming up with some interesting ideas instead of crapping all over him.

by Robert57 on Jan 4, 2012 11:45 PM EST up reply actions  

Force of habit.

Galactus does as he pleases. Because Galactus is drunk.

@#$%ing Twit: @blogtard
OTM | Silver Seven

by Bloggy on Jan 5, 2012 9:40 AM EST up reply actions  

That was actually a well-reasoned response.

Punctuated by the context of the Giants/Oakland dynamic.

Galactus does as he pleases. Because Galactus is drunk.

@#$%ing Twit: @blogtard
OTM | Silver Seven

by Bloggy on Jan 5, 2012 9:53 AM EST up reply actions  

Where did I crap on him specifically?

I said it was a terrible idea. In my opinion, it is. He tries to show why it would help “baseball” when really the idea comes from a desire to help his own team. I don’t have a problem with him wanting the A’s out of town and it isn’t a dig against him personally.

Seriously, you constantly shit all over other people’s ideas and preferences. I say an idea is terrible and then give very clear reasons why…and I’m some asshole just crapping on a guy for no reason? Get over yourself.

by The Name is Dalton on Jan 6, 2012 5:38 PM EST up reply actions  

Well

Saying you do it “constantly” is an unfair over exaggeration.

by The Name is Dalton on Jan 6, 2012 7:11 PM EST up reply actions  

the real truth is that the reason the Giants want to hold San Jose hostage

is because they have a lot of endorsement deals that lose a ton of value if that isn’t the team of the region- nothing to actually do with the Single A team.

by wolf9309 on Jan 2, 2012 12:32 AM EST up reply actions  

Interesting.

Good to know. I’m sure they’ve got some of the companies I’m referring to as sponsors. Still, I don’t really see how they’ve been allowed to go against it this easily. I don’t remember this much backlash when the Nationals moved to Washington…was this the case there too?

by The Name is Dalton on Jan 2, 2012 2:53 PM EST up reply actions  

Baltimore put up a stink, if I remember correctly.

Galactus does as he pleases. Because Galactus is drunk.

@#$%ing Twit: @blogtard
OTM | Silver Seven

by Bloggy on Jan 3, 2012 1:29 PM EST up reply actions  

Also

Nice little dig here:

ESPN says the Yankees and Red Sox have the best rivalry in sports (because both teams are able to spend so much)

This undermines your whole post by showing your true bias. I am sick of the “ESPN has a Sox-Yankees bias and it’s because of their money” bullshit. It is an old, tired and incorrect argument.

The two teams have had an intense rivalry for over a century. The two CITIES have had a rivalry since the fricking American Revolution for crying out loud…it isn’t just Sox-Yankees. It’s all NY-Bos sports, really. Saying it is because of ESPN is one of the most asinine arguments I’ve read on this site.

by The Name is Dalton on Jan 1, 2012 9:23 PM EST reply actions  

Is it worse than "Playoffs every year... WE NEED RINGS!"

Or “Tell Carl Crawford play hard always?”

You build on failure. You use it as a stepping stone. Close the door on the past. You don't try to forget the mistakes, but you don't dwell on it. You don't let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space.
-Johnny Cash

by TheLoneDavid on Jan 1, 2012 9:41 PM EST up reply actions  

Moving the Rays to Alabama?

I had to do a spit-take! Take it from me, there is no city in Alabama capable of supporting a MLB team at this time.

by Fromalabama on Jan 1, 2012 11:16 PM EST reply actions  

When the As do move to Oakland

they need to change their name. “San Jose A’s” doesn’t sound right.

You build on failure. You use it as a stepping stone. Close the door on the past. You don't try to forget the mistakes, but you don't dwell on it. You don't let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space.
-Johnny Cash

by TheLoneDavid on Jan 2, 2012 12:57 AM EST reply actions  

Big block of words

Galactus does as he pleases. Because Galactus is drunk.

@#$%ing Twit: @blogtard
OTM | Silver Seven

by Bloggy on Jan 2, 2012 7:00 AM EST reply actions  

Loud Noises

The Year of Extreme Opinions
I apologize if this post has offended you in any way. Please retroactively ignore it. Thank you for your consideration.

by nuthinboutnuthin on Jan 3, 2012 4:20 PM EST up reply actions  

I dont agree

San Francisco has almost 7.5 million residents
San Jose has 1 million residents making it the 10th largest city in the US.
Sacramento is another 500,000.
That’s 9 Million in just those 3 cities.

There are plenty of people to justify the move to San Jose. San Jose has triple the amount of residents as Anaheim and they have both a MLB franchise and a NHL franchise and there is talk of putting the new LA NFL team in Anaheim as well.

I have no idea why the A’s are moving, what their rational is for the move, but lack of interest from the San Jose public or a not enough fans to go around is not the reason.

Plus there are also rumors about the Raiders moving back to LA. So moving the A’s to NJ is just not a valid option when they have a solid chance of owning the southern part of the San Francisco/San Jose/Sacramento metropolis region.

by SoxAcumen on Jan 6, 2012 5:07 PM EST reply actions  

From what I understand

Is that the A’s Stadium sucks, one of the worst in the majors. So they could legitimately be looking to get to a more lucrative market or they’re trying to leverage this into a new stadium deal in Oakland.

All we know for sure is that their stadium is crap, and they want to get into a better one. Whether they want it to be in Oakland, San Jose or elsewhere we don’t know.

by The Name is Dalton on Jan 6, 2012 5:42 PM EST up reply actions  

I mean, part of it is also

Oakland sucks. It’s a tough place to get people to come to from out of town. Easier to get fans from Oakland to make a trip to San Jose than it is to get fans from San Jose to come to Oakland

by wolf9309 on Jan 6, 2012 7:10 PM EST up reply actions  

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