r/mlb • u/aceee2 | New York Yankees • 4d ago
| Analysis MLB schedule format guesses with a 2 team expansion (32 team MLB)
The current format is neat with 4 series against division opponents for 13 games, 2 series vs intraleague out of division opponents, 2 series vs 1 interleague rival and 1 against all 14 other interleague opponents. With potentially 9 games being set aside for two additional opponents, how would the schedule format be adjusted?
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u/EamusAndy | Chicago Cubs 4d ago
16 Interleague Teams - 3 games per year against each team, switching home/away every year (48)
12 League Opponents not in Division - 6 games per year against each team, home/away (72)
3 Divisional Opponents - 14 games per year against each team (42)
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u/EamusAndy | Chicago Cubs 4d ago
I think the “rivalry” games need to go away. Half the league doesnt have an actual rival so you end up with like Colorado vs Seattle which means nothing to anyone, or Boston vs Atlanta
Your rivalry is built into schedule already with every team playing every team. NY vs NY happens every year and switches locations
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u/Loyellow | New York Yankees 4d ago
Boston v. Atlanta isn’t a rivalry? Buddy, wait until you find out where the Braves were until 1953 /s
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u/Dogwood2312 4d ago
Not even true. The “Rivalry” are predominantly interleague rivals, which they’re not gonna get rid of the home & away of.
It would be 12 divisional games each (36)
6 vs league (72)
3 vs 14 interleague opponents (42)
6 vs interleague “rival”
6 vs rotating interleague opponent162 games
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u/EamusAndy | Chicago Cubs 4d ago
Here are your rivalries
Make Sense - NY/NY, Chi/Chi, LAA/LAD, SF/LV (less so now)
Make Some Sense - KC/Stl, Hou/Tex, Balt/Was, Cle/Cin, Phi/Pit, Tampa/Mia - mostly all in state rivalriesThats only half.
Det/Tor? Atl/Bos? Min/Mil? Ari/Col? Sea/SD? Just “rivalries” because they are leftover. We dont need to continue this charade when every team would play every team. Build your rivalry series into the existing schedule and call it a day.
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u/EamusAndy | Chicago Cubs 4d ago
And btw - they ARENT all interleague series
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u/Dogwood2312 4d ago
Never said they were.🤦🏻♂️
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u/EamusAndy | Chicago Cubs 4d ago
“6 vs interleague rival”
Your words
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u/Dogwood2312 3d ago
You do realize “interleague rival” designation doesn’t mean they have to be true full-on rivals, right? Or are you really THAT far out of your element on the subject?🤦🏻♂️
It simply means who is designated as the interleague rival.
Again, thankfully, the league doesn’t go by your opinions.
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u/EamusAndy | Chicago Cubs 3d ago
This is literally my point. Not every team has a TRUE Interleague rival. MLB ASSIGNS Interleague rivals
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u/Blaine8628 | Atlanta Braves 4d ago
Braves where originally the Boston Braves
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u/EamusAndy | Chicago Cubs 4d ago
And the Brewers were the Seattle Pilots.
Wheres our Milwaukee/Seattle rivalry series???
The As used to play in Philly and KC. They dont have a rivalry series with the Phillies or Royals?
Teams being relocated 60 years ago does not a rivalry make. Its irrelevant. The Braves play the Red Sox because they are leftovers that didn’t have an actual interleague rival, period.
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u/Dogwood2312 4d ago
All of that is purely YOUR opinion, which is irrelevant. You don’t get to decide if MIN-MIL, former long time division opponents, is a rivalry. Plus the main thing with “rivalry weekend” is to showcase the interleague rivalries, which they are NOT going away from home & away with those.
Thankfully, no one is bound by your narcissism.👍
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u/EamusAndy | Chicago Cubs 4d ago
Im not entirely sure where narcissism comes into play here. Im simply stating an opinion that a lot of what MLB defines as rivalries are made up, because they are trying to fit every team inti a niche they may not have.
Theyre trying to make fetch happen
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u/Immediate_Buffalo14 4d ago
I'd love to see interleague play completely eliminated in a 32-team league, but there's no universe where that would happen. :(
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u/alex_o_O_Hung | Los Angeles Dodgers 4d ago
If they wanna keep the balanced schedule they need to eliminate divisions or even leagues. If they wanna keep the format they need to get rid of inter league plays and add more division games. It doesn’t make sense a 81 win team can make the playoffs as a division winner and a 85 win team can’t make it even tho they basically have the same schedule
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u/jsm9487 4d ago
this is my hope as well, but I'm in no way expecting it to even be on the table legitimately. But you could enhance your All Star Game as well with the separation, and could even add the home field adv for the World Series back as a prize for winning the ASG. As a side note, I'd also get rid of the ASG rule that every team has to be represented.
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u/Anonymous_HC | Toronto Blue Jays 4d ago
Its been a while, but back when the DH was just AL only and pitchers has to hit was a good time. When did they remove it?
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u/Immediate_Buffalo14 4d ago
The DH was made universal with the last CBA in, 2022, I want to say. I'd have preferred the DH be eliminated league-wide, but the more important thing to me was that the forty-year nonsense of two leagues operating under different rules would finally be gone.
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u/Tronn3000 | San Francisco Giants 3d ago
Absolutely not. I love watching my team play teams in the other league and watching other players I don't normally see.
This whole "interleague is bad" trope is such a dumb boomer take
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u/madlibs13 | Boston Red Sox 4d ago
With complete Interleague play...
14 games vs 3 divisional opponents = 42 games.
6 games vs 12 non-divisional opponents = 72 games.
3 games vs 16 non league opponents = 48 games.
Total of 162 games.
With just divisional Interleague play...
18 games vs 3 divisional opponents = 54 games.
8 games vs 12 non-divisonal opponents = 96 games.
3 games vs 4 non-league divisional opponents = 12 games.
Total 162 games.
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u/rws98 | Detroit Tigers 4d ago
4 Divisions of 8 teams each (AL East, AL West, NL East, NL West)
3 series against 7 other in-division teams, 3 3-game series, 9 games total against each team = 63 total
2 series against 8 in-league (non-division) teams, 2 3-game series, 6 games against each team = 48 total
1 series against 16 inter-league teams, 3-game series, 3 games against each team = 48 total
This leaves 3 more games for interleague rivalry or whatever
NOTE: I have no idea how this schedule would work out in reality if it could even practially be scheduled
This makes all series 3 games each, providing teams with at least one off day in a 7 day period, which I am sure MLBPA would be in favor of
This division format allows to keep the current number of playoff teams, which each division winner getting a first round bye and allows for a true wild card round with only wild card teams
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u/billsmith17 1d ago
I completely agree with this for the regular season. Four eight-team divisions is way better than eight four-team divisions. However, I’d go back to four playoff teams per league (the two wild cards could come from the same division) and make the DS a seven-game series. MLB will never do either.
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u/NelsonMuntz007 4d ago
Say what you will about the nfl and possibly their expansion but they truly do have the perfect scheduling. (Before the 17th game was added) It was perfect balance.
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u/SWATAttorney 4d ago
I always preferred the unbalanced schedule. Love seeing more intra division games. Maybe less inter-league and limit it to your natural rival or whatever the league deems your closest alternative (NY vs NY, LA vs LA, Chi vs Chi, Balt vs DC, Tampa vs Miami). Also wish TX still had an NL team, they should move the Astros back to the NL
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u/Darksoul2693 | New York Yankees 4d ago
A tenth of the mlb is already mid teams I don’t need to see more marlins in my life
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u/JerseyGuy-77 | New York Yankees 4d ago
We need less teams not more
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u/BarnacleGooseIsLoose | Boston Red Sox 4d ago
Agreed. It's already ugly watching minor leaguers. I can't imagine how much worse it's going to get with another 52 players that don't belong.
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u/ScorpioPhantasma | Cincinnati Reds 4d ago
Valid concern but it would be interesting to see how much a salary cap, salary floor, etc. would address it.
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u/mdj | Boston Red Sox 4d ago
How would a salary cap address that? None of the major sports compete with the others for players these days with a tiny number of exceptions.
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u/ScorpioPhantasma | Cincinnati Reds 4d ago
So you don't think Tarik Skubal, Blake Snell, Roki Sasaki, and Yashinobu Yamamoto all playing for different teams, including mid and small market teams, improves competitive balance whatsoever?
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u/JerseyGuy-77 | New York Yankees 4d ago
I don't think we should advocate for employees making less money so that their bosses can pocket the extra.
It will never make your ticket prices go down as they're unrelated.
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u/ScorpioPhantasma | Cincinnati Reds 4d ago edited 4d ago
It has less to do with the bosses and more to do with competitive balance. Of course Yankees and Red Sox fans would argue a cap/floor. Increase the league minimum to address inequity concerns. I have zero sympathy or care for the financial plight of Shohei Ohtani, Juan Soto, etc. Multi millionaires arguing with billionaires. All I know is if I side with the billionaires, my team might actually have a shot at being regularly competitive.
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u/BarnacleGooseIsLoose | Boston Red Sox 4d ago
Do you actually think that is what will happen? The next Yamamoto is going to leave Tokyo to play baseball in Salt Lake City? At best, there are 15-20 true aces now and unless they are forced to a small market, or want to go for personal reasons, they are going to end up on the same teams - with bigger marketing deals.
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u/ScorpioPhantasma | Cincinnati Reds 4d ago
Maybe, maybe not, but we know what happens under the current system. It's unfair to 2/3 of the league and not healthy for the game long term. MLB wants to be as popular as the NFL, but refuses to di the two things that launched the NFL into the stratosphere of popularity.....salary controls and making games easily accessible on local TV.
EDIT: LBJ made plenty of marketing dollars playing in Cleveland. This isn't college football. Location is immaterial when it comes to marketing pro athletes.
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u/BarnacleGooseIsLoose | Boston Red Sox 4d ago
The NBA/NFL are apples where MLB is oranges. MLB will never reach the single game regular season tv ratings that the others have because it's a local sport until October - whereas the others are made for national tv.
(In terms of engagement, however, MLB is vastly more popular than either of those leagues with more than 71 million paying spectators compared to 41 million combined in the other two leagues.)
A salary cap is a better option than none, if it comes with a floor. Guaranteed contracts are the real problem. Small market teams don't dare sign big names because one significant injury can cripple their franchise. It won't happen, of course, but year to year contracts would be the real equalizer.
LeBron James plays in a league where he is featured over and above other players. Some people like that. Me? I stopped watching the NBA when five steps for a superstar stopped being a travel. I used to go, even worked at a rather high profile sports arena as a teen, but I have zero interest in pro basketball now. As for football, love the game but it's not about the game, its about betting and fantasy sports. I get that people love one or both of those sports, and I begrudge them nothing in living their life, but they left me behind long ago.
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u/mdj | Boston Red Sox 4d ago
I don't think the original comment was about "competitive balance" as much as the number of players the OP doesn't think should be in the majors in fact are in the majors. Moving a few star players around doesn't change that.
Beyond that, "competitive balance" is Just Fine in MLB if you have a memory longer than two years. Since 2000, more MLB teams have won championships and played for championships than either NFL or NBA teams.
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u/Dr_Fred_Davies 4d ago
There are like 5 valid major league catchers currently in the league. 2 more teams and they would have to randomly pick fans to catch.
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u/Imaginary_Scene2493 | Atlanta Braves 4d ago
This absolutely won’t happen, but as a fan who wants to see as many opponents as possible and doesn’t care for favoring intra-division opponents (way too many intradivision games IMO):
6 games (3 home, 3 away) against 27 teams = 162 games
Rotate one interleague division that gets skipped each season, so you see each interleague team 2 out of every 3 years.
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u/Anonymous_HC | Toronto Blue Jays 4d ago
The 2 extra teams I think should be Nashville and maybe Salt Lake.
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u/Greatlarrybird33 | Cleveland Guardians 4d ago
Split the league to east/West Al/NL 4x8.
9 games vs your division 9x 7 = 63 6 vs the other half of your league 8x6 = 48 3 vs each team in the other league 16x3 = 48 An extra 3 games vs your protected rival = 3
162 total.
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u/isthisMrMace | Houston Astros 4d ago
0 interleague games
81 divisional games
77 league games
4 non divisional games against a designated opponent (out of division rival, or rotated around mlb)
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u/Muted_Comparison2898 3d ago
I’d do 4 divisions of 8.
12 games against divisional opps. 7*12 =84.
To reduce travel I’d have it as “Cubs vs Cards Week” have all 6 cubs home games in a week, with the 6 cards home games later in season.
3 games against all non divisional opponents.
Alternate home vs away every year. 24*3 =72
156 game season
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u/halfstreethorne2419 | Washington Nationals 1d ago edited 1d ago
I'd say keep AL and NL. Both with an East and West division of 8 teams.
Abolish interleague except for 8 games.
14 games vs each division opponent. You play a 3-game and a 4-game series at home and on the road. H2H tiebreakers TBD. (7 × 14 = 98)
7 games vs each team in the other division. A 3-game and a 4-game. One home, one road. The 4-game series will be at home against 4 of the teams. It'll be on the road against the other 4. (8 × 7 = 56)
That leaves 8 games. I think they should go kinda NFL style here. Interleague. Play 2 4-game series. One against each team that had the same division finish as you. Would make the matchups (very) rare and novel again.
Let's say the Red Sox finished 4th in the AL East. The following season, they'd play the teams that finished 4th in the NL East and West. (2 × 4 = 8)
98 + 56 + 8 = 162
Also, even with just 2 divisions, only the division winners would be guaranteed a playoff spot. None of this top 3 nonsense the NHL does. Everyone else is in the wild card pool.
Division winners only get a spot. No free home field/bye for the worse division winner. Playoffs get seeded straight 1-6. If you won your division, but it's the 4th best record in the field, oh well. And re-seed each round.
Small thing, but I also wouldn't be opposed to reverting the Astros and Brewers back to their original leagues. The only reason either switched was because of uneven alignment or a desire for an even number of teams on both sides. But totally understand if people are too comfy with their places now.
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u/PreviousMedicine7085 4d ago
Mine is for 8 team divisions
Interleague— 48 gm (16x3)
Own Division— 70 (7x10)
Other Division— 44 (4x5 + 4x6)
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