I Can Only Imagine...

Lotta talk this week about fixing baseball. Is attendance bad? Does everyone really hate the Yankees? Is there too much offense? Will no one watch the All-Star Game tomorrow night? Do we care about steroids? I don’t know, but people at work keep asking me what I’d do if I were commissioner, so here it is…

Dream with me for a moment. Imagine a world in which there are only sixteen major league teams—the original sixteen. Instantly 350 sub-par baseballers are demoted to the minors where they belong. The talent represented by the remaining 400 players is concentrated into eight teams per league who can all compete every year. Not only does the talent level automatically increase, but the limited number of roster spots makes competition more intense than ever before as players fight each day to keep their jobs (after all, the minors will be loaded with guys who just missed the cut). Pitching staffs are solid through and through. All-Stars from previous years are now utility guys and pinch hitters. The DH is abolished forever, further purging the game of the marginal and washed up. Furthermore, the TV revenue is now divided eight way rather than into thirty measly pieces. For the first time ever only the best of the best compete, for baseball is now be open to the black, the Latino and the Asian. The world has never known baseball of this quality! Would that I could make it happen.

The Teams:
AL
Baltimore (the old St. Louis Browns)
Boston Red Sox
Chicago While Sox
Cleveland
Detroit
Minnesota (the original Washington Senators)
New York
Oakland A's (via Philadelphia)

NL
Atlanta (the old Boston Braves)
Chicago Cubs
Cincinnati
L.A. Dodgers (via Brooklyn)
Philadelphia Phillies
Pittsburgh
S.F. Giants (via NY)
St. Louis Cardinals

Peace, love and pitchers who can bunt,
ben