About a decade ago, an effort (or at least an idea) was had in regard to testing out a theory of geographic realignment of NFL teams placed in the closest proximity to each other, regardless of conference. After this decade, a new idea came about: MLB realignment!

In this post, here is a ‘flukadamus’ What If presentation of all 30 teams in Major League Baseball in alignment to the closest teams in their respective locations. There are a few notables that will be discussed here based on thought-process with this particular order.

To start, the assembly was in order from divisions first, then the conference second. The idea was to have all divisions in place and later send them over to the closest regions possible, sort of like a u-shaped curve separating the lower half of the United States and the upper part, including Toronto. That said, the placement is as follows:

1. In the National League, the Central consists of two teams that would stay in place from what is current right now: the Milwaukee Brewers and the Chicago Cubs. Add the Minnesota Twins, the Detroit Tigers and the Toronto Blue Jays in that division. Normally, Toronto is considered an East division team, but it seemed apt to place them closer to Detroit and the rest of the upper Midwest.
2. The West has both Los Angeles teams (Angels and Dodgers), in addition to the Oakland A’s (will eventually move to Las Vegas sometime in the future), the San Francisco Giants and the Seattle Mariners.
3. The East consists of the Boston Red Sox, both New York teams (Yankees and Mets), and both Pennsylvania teams (Philadelphia Phillies and Pittsburgh Pirates). The Pirates are considered a Central team, but moving them over to the East was the general idea.

So with the NL conference in place, there is the upper Midwest and Canada, the West Coast teams and the New England region of teams.

As for the American League, it is of its own changes:

1. The Central consists of the other Chicago team (White Sox), both Ohio teams (Cincinnati Reds and Cleveland Guardians), and both Missouri teams (Kansas City Royals and St. Louis Cardinals). This is going from the South Side Chicago team playing the east teams of the Reds & Guardians and west teams of the Royals & Cardinals.
2. The West division has the Arizona Diamondbacks, the Colorado Rockies, both Texas teams (Houston Astros and Texas Rangers) and the San Diego Padres. The Astros and Rangers are already currently in the West division for this conference, but the idea was to move the Diamondbacks, Padres and Rockies from the NL to the AL.
3. Finally, the East provides the teams of the Atlanta Braves, Baltimore Orioles, both Florida teams (Miami Marlins and Tampa Bay Rays) and the Washington Nationals. The Braves, Nationals and Marlins all move to the AL with the Orioles and Rays to assemble Atlantic coast division rivalries.

There is acknowledgement that, like the NFL scenario, it is not a perfect reality due to tradition of certain rivalries that take place between certain ball clubs. Still, it would be nice to dream of an idea where both New York teams fight it out multiple times in a season, or even the Ohio, Pennsylvania and Texas teams do the same. The only exception is the Chicago based teams. Now, there COULD have been the effort to put them in the same Central conference together like L.A. and all, but the exception was made for the White Sox and Cubs so that the u-shaped curve separating regions could happen. Otherwise, maybe you sacrifice Toronto out of the NL and put them in the AL with the Reds, Guardians, Royals and Cardinals.

Either way, this showcase is something that some thought was put into a lot more than the NBA one that was considered, but ultimately abandoned. If MLB would like to consider this, that’d be great. But there is high doubt that it would……you know, possibly due tradition and such.

Disclaimer: all logos and identities seen in this post are credited to Major League Baseball and their respective teams.