Why not move the Houston Astros to the AL West?

Question

the national league has 16 teams:
5 east, 6 central, 5 west

the american league has 14 teams:
5 east, 5 central, 4 west

Moving the Houston Astros (NL Central) to the american league (AL West) would create 5 teams in each division, making playoff contention more equitable. In addition, they would be in the same division as the Texas Rangers, increasing rivalry and benefitting both teams. Houston is too far from the rest of the teams in the NL Central anyways (Chicago, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, St. Louis, Milwaukee). Why doesn't MLB initiate this?

Answer 1

Because you can't have uneven teams. It would be 15 in each league.

That's why in interleague play two teams from NL have to play each other. Imagine if it was 15/15. This would mean two teams would have to play inter-league every week of the season.

If the number of teams in each league cannot be divided by 2, it won't work.

Answer 2

Before asking questions and losing the 5 points, try searching for old questions first. This question has been answered many times before.

The answer is that moving anyone to the AL to "even up" the leagues and the division would create an odd number of teams in each league. This would add the complication of having to either schedule an interleague series regularly, or give a team several days off in a row regularly, since the NL and the AL don't play each other. Unlike the conferences in the NFL, NBA, or NHL, the NL and the AL have DIFFERENT RULES, and playing each other regularly would be more problematic than having different numbers of teams in each division.

Answer 3

Can't have uneven # of teams in either of the two leagues because that would mean one team in each the NL and AL would not have a team in their leagues to play. In order for there to be an even amount of teams is to have a multiple of 4 # of teams so that this is possible. When the D Rays and D Backs came into the MLB in 1997, they had to move the Brewers to the NL after they were in the AL since 1969. I for one propose contracting the D Rays and the Nationals, though they would probably not let that happen.

Answer 4

It is almost impossible to force a team to change leagues. The only time it has happened was Milwaukee moving to the NL. In that case, Bud Selig, the owner and the commish, wanted the Brewers to be NL, and he had to throw ALOT of bones to the other owners to approve the move. As for the rivalries, Houston and St Louis have a very strong one now(made possible by the move from the NL West to the NL Central). I think it would be more feasible to move Colorado to the AL West. They are at least in the Mountain Time Zone, and they really don't have any bitter rivals in the National League.

Answer 5

Costas suggested the same thing in his book "Fair Ball." It won't happen because baseball purists would not be too enamoured with the idea of playing at least one interleague series every single day. Besides, if any team should switch leagues from NL to AL, it should be the team that switched from AL to NL in the first place: Milwaukee.

Answer 6

The plan was to put Arizona in the AL West and move Seattle to NL, but the D-Backs cried and Selig gave in. As far as moving an NL team to the AL you can't 15-15 won't work.

Answer 7

simple reason the way it is now, there is an even number of teams in both the nl and the al that way evert team could be playing some one, and not a day off because of a bye. This way you have all the teams playing the same number of games.

Answer 8

It would cause the two leagues to have 15 teams. Having an uneven number means that you would have to keep one team idle every day (a scheduling nightmare) or have inter-league play throughout the season. MLB is not ready for that.

MLB has a much stronger history of the individual leagues than did the NFL before the NFL-AFL merger. The NFL-AFL rivalry was only 7 years old before they negotiated the merger and the inter-conference games.

Answer 9

I agree, it makes total sense. I think because they want even number teams in the NL and AL. I think they feel it makes scheduling easier? Probably the next time they have expansion teams, they will add 2 teams to the AL West. It makes total sense to me though. In the NL Central you need to be better than 5 teams to win the division and in the AL West you only need to be better than 3 teams. I'm in favor of the 5 teams in every division.

Answer 10

Each league would have 15 teams. This would create scheduling problems by having 2 teams off every day when there is no interleague play . MLB will not accept teams not playing on Sat. & Sun.