Re-aligning Baseball

Alright, a common complaint in this area is that the Jays have no chance to win against the payrolls of the Yankees and Red Sox. The complainers are not wrong, in fact they are head on. There is no salary cap in baseball and the team with the most money, usually does the best, it is not fair or really in the spirit of sport but it is what it is.

I think there are 3 plans to realign baseball.
1. By Payroll (locked in for 3 years)
2. Looking at moving to 4 uneven divisions in each league
3. Expansion to 32 teams and 4 even divisions in each league

1. By Payroll
The key hear is to lock teams into divisions for 3 years to avoid good teams cutting payroll to go into a lower division and then winning.
We can use the Opening Day Payrolls for the 2010 season for this and look to change a few things.

This format brings in 4 price categories, we are keeping 8 teams in the playoffs. League's are not taken into consideration for this format.

Top Division (4 Playoff Berths)
Ah the controversy begins already, the teams that spend the most will be facing the top competition and really I think it is ok that they get half of the berths. These will be the teams that will have the best players and make the most money for the league. This is a 12 team division.
1. New York Yankees ($206.333 million)
2. Boston Red Sox ($162.747 million)
3. Chicago Cubs ($146.859 million)
4. Philadelphia Phillies ($141.927 million)
5. New York Mets ($132.701 million)
6. Detroit Tigers ($122.864 million)
7. Chicago White Sox ($108.273 million)
8. Anaheim Angels ($105.013 million)
9. Seattle Mariners ($98.376 million)
10. San Francisco Giants ($97.828 million)
11. Minnesota Twins ($97.559 million)
12. Los Angeles Dodgers ($94.945 million)

Second Division (2 Playoff Berths)
This division will have 6 teams in the division
13. St. Louis Cardinals ($93.540 million)
14. Houston Astros ($92.355 million)
15. Atlanta Braves ($84.423 million)
16. Colorado Rockies ($84.227 million)
17. Baltimore Orioles ($81.612 million)
18. Milwaukee Brewers ($81.108 million)

Third Division (1-2 Playoff Berth(s))
This division also has 6 teams, but these teams do pay less, and should not be treated equally.
19. Cincinnati Reds ($72.386 million)
20. Kansas City Royals ($72.267 million)
21. Tampa Bay Rays ($71.923 million)
22. Toronto Blue Jays ($62.689 million)
23. Washington Nationals ($61.425 million)
24. Cleveland Indians ($61.203 million)

Fourth Division aka the Cheapskate Division (0-1 Playoff Berth(s))
I have decided that if these teams want to be in the playoffs their champion will have to face the third division runner up in a best of three playoff series to get into the playoffs.
25. Arizona Diamondbacks ($60.718 million)
26. Florida Marlins ($55.641 million)
27. Texas Rangers ($55.250 million)
28. Oakland Athletics ($51.654 million)
29. San Diego Padres ($37.799 million)
30. Pittsburgh Pirates ($34.943 million)

This situation particularly sucks for the Diamondbacks because they are half a million dollars from switching with Cleveland, but alas, I figure we need to reward the moderate spenders over the cheapskates.

So the playoffs?
The top division will have their own playoffs, so the #1 seed will take on the #4 seed, and the #2 seed to take on the #3 seed with the winners playing for the right to go to the World Series.
The next 4 spots are taken by the bottom three divisions, the 2nd Division 1st place will face either the 3rd division runner up or the 4th division champion, and the 3rd division champion will face off against the 2nd division runner up. The winner of these series will face each other for the right to go to the world series.

This alignment would hold until the end of the 2012 season, and than the divisions would be redrawn. As for scheduling, the teams would play 6 games against each of the other 29 teams, 3 home and 3 road that is 174 games.

2. Uneven 8 division
This is based on geography and with four teams in each division. You would have 4 division champions making the playoffs, no wild cards, but if MLB wanted too they could add 2 from each league. Scheduling? Very complicated, and I would let the MLB figure that one out.

AL East
New York Yankees
Boston Red Sox
Baltimore Orioles
Toronto Blue Jays (I tried, but I cannot justify putting a team based on geography in the east)
AL North
Detroit Tigers
Chicago White Sox
Minnesota Twins
Cleveland Indians
AL South
Tampa Bay Rays
Kansas City Royals
Texas Rangers
AL West
Seattle Mariners
Oakland Athletics
Anaheim Angeles
NL East
New York Mets
Philadelphia Phillies
Pittsburgh Pirates
Washington Nationals
NL North
Chicago Cubs
Cincinnati Reds
Colorado Rockies
Milwaukee Brewers
NL South
Atlanta Braves
Florida Marlins
Houston Astros
St. Louis Cardinals
NL West
Arizona Diamondbacks
Los Angeles Dodgers
San Diego Padres
San Francisco Giants

3. Expansion to 32 teams
Two Expansion Teams: Charlotte, NC and Oklahoma City, OK
AL East
New York
Boston
Baltimore
Charlotte
AL North
Toronto
Detroit
Chicago
Cleveland
AL South
Tampa Bay
Kansas City
Texas
Oklahoma City
AL West
Seattle
Minnesota
Oakland
Anaheim
NL East
New York
Philadelphia
Pittsburgh
Washington
NL North
Chicago
Cincinnati
Colorado
Milwaukee
NL South
Atlanta
Florida
Houston
St. Louis
NL West
Arizona
Los Angeles
San Diego
San Francisco

Well what do you think? I personally love the payroll idea, and the expansion idea as well, but I am interested in what you the readers have to say.