By Jordan Long
The Major League Baseball All-Star Game is tonight. The Commissioner of Major League Baseball, Rob Manfred, had his annual press conference during the All-Star festivities. He would like to see baseball add a few more teams. According to cbssports.com, Manfred said, “Now the mayor of Montreal has been very vocal about bringing baseball back to Montreal. It was not great when the Expos left. The fact of the matter was baseball was successful in Montreal for a very long time. Charlotte is a possibility. And I would like to think that Mexico City or some place in Mexico would be another possibility.”
Major League Baseball has not expanded since the Tampa Bay Rays and the Arizona Diamondbacks started playing in 1998. Baseball at some point wants to add two more teams to the current 30, which would total 32.
Montreal deserves a second chance at baseball. The move of adding Montreal will give Canada two baseball teams. Montreal had the Expos from 1969 to 2004. The Expos relocated to Washington DC and became the Washington Nationals. During that time, the Expos made the playoffs once back in 1981. They left at the end of 2004.
Montreal is a respectable sports town. They have hockey and Canadian Football as their major sports. They have been hoping for the day baseball comes back. They would hopefully fill the stadium and watch their team compete. The only downside is would they really support the team? MLB took a team away once so it is possible they would do it again.
Charlotte is an interesting choice. They have the Charlotte Knights which is currently the Triple A affiliate of the Chicago White Sox. Charlotte has enjoyed minor league baseball since 1976. The city proved it can support a minor league team. This would be the place to expand because they do have the NBA Hornets, NHL Hurricanes and the NFL Panthers.
The place that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense is Mexico. Mexico has their own professional baseball league. Manfred should not consider them. Adding MLB would be direct competition and the fans may not support the team. They will cheer for the teams they grew up seeing. It would be best for MLB to stick to Canada and Charlotte.
Major League Baseball will not increase teams for a while. MLB must take a deep hard look at which places to add more teams. Hopefully in the next five years we will have two more teams in Major League Baseball.
Where do you think Major League Baseball should expand?
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