Happy Labor Day weekend!
We’ve touched on Expansion a couple times in the past few weeks in this space, and in the comments we’ve talked about a couple of interesting “what-ifs” related to the side effects of Expansion, namely:
- What happens if we put MLB teams into existing AAA markets?
- How would two new MLB teams build out their affiliate farm systems?
I’ve given these topics some thought in the past, but never put pen to paper in this space, so what better time than the present. First, I did a little XLS work to build what i’m calling the MLB Pyramid. I cross-referenced all full season minor league teams to their Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs) to see where there’s under-served markets that might be suitable for eventual minor league team relocation.
Here’s that spreadsheet, and then here’s some quick macro market analysis.
First off, if you’re looking at the Google XLS link, here’s a guide to the color coding:
- i’ve got the markets that currently have a MLB team highlighted in Yellow.
- Then, I’ve highlighted the 6 leading expansion markets that keep getting bandied about in Green.
- lastly, i’ve highlighted in Red the Markets that either have NO baseball, or which clearly don’t have a big enough team right now.
You can filter on the level to find the 30 teams in each level if you want to see them in one place, which is a fun exercise. If you filter on MLB though the count isn’t 30 since several markets have 2 teams and I don’t have Canadian teams here.
So, what does this pyramid tell us? Some interesting information.
MLB Market Consideration Thoughts
- The largest area w/o a MLB team technically is Riverside, but as part of the larger LA market it won’t get a third team. Just like Brooklyn won’t get a 3rd team, despite NY being the largest MSA in the country.
- Orlando is thus the largest stand-alone MSA without a MLB team. And, it doesn’t have ANY organized full season baseball. It doesn’t even have a spring training facility. Is it fair to characterize Orlando as basically a city serving its two massive theme parks, and as such one that cant’ really support 80 home dates of a baseball team? Maybe, maybe not; it hosts an NBA team just fine.
- The two leading expansion cities per the tea leaves (Nashville and Salt Lake) trail a slew of other markets, and if a team went into SLC it’d immediately be the smallest market in the sport, well behind even Milwaukee. This is problematic, but unavoidable; no matter where you put a team it’s going to be a “small market” and not able to immediately compete with the Houstons and Philadelphias of the world.
Ok, so lets assume Nashville and Salt Lake City get MLB teams. Guess what? Both cities have established AAA teams. So, what happens to them? Well, it depends.
- The team could just dissolve, though this seems highly unlikely given that AAA teams are worth around $50M right now.
- More likely, the AAA team would relocate. When the last round of expansion happened in 1998, both Denver and Phoenix had existing AAA teams. What happened to them? Well, initially the Denver Zephyrs moved to New Orleans and the Phoenix Firebirds moved to Tucson. Interestingly, both of those teams have since moved; New Orleans’ franchise is now in Wichita, while Tucson’s moved to Reno.
- Ironically, New Orleans and Tucson now are amongst the largest markets in the country without affiliated baseball of any sort, and could both be targets for a new AAA team if/when the existing teams have to relocate.
Where else would a new AAA team make sense? Well, scanning down the markets:
- If Orlando and Portland don’t get teams, they’d both make good AAA sites. Portland has had AAA baseball in the past, though area residents don’t speak fondly of the experience.
- San Jose remains a major, growing market that’s further from the San Francisco ballpark than Nationals park is from Camden Yards, yet the Giants maintain territorial control.
- Several AAA teams technically live in the same MSA as their MLB teams: Atlanta, Minnesota, Seattle, and Houston’s AAA teams play in Gwinnett, St. Paul, Tacoma, and Sugar Land respectively. However, neither Nashville or Salt Lake are “big” enough to have both a MLB and a AAA team in the same spot.
If, for some reason, MLB went into two totally blank markets instead (say, Orlando and Raleigh), then there’s zero impact to any existing AAA or other team, and you’d have to basically come up with brand new AAA teams from existing markets. What do you do then?
- If you wanted to “promote” an existing AA market to AAA, there’s a couple that make a lot of sense. San Antonio and Richmond both have AA teams now but are more than big enough to support AAA baseball. Richmond was a AAA affiliate for decades before the Braves bought the team and moved it to an Atlanta suburb, while San Antonio is technically in the market for a MLB team itself and could more than support AAA.
- However, if you made Both Richmond and San Antonio AAA markets, you’d screw up the AAA league structure, giving both the International and Pacific Coast league odd numbers of teams. PCL has two divisions of 5, while IL has two divisions of 10, so this might be problematic unless you moved one to the other. And there’s zero teams in either league who geographically make sense to move.
- If you wanted two to IL (which would give it 22 teams, and would make for more unbalanced divisions) you’d probably go Richmond and Hartford.
- If you wanted to go two to PCL markets you could probably promote San Antonio and one of Tulsa/Little Rock, which would give PCL two divisions of 6, which is nice and neat.
MLB teams want their AAA franchises to be somewhat close, and putting two teams in the Texas/Oklahoma area kind of splits the difference between an eastern and western team. So that works.
If you displace two AA markets with AAA teams, then you’ve got further cascading franchise disposition to deal with. Here’s the fun part; we still have to “find” markets for two more AA, High-A, and Low-A teams, in addition to two more spring training facilities (one in Florida, one in Arizona). What would that look like? Lets take a look.
AA Minor league expansion
In the lower leagues, we get a lot more geographically focused. AA has three leagues: the Eastern League, the Southern League, and the Texas League. So, there’s really no west coast leagues out there. Furthermore, if you look at where the High-A leagues are (East Coast, Upper Midwest, and the Northwest), there’s really only one option: you have to move two High-A South Atlantic teams into the AA Eastern League:
- Wilmington and Brooklyn’s teams are in the biggest High-A markets and make the most sense given the geographic layout of the Eastern League. There’s AA teams that span from New Hampshire to Richmond, and putting these teams right in the middle makes sense.
- There’s North Carolina markets that are tempting, like Raleigh or Greensboro, but these teams are probably irked by the trip south to Richmond as it is.
High-A expansion
Again, since the three High-A leagues are so geographically clustered (Carolina, California, and Florida), the only real option is to take two Low-A teams in the Carolina League and move them into the South Atlantic league. There’s several decent options; two teams in the Charlotte suburbs, Charleston (which used to be High-A before the re-org), Myrtle Beach (same), Columbia, South Carolina, or even Fredericksburg. These were all solid High-A markets before getting “demoted” and some could get the call.
Low-A expansion and below
Because we’ve poached so many east coast teams, we’d have to basically “find” two new markets somewhere in the mid-Atlantic coast to replace the two lost Low-A franchises.
Both would make sense in Virginia; one in Charlottesville, one in Ashburn/Leesburg? Or, you could go find some closed Short-A teams that make sense (though many of them are now lost to time).
Lastly, some teams have rookie teams outside of their complexes; if these two teams wanted to go that route they could put teams in two non-served western markets Casper WY and Fort Collins.
Anyway, this kind of empties the notebook on a text file I’ve had sitting around for a decade. Thoughts? Interesting?