There Hasn't Been A Difference Between The American League and The National League For A Very, Very Long Time

 

Earlier this month that was a collective scream heard across the country. While at first it seemed like every grandfather in the world simultaneously broke their hips, it was actually something far worse: every baseball commentator in the world was reacting to Commissioner Rob Manfred's announcement that he was planning realignment for Major League Baseball.

As any true fan of the game knows this portent was written as one of the signs of the apocalypse in the Book of Topps, the final sign which will lead to a cataclysmic chain of events that will cause Abner Doubleday's parents to never meet, which in turn will lead to him never inventing the game at Cooperstown, therefore causing the entire sport of baseball to vanish from the space-time continuum.

The first two paragraphs are purely satirical. What is meant to be taking more seriously, certainly by fans, is a New York Post columnist argument that Manfred's decision spit in the face of the fan-base of baseball: 55-64 year olds. This confirmed something I have long suspected about far too baseball fans: they would prefer that the last game of baseball ever played be done while all of them are watching, with all of them dying after the last out is recorded – rather than have one element change and lead the possibility of new fans coming to it. That this columnist reals thinks this is persuasive argument not to change the game couldn't do more to represent the generational problem that Manfred is trying to solve and the obstacles that he will face.

None of this is new of course. When it comes to any change in baseball, the purists are like that old Republican voter: they've been against every single one. Night baseball, radio, integration, expansion, the designated hitter, free agency, all of them will irrevocably destroy the game as we know it. One is reminded of certain end-of-days cultists who when the apocalypse doesn't happen say they'd made a miscalculation in the prophetic writings and it will actually happen next year.

In this case what they claim to be angriest about is that this will eradicate the National League and the American League, two institutions that have existed before the automobile and as you might expect have far more symbolic value to purists then any real value they might have had. There are many reasons why all of this arguing about something that has had less real meaning in baseball for decades before this argument took place (I'll get to that) but I'd like to point out that there are several reason this whole argument was pointless to begin with.

First of all these two leagues have existed separate but equal (which was the law of the land in many other ways in the bad old days) since 1903. That was of course back when there were only eight teams in each league. And the major reason there was a difference was because each league represented five cities: Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, New York and St. Louis.

A three-man commission was set to rule baseball. Both leagues were supposed to share authority equally but Ban Johnson, President of the American League, was the one with all the real power. This changed in 1919 with the coming of the Black Sox Scandal which led to the establishing of the office of Commissioner. Kenesaw Mountain Landis ruled the game like an absolute czar and while both leagues would continue to have Presidents running them, from that point forward the Commissioner was the sole authority over the sport, which is true to this day. In the eyes of the commissioner, the job of president of the league wasn't worth a pitcher of warm spit.

The more important change between the two leagues came in the 1950s. With the rise of television, the interstate highway and air travel, more Americans were migrating west. As a result attendance for all teams dropped drastically and most cities could no longer afford two major league teams. In 1952 the Braves left Boston for Milwaukee, in 1953 the Browns left St. Louis for Baltimore and Connie Mack's A's eventually left Philadelphia for Kansas City. It's hard to imagine that any of these cities were upset that they were getting a National League team instead of an American League one or vice versa. Certainly when the Braves went to Atlanta and Milwaukee got the Brewers four years afterwards, no citizen said: "But we wanted a National League team."

More importantly when expansion filled in the gaps, it was only New York that got a replacement. Even that was more likely due to the fact that they had lost two teams rather than one. No Browns fans or Athletics fans ever demanded another A.L. counterpart to make up for the one they lost.

By that point I'd argue there was no real difference between an American League team and a National League team and certainly future expansion has does nothing to highlight that. There may be a National League and American League team in Florida but considering no one goes to either team's home game its hard to say there's any league pride to speak of there. And it's not like people were up in arms when the Astros and the Brewers changed leagues: the teams still existed so the fans didn't care that much. Only the purists did.

And this brings me to the final reason that irrevocably made sure that there was no difference between the two leagues: free agency. There had apparently been a gentleman's agreement during much of the 20^th century against trading players between leagues, mainly because one league would want to give the other the player that led to winning the World Series. This was really never a hard and fast rules and certainly the Yankees during the era of George Weiss never much followed it: they had a tendency of picking up old National league players at the end of their careers, from Johnny Mize to Dale Long, to help them with pennant stretches. By the 1970s that rule was basically gone as players such as Frank Robinson, Dick Allen and Nolan Ryan were traded between both leagues for multiple players.

This was officially cast away for good when free agency eliminated this last element. Baseball players were free to go to the highest bidder and they held no more loyalty to their leagues then their teams. One of the first free agents was Don Gullett, who left the Cincinnati Reds to be signed by the Yankees in 1977.

So it's pretty clear that there hasn't been a dime's worth of difference between the two leagues for a very long time and that's before you throw in that as part of his consolidation of power Bud Selig chose to eliminate the presidencies of both leagues by 2000. As much as purists ( again that horrible word) will argue Selig destroyed the game with interleague play, realigning the divisions and making the DH part of both leagues, all he was doing was saying the quiet part out loud. Baseball is one sport and the two leagues only exist for purposes of the World Series.

And that's no different from the championship of any other sport. Does anyone really know what the difference between the AFC and the NFC, the Eastern Conference and the Western Conference, the Eastern Division or Western division of all the other sports? For the record teams played their rivals in other divisions over the years in all of these sports and no one ever seems to argue that whenever the Islanders play the Rangers or the Knicks play the Lakers that it's unnatural? So why is there such outrage when the Yankees play the Giants?

 Now of course there was a period when the two leagues were different. It happened not long after Jackie Robinson played his first game for the Brooklyn Dodgers. Not long after that Bill Veeck signed Larry  Doby for the Cleveland Indians and integration began to slowly progress into the majors. Of course it wasn't fully integrated until 1959 when Pumpsie Green played for the Red Sox.

By 1960 nine of the last eleven Most Valuable Player Awards had gone to African-American players. Elston Howard became the first most valuable player for the American in 1963. After that the National League won seven consecutive All-Star Games and had a streak in which they'd won twelve out of fourteen. One such reason, as multiple historians have pointed out, was due the fact the American League, led by the ownership of the Yankees, had been far slower to integrate than the National League had been and by that point had the overwhelming majority of African-American superstars, including Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, Ernie Banks, Willie McCovey and Bob Gibson. I guess that answers a question I was going to ask: "Was there ever a difference between a National League superstar and an American League one?" It's just not one those people who argue those two leagues are institutions that should never change really want to talk about that much, especially considering the problems the game is having with African-American players these days.

But even long before that in the nearly forty-five seasons the two leagues co-existed, as a scholar of the game I'll be damned if I can find a difference between the superstars of one league or the other. Ed Walsh of the White Sox and Three-Finger Brown of the Cubs when they dominated their pitching to have the lowest earned run averages of their respective leagues. Rogers Hornsby hit .400 twice for the Cardinals, George Sisler did twice for the Browns. Jimmie Foxx and Chuck Klein each won the triple crown for the Philadelphia teams in either league. The only people who seem to really care the most nitpicking of historians: in major league baseball they all rank among the greats. Is there some kind of tally I know being kept of which league has the most Hall of Famers in it somewhere? And wasn't that rendered mute when the Negro Leaguers staring coming in the 1960s?

To be clear realignment is one of those discussions that has been the mission of commissioners and league presidents since at least the 1970s and it takes a lot more than it being suggested for it to become a reality. Manfred may have a plan but so have such names as Bowie Kuhn and Bill White and it went nowhere. There are many steps and obstacles to come and it's not like if the commissioner just says something, it will happen. Even Manfred admits there will have to be new expansion teams added just for it to become possible and he has even worked out where those two teams will be. And as is almost always the case the owners hate change as much, if not more, then the media and their aging fan base do. I'm taking the wait-and-see approach.

I'm not sure what I do think about the idea of realignment. It may be a totally destructive idea or it might help revitalize the game. What I do know is that if the only argument is that it tears down two establishments that have existed since before the twentieth century that's not the best argument against it. If anything, it's one of the biggest reasons for it, if for no other reason that it has the oldest established fan base of any sport clutching their pearls in agony.