The subject came up during a recent game thread mentioning wild card expansion and realignment, expansion vs contraction, and balancing playoff scenarios, so Ithought I'd give this a shot.....

If I was commissioner of MLB.............(begin fuzzy dream sequence)

A. Expansion    

Okay, to make the extra wild card work, we must have even divisions, and contraction isn't going to happen. So, first, we grant MLB Expansion teams to .......

Las Vegas, and Charlotte.

Don't leave yet, hear me out. Las Vegas is the largest city in the US with NO major sports team, so it makes sense. Charlotte Already has 2 major sports franchises, so it would make sense, although, Nashville could be considered as well.

B. Realignment

This is where purists will scream. I consider myself a purist, but I see the need to
move forward at the same time, as long as there is a real purpose to the change.
My proposal is to go NFL here, 2 leagues, four divisions per league.

American League:

Eastern Division
1. New York Yankees
2. Boston Red Sox
3. Toronto Blue Jays
4. Cleveland Indians

Western Division
1. Oakland A's
2. Los Angeles Angels
3. Seattle Mariners
4. Las Vegas (unnamed)

Northern Division
1. Minnesota Twins
2. Chicago White Sox
3. Detroit Tigers
4. Kansas City Royals

Southern Division
1. Tampa Bay Rays
2. Baltimore Orioles
3. Houston Astros
4. Texas Rangers

National League

Eastern Division
1. New York Mets
2. Philadelphia Phillies
3. Washington Nationals
4. Charlotte(unnamed)

Western Division
1. Los Angeles Dodgers
2. San Francisco Giants
3. San Diego Padres
4. Arizona Diamondbacks

Northern Division
1. Milwaukee Brewers
2. Chicago Cubs
3. Colorado Rockies
4. Pittsburgh Pirates

Southern Division
1. Atlanta Braves
2. Florida Marlins
3. Cincinatti Reds
4. St. Louis Cardinals

C. Good Bye Interleague
I know...... it was fun for a minute, and of course this means that we'll no longer
see Milwaukee in the regular season.... so what! Interleagtue is an idea who's time
has passed. Under the realignment, teams will play division foes 18 times eack, for
a total of 54 games, and non division foes 9 times each(alternating home field
advantage yearly), for a total of 108 games. 108 + 54 = 162... Easy Peasy, Lemon
Squeezie.

D. Playoffs
Here again... NFL style. As much as I am not a big football fan, they are not afraid
to try new things. Obviously, the 4 division winners, plus the two best non division
winners. The top two get a bye for round one, which is a best of 5, with basic rules
intact, you can only play a division foe in the last round, unlessboth wild cards
come from one division. Under this year's American League standings, the wild
card round would be:

Tampa Bay at Detroit
Boston at Los Angeles

Texas and New York, having the best records as of this writing, get the byes.
From there, we proceed to Division Playoffs, LCS, and World Series with the team
with the better record having home field. This system has bugs, I'm sure, such as
an extra week of playoffs. But last I looked, there are often too many days
between the start of series. So, when eack round is resolved, the next round
begins after one day off... regardless. If both series of a round are sweeps, then
one day off, and go again. I think that the staggering of games is also harmful. All
series start on the same day... no exceptions. Same off days too. At the most, it
would add a week to the playoffs, more likely, 3 to 5 days. That's my opinion, but
I could be wrong....

I'm sure that I'll take some lambasting over this, but... what the hell, I gave it a
shot.... I'd love to hear others' ideas, and to hear what you think.