You get to locate 1 new team in each of the 5 major leagues. What cities do you pick?

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Jonesy55

So no teams in the South either pre 1950s?

nope, prior to the philadelphia A's moving out to kansas city in 1955, there was no MLB south of DC or west of st. louis. it was all contained in the northeast quadrant of the country because that's where all of the nation's largest cities were (with the exception of the two california juggernauts) and that's what railroad travel times practically allowed for (MLB is a very travel intensive sport).

MLB arrrived out west in 1958 when the dodgers and giants both simultaneously left new york for california.

and MLB didn't arrive in the south until the houston colt .45s (later renamed the astros) expansion team was created in 1962, followed by the braves moving from milwaukee to atlanta in 1966.

Originally Posted by Jonesy55

Were there other high quality leagues there too like on the west coast?

the other AAA leagues at the time were the international league and the american association.

the international league consisted mainly of teams in northeast cities that didn't have MLB at the time (baltimore, buffalo, rochester, newark, etc.) along with teams in toronto and montreal (hence the "international" moniker).

the american association consisted mainly of teams in midwest cities that didn't have MLB at the time (milwaukee, minneapolis, indianapolis, kansas city, columbus, toledo, etc.).

the west coast had the PCL, which would have been considered the highest level of professional baseball outside of MLB at its height, while the south was pretty much shut-out of higher level baseball in that era, only having teams at lower levels in the minor leagues.

[LosAngelesSportsFan]

Really appreciate your knowledge on this steely!

[Steely Dan]

^ thanks. i'm certainly no expert on the PCL, but i do like baseball, history, and historic ballparks, so it's a natural fit for me to learn more about.

and speaking of historic ballparks, here are some pics of seals stadium in SF where the SF seals played from 1931-1957. it also served as home field for the giants for their first two season in SF until candlestick was completed. with a capacity around 20,000, it was the second largest PCL stadium after wrigely field in LA.


source: https://www.ballparksofbaseball.com/...seals-stadium/



source: https://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/25/s...nce-stood.html

[Pavlov's Dog]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

though it wasn't nearly as long, in its heyday of the late '30s - late '50s, the PCL enjoyed an extended period of team location stability too. from 1938 until 1958 (when the dodgers and giants moved out to cali and totally interrupted the PCL's mojo), the PCL looked like this:

san diego padres
los angeles angels
hollywood stars
san francisco seals
oakland oaks
sacramento solons
portland beavers
seattle rainiers


2 teams in LA, 2 teams in the bay area, and 1 team in each of the other 4 major west coast cities. some of the stadiums in the league were large enough to hold over 20,000 fans. the PCL was a pretty big deal, with high quality baseball teams playing in some of the biggest cities in the country, not small little backwater cities that we often associate with minor league baseball. with 8 teams, that would have aligned nicely with the existing 8 teams in both the NL and the AL at that time. if the PCL had simply been allowed to join MLB, it would have negated the need for a whole lot of team reshuffling and expansion teams. and with no interleague play during the regular season back then, travelling cross continent wouldn't have been an issue, but i don't know how the world series would have worked with 3 leagues. maybe that was one of the reasons the NL and AL wouldn't let the PCL join them?

Interesting observation. Of course there were plenty of other large cities in the Midwest, Plains and South that didn't have an MLB team either so they could unddoubtely expanded to places like Minnesota, Kansas City, Dallas, Houston, New Orleans, Atlanta and Miami if they had wanted to have more teams. Of course having a government approved monopoloy on Major League baseball they could collude to get whatever terms they felt were best for their own interests.

[Sun Belt]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

^ thanks. i'm certainly no expert on the PCL, but i do like baseball, history, and historic ballparks, so it's a natural fit for me to learn more about.

Speaking of the PCL:

Long ago:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/67827566@N00/4331601168

After, but not current [the Intercontinental Hotel is about to open on the site, next to the new park, to the right of the building under construction in the picture]:

https://coolsandiegosights.com/tag/stadiums/page/2/

Take note of the home plate slab of granite that exists today. I took some pictures here 2 days ago. Will be going to the Dodgers/Padres game this week down in S.D. later this week. Pretty cool that we're discussing this topic today.

You can see the Wyndham Hotel in the background, that's where I stayed for the 4th of July this year.

[xzmattzx]

Originally Posted by Pavlov's Dog

Thanks for that. I had forgotten how static the league was and the fact that Boston had two teams. It's such a Red Sox town nowadays. Does anyone still pine for the Braves?

I have a friend who's grandfather rooted for the Boston Braves, and he followed them to Milwaukee and Atlanta until he died.