More East games on tap

With realignment postponed, owners approve an unbalanced schedule that would increase games vs. division foes.

By MARC TOPKIN

© St. Petersburg Times, published July 15, 2000

ST. PETERSBURG -- Now the Devil Rays will really find out what life is like in the American League East.

Baseball's owners abandoned plans for realignment Friday and instead approved an unbalanced schedule for next season that will increase the number of games the Rays play against their divisional opponents.

The Rays will play 19 games each season against the Yankees, Red Sox, Blue Jays and Orioles, a significant increase from the 12-13 under the old format. Each team likely would make three visits to Tropicana Field each season rather than two.

"We're in a division with four outstanding franchises, and from the perspective of enhancing the number of games we play against our divisional opponents, it is a good move," Rays senior vice president/general counsel John Higgins said.

It also could make winning more challenging, since the AL East teams usually feature the largest payrolls and most star-laden rosters in the league.

"Whether we're in the NL East or the AL East, eventually we have to beat the good teams to get where we want to go," general manager Chuck LaMar said. "The division we're in right now is a tough division, and it always will be. We've got to become competitive enough."

Under the new format, the Rays would play six, seven or nine games against each of the other AL teams and would continue to play 18 games against NL teams. Baseball officials had talked about rotating the interleague opponents, but it appears the Rays would again play the NL East teams (the Braves, Expos, Mets, Phillies and Marlins). A final draft of the schedule is expected in about two weeks.

Commissioner Bud Selig had been lobbying for moderate realignment, pushing a plan that would have moved the Rays to the National League and Arizona to the AL in hopes of creating more regional rivalries. (The two expansion franchises can be moved without their approval through November 2002.)

Rays officials seemed to like the idea of shifting to the NL, thinking Tampa Bay fans would find NL opponents more appealing. But Higgins said the decision to put off the realignment plan, at least until 2002, was not necessarily disappointing.

"Obviously there's pros and cons to both situations," Higgins said. "When it was first talked about as a possibility, we really wanted to do what was best for baseball. If was good for the 30 clubs collectively, we were willing to do it. But now that baseball was able to accomplish what it wanted to do without moving teams between leagues, that was fine, too."

© St. Petersburg Times. All rights reserved.

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