Notable Changes To Major League Baseball
Bud Selig helped introduce the following changes to Major League Baseball:
- Realignment of teams into three divisions per league, and the introduction of playoff wild card teams (1994)
- Interleague play (1997)
- Two additional franchises: the Arizona Diamondbacks and the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, now the Tampa Bay Rays (1998)
- Transfer of the Milwaukee Brewers from the American League to the National League (1998)
- Abolition of the American and National league offices and presidencies, and inclusion of all umpiring crews into a common pool for AL and NL games, instead of having separate pools per league (2000)
- Unbalanced schedule (2001)
- Home field advantage in the World Series granted to the winner of the All Star Game in the same season (2003)
- Transfer of Montreal Expos franchise to Washington, D.C., becoming the Washington Nationals (2004)
- Dedicating April 15 as Jackie Robinson Day (2004)
- Stricter Major League Baseball performance-enhancing drug testing policy (2005)
- World Baseball Classic (2006)
- Introduction of instant replay in the event of a disputed home run call (2008)
- Introducing a second wild card playoff team in each league (2012)
- Requiring the Houston Astros to move to the American League (2013), as a condition of the sale of the team to Jim Crane, resulting in an odd number of teams in each league and interleague play throughout the season
During Selig's terms as Executive Council Chairman (from 1992–1998) and Commissioner, new stadiums have opened in Arizona, Atlanta, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Colorado, Detroit, Houston, Milwaukee, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, Arlington, St. Louis, Washington, D.C., New York City (Flushing, Queens and the Bronx), Minneapolis, and Miami.
Read more about this topic: Bud Selig
Famous quotes containing the words notable, major, league and/or baseball:
“Every notable advance in technique or organization has to be paid for, and in most cases the debit is more or less equivalent to the credit. Except of course when it’s more than equivalent, as it has been with universal education, for example, or wireless, or these damned aeroplanes. In which case, of course, your progress is a step backwards and downwards.”
—Aldous Huxley (1894–1963)
“What, really, is wanted from a neighborhood? Convenience, certainly, an absence of major aggravation, to be sure. But perhaps most of all, ideally, what is wanted is a comfortable background, a breathing space of intermission between the intensities of private life and the calculations of public life.”
—Joseph Epstein (b. 1937)
“Half a league, half a league,
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
“Forward the Light Brigade!”
—Alfred Tennyson (1809–1892)
“One of the baseball-team owners approached me and said: “If you become baseball commissioner, you’re going to have to deal with 28 big egos,” and I said, “For me, that’s a 72% reduction.””
—George Mitchell (b. 1933)