What Might "Floating Divisions" in Major League Baseball Look Like?

Just trying to play some Sherlock Holmes-slash-Kreskin.

Here are parameters I'm seeing based on what the Tom Verducci revelation said, but building on that with some degree of conjecture...

- Divisions would be redrawn on some periodic basis, possibly as often as yearly, and maybe as rarely as every five years.

- Eastern and Pacific time zone teams would be eligible to play with teams in the Central and Mountain, but not with each other.

- As a result, 10 teams (Central and Mountain) could play in any division, while 14 in the Eastern and six in the Pacific would be restricted.

- The two NY, CHI, and LA teams would each almost certainly be restricted to continue playing in separate leagues from their cross-town rival, and almost certainly also would remain attached to their current league.

- Making the assumption that there would continue to be two leagues and three divisions within each...

- The two leagues' Eastern divisions and one of the Central divisions would be available to Eastern, Central, and Mountain time zone teams; the numbers, then, would necessarily dictate that those three divisions would be occupied by the 14 Eastern time zone teams plus one Central time zone team...or three...or, it's sounding like, more likely, two, for a total of five teams in any given division.

- Accordingly, the other three divisions would be populated by the remaining Central, Mountain, and Pacific time zone teams.

- Within those broad geographical guidelines, some number of weaker clubs—for argument's sake, let's just say the lower half—would be put into a pecking order based on a formula that allows them to select which division they prefer to play in.

- It is likely that that formula would contain as variables (a) the club's recent W/L percentage, which quite possibly would be a three-year average; (b) the club's market size; and (c) some measurement of financial success, and probably net income would be best.

- The 15 strongest clubs would be placed in divisions based on geography and history; then, the club scoring the weakest by virtue of the formula would be allowed to select the division they prefer (and again, their choice potentially could be limited somewhat by the time zone guidelines), followed by the second weakest, third weakest, and so on.

- It would be reasonable to believe that inherent with this would be some firm decision on the future of the designated hitter rule—one that, once and for all, would unify the game.

Seem reasonable? Consistent with what you've read?

By the by...since my previous treatise on the DH topic, there has arisen a new "cause blog" titled Unify Baseball Movement. I encourage readers here to visit and participate in that discussion at http://UnifyBaseball.wordpress.com . While there are several cool ideas there worthy of consideration, the one that I believe is most easily established is the one described on the page titled The Club Decision option.