With the 2027 collective bargaining agreement still hanging out there as a giant unknown, baseball’s future is already getting tossed around in all kinds of speculative directions. The sport itself is expected to stay recognizable, but there’s plenty of uncertainty around payroll rules, roster structure, and the other machinery that shapes the regular season and offseason.
That looseness has opened the door for wild realignment ideas, and one of the most eye-catching came from Pirates blogger Kody Duncan. His pitch was simple: if MLB and the MLBPA can’t settle on a salary cap and floor, then the league should redraw its divisions and conferences. In his version, fairness is the guiding principle.
“If MLB and MLBPA do not agree on a Salary Cap and Floor this offseason, they need to realign the Conferences and Divisions:
Here is my new NL and AL based on fairness if a cap/floor isn't put in place:
NL Central:
- Pittsburgh Pirates
- Cincinnati Reds
- Washington Nationals
-…”
That’s where the agenda starts to show. Duncan’s proposed National League Central strips out the Milwaukee Brewers, St.
Louis Cardinals, and Cubs, while bringing in the Nationals, Cleveland Guardians, and Miami Marlins. It does not exactly take a detective to figure out who benefits most from that setup.
The more interesting part, at least from a Cubs perspective, is where Chicago ends up. Under Duncan’s plan, the Cubs would slide into the American League East and line up with the Yankees, Red Sox, Blue Jays, and Orioles. The Rays, oddly enough, would be sent to the American League Central.
That’s the kind of move that gets your attention, even if the whole exercise is built on shaky ground. Cubs-Red Sox-Yankees as division rivals is a jarring thought, but it also raises a real question: would that actually be better for Chicago?
The answer leans no, and for a few reasons. Right now, one of the Cubs’ advantages in the National League Central is financial muscle.
That edge hasn’t necessarily translated into results, but it is still an edge. In Duncan’s version of the world, that cushion disappears.
The Yankees, Red Sox, and Blue Jays all finished the 2026 season with a higher luxury tax payroll than the Cubs. So if Chicago can’t lean on spending as the separator, the pressure shifts to player development. And that’s where the organization has already come up short.
So, no, the idea probably shouldn’t go any further than a social media thought experiment. These kinds of realignment proposals rarely hold up under real scrutiny, and this one is no exception.
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