Here is a look at a little of the history of the American Circuits
1955 EXPANSION WILL NOT BE THE FIRST MAJOR SHAKE-UP OF THE NATIONAL BASEBALL LEAGUE
The decision to expand the American Circuits from 20 to 24 teams over the next two seasons, giving birth to my Kansas City franchise, is just the latest in an ambitious plan of growth for major league baseball. A couple of posts earlier in a discussion about my potential rivals in St Louis I touched on the fact that there was a rival league to the NBBL that played in the 1880s and 1890s with 4 of those teams joining the NBBL upon the new league's demise. In 1893 the National Base Ball League expanded from 8 to 12 teams and would remain in that structure and enjoy great success until after WWII.
In 1946 the All-American Baseball Conference was created as a rival to the NBL (which had long ago shortened it's moniker from NBBL by reducing Base Ball to just one word). The AABC had eight teams initially and relied on NBL castoffs but also broke the color barrier by signing a number of top stars from the Negro Leagues. The NBL quickly followed suit and the leagues developed a peaceful co-existence almost as partners right from the beginning. That partnership included allowing the AABC winner to play in the World Series as a true championship between the winners of the two leagues. In addition an annual all-star game between the two leagues was instituted beginning with the 1947 season.
The two leagues took the next step in their partnership in 1949. Up until that point the NBL had kept it's same two division, 12 team alignment first established in 1893 but with the two leagues working together and the American loop only having 8 members it made perfect sense to move two NBL clubs to the ABL. But who would move? In the end it was the Boston Terriers and Baltimore Lords who agreed to switch leagues. The Terriers were an original team from the NBBL's first season of 1876 and one of only 3 teams that could claim that distinction (along with the Chicago Traders and New York Knickerbockers). The Lords were part of the old AABC beginning in 1882 and joined the NBBL in 1893. The 1955 expansion, which my Kansas City team will be a part of, and 1956 will each add two teams bringing both leagues to 2 divisions of 6 teams.
QUITE A DISCUSSION IN BOSTON AT THE TIME I IMAGINE
As I pour through some of the league history I have to say I find the 1949 team movement interesting and imagine there must have been some contentious discussion (not necessarily from online GM's but from fictional team owners I am thinking). I expect Boston in particular would have had some very mixed emotions before agreeing to switch leagues, although I am sure the opportunity to finally get out from under the Knickerbockers shadow really helped make the decision easier as did the likelihood of championship opportunities in the new loop. Still, I figure there must have been a lot of staunch traditionalists in New England wanting to cling on to their history as one of just 3 original teams - along with the Traders and Knickerbockers - from the original National Base Ball League. To some it probably seemed like heresy to even consider such a move to an upstart new league.
I was trying to think of some real world examples and we really don't have any in baseball. The Terriers were an original team, dating back to the NBBL's inception in 1876 - granted, not a very successful one with just 2 titles in 73 years - so you can't compare them to the real-life Brewers or Astros moves. Perhaps it would be like the Cubs instead of the Astros switching in 2013 but even that it does not quite compare because the real-life AL had well over 100 years of history where in this world the American Baseball League was only 3 years old.
I think to find the closest example of the Boston switch, along with the Baltimore Lords who had been in existence since 1882 but unlike Boston began play in an upstart league before being absorbed by the NBBL a decade later, we have to look to the NFL. The Pittsburgh Steelers, Cleveland Browns and then Baltimore Colts swapped leagues in 1970 when the NFL and AFL merge. It was technically more a swap of conferences as the NFL absorbed the AFL at that time but the Steelers with a rich but ultimately very unsuccessful history in an established league just like our Boston Terriers, seem to be the closest comparison to the Terriers flip to the ABL. Interestingly, the Baltimore Colts could nicely sub in for the Baltimore Lords to further this analogy as the Colts, like the Lords, had their franchise beginning in upstart league - in this case the All-American Football League - before being granted membership in the established NFL when the AAFC folded.
Turning back to the Terriers, I imagine there were also many in Boston who welcomed the switch. The Terriers had long been the poor step-sisters of the NBL Eastern Division and the whipping boys of the New York Knickerbockers in particular, but also to a lesser extent the Brooklyn Bluebirds. New Englanders have long hated the Yankees in real life but I imagine it must have been even worse in this universe with two metro New York teams to despise.
From 1893 when the merger occurred and the Brooklyn Bluebirds joined the Eastern Division of the league along with Boston and the New York Knickerbockers, the Bluebirds won 10 division titles and 5 league championships compared to just two divisions and two league titles for the Terriers. If the Terriers felt overshadowed by the Bluebirds just imagine the inferiority complex they had when it came to the Knicks. Both entered the league in 1876. Between 1876 and 1948 Boston finished first in the division a grand total of 2 times. The first came in 1889 when the league still had only 8 teams and was battling with the AABC and Boston won the pennant by two games over the second place Knickerbockers. The second came in 1913 when the Terriers won the East and beat the Cincinnati Packers in 7 games to win their first World Series. It was also one of only two times from 1893 thru 1948 that the Knickerbockers finished last in the 6 team division. One still has to wonder what brought a bigger smile to Bostonians faces - a Terrier title or the Knicks in the cellar? The Knickerbockers, on the other hand, were the class of the NBL, winning 24 division titles and 13 World Series between 1893 and 1948 to go along with 3 more titles won prior to the creation of divisions in 1893.
SINCE 1949
While old-timers might still grumble about tradition the switch of leagues it appears for the Boston Terriers it was the best thing that could have happened to the franchise. The Terriers, instead of being the lovable loser that could never get past New York, suddenly became the class of it's division winning three straight pennants and a pair of World Series titles. The streak would end in 1952 but the Terriers looked to start a new one last year with another pennant, their fourth in 5 years in the American Baseball League. It has not been easy as their average margin of victory in the four winning seasons was by just 2 games but Boston was suddenly a winner. Of course, Boston fans would be very quick to point out that since they left the NBL, their old foes in New York have failed to win a pennant. New York you see, unlike Boston suddenly, can't quite get over the hump. The Knickerbockers finished second three times in the past five seasons - finishing on average over those 3 years, 2 games back - same as Boston's average margin of victory in the other league over that span. Are the tides turning and the Terriers about to replace the Knickerbockers as baseball's dominant team?
I am not so sure about that last sentence as at the time of this writing - May 10, 1954 - both the Terriers and Knickerbockers lead their respective divisions. Imagine the excitement- and decades of feeling like second class citizens- a Terrier win over the Knickerbockers in a World Series could do for the psyche of the Boston sports fan.