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Conferences in the MLB and NFL are useless nowadays
I want to start by saying, I know why they exist. I understand they’re historical, but there’s no reason to have them in 2026. I also want to state that divisions are important and should be kept.
The main reason for them not being needed is they already schedule multiple out of conference games each season. If the teams from each conference never played until the Super Bowl/world series like they used to, then that would be fine. But they schedule so many out of conference games that it doesn’t really matter. The lines between the conferences are blurred.
Now you might say that the NHL, NBA, and NCAA do this too-why am I not bringing that up? Well the reason for that is those leagues have their own identity. The NHL and NBA are still East vs. West, so you can just know what conference each team is in by their location.
In college sports, there are 1) multiple conferences and 2) said conferences were/are geographic or formed by like minded institutions so they had a lot of similarities. And while college conferences have somewhat strayed away from geography, it was never like that for the MLB or NFL. If you look at the early American League there was a team in Boston, New York, Chicago, and later on a team in LA; in the National league there was a team in Boston, New York, Chicago, and later one in LA. Additionally, you may hear when someone talks about college sports that “oh I can’t wait to watch some SEC Football this Saturday, the games are always so competitive!” or “I’m looking forward to the ACC basketball matchups tonight!” No one says that they only watch AFC football outside of their own team as it's much better and more competitive than NFC.
The MLB and NFL should keep their divisions and rivals, but just schedule whoever at this point. For playoffs, all they need to do is just, in the NFL's case, make a 14 team bracket, seeded 1-14. Easy
#conversation
I want to start by saying, I know why they exist. I understand they’re historical, but there’s no reason to have them in 2026. I also want to state that divisions are important and should be kept.
The main reason for them not being needed is they already schedule multiple out of conference games each season. If the teams from each conference never played until the Super Bowl/world series like they used to, then that would be fine. But they schedule so many out of conference games that it doesn’t really matter. The lines between the conferences are blurred.
Now you might say that the NHL, NBA, and NCAA do this too-why am I not bringing that up? Well the reason for that is those leagues have their own identity. The NHL and NBA are still East vs. West, so you can just know what conference each team is in by their location.
In college sports, there are 1) multiple conferences and 2) said conferences were/are geographic or formed by like minded institutions so they had a lot of similarities. And while college conferences have somewhat strayed away from geography, it was never like that for the MLB or NFL. If you look at the early American League there was a team in Boston, New York, Chicago, and later on a team in LA; in the National league there was a team in Boston, New York, Chicago, and later one in LA. Additionally, you may hear when someone talks about college sports that “oh I can’t wait to watch some SEC Football this Saturday, the games are always so competitive!” or “I’m looking forward to the ACC basketball matchups tonight!” No one says that they only watch AFC football outside of their own team as it's much better and more competitive than NFC.
The MLB and NFL should keep their divisions and rivals, but just schedule whoever at this point. For playoffs, all they need to do is just, in the NFL's case, make a 14 team bracket, seeded 1-14. Easy
#conversation
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