Oakland Royals/Kansas City A's

Aside from the fact that I doubt the Oakland team would call themselves Royals (probably Oaks), what other changes does this create? POD is A's stay in KC and Oakland gets the Royals expansion franchise in '69. Do the A's still go on to dominance with Reggie Jackson in the early 70s? Does the Oakland team gain success rather quickly and challenge the Yankees later on?
 
Aside from the fact that I doubt the Oakland team would call themselves Royals (probably Oaks), what other changes does this create? POD is A's stay in KC and Oakland gets the Royals expansion franchise in '69. Do the A's still go on to dominance with Reggie Jackson in the early 70s? Does the Oakland team gain success rather quickly and challenge the Yankees later on?

you have to butterfly away Finley's ownership. And no they don't become a dominate team because the guy that owned them prior to Finley traded every good young player he had to the Yankees for veterans. So pretty much the A's stars of the 70's end up on the Yankees
 

Xen

Banned
Arnold Johnson (the man who bought the Philadelphia Athletics and moved them to Kansas City as a Major League farm club for the Yankees) died in 1960, his estate then sold the team to Charles O. Finley.

Now I agree we must butterfly away Finley owning the A's, so lets say he outbids Bill Veeck for control of the White Sox in 1959 (a year before he bought the A's). Veeck then takes control of the Athletics with plans to keep them in Kansas City, in OTL he got sick in the mid 60's and sold the White Sox, in TTL he'll still get sick but sell the team to Ewing Kaufman (the original Royals owner).

The White Sox are the team that adopts the green and gold colors, as it is something Finley wanted anyhow because of color television. It is doubtful he will get to move the ChiSox either, no way does the AL surrender the Chicago market to the NL, besides he always wanted the White Sox.

Now the 1969 expansion draft is likely not to happen in 1969, MLB was wanting to do it in 1971/1972 when Senator Symington got involved and said theres no way in hell he will allow KC to wait that long, so it was bumped up a couple of years. The rushed expansion cost Seattle, the Pilots, and nearly cost San Diego the Padres. Here he doesn't get involved and the expansion waits until 1972. However I have my doubts Oakland will get a team, I seriously do, you need someone with a forceful personality to get to move a team into the Giants backyard, something the area was lacking at the time, hell they barely got the Raiders.

What is more likely to happen is the team goes somewhere else, Dallas or Milwaukee spring to mind. Assuming if you will three of the four teams are placed in the same location (Seattle, San Diego and Montreal) then the fourth city is either Dallas-Ft Worth, or Milwaukee. If it is Dallas-Ft Worth it only changes that Bob Short sells the second Senators to Bud Selig who moves the team to Milwaukee, if it is granted to Milwaukee, then Bob Short moves the Senators to Dallas-Ft Worth himself.
 
A's stay in KC

Also, I read that Buffalo also had a good chance to get the fourth expansion team in 69. They set aside money for a stadium and had a great presentation, and they were amazed that they didn't get a team. I think that it had to do with their reputation and the fact that the NL Owners would rather visit Montreal than Buffalo.
 

Xen

Banned
Also, I read that Buffalo also had a good chance to get the fourth expansion team in 69. They set aside money for a stadium and had a great presentation, and they were amazed that they didn't get a team. I think that it had to do with their reputation and the fact that the NL Owners would rather visit Montreal than Buffalo.

It was also demographics, the long term abilities of Buffalo supporting a team did not look too good in 1969, the city was losing population hand over fist and baseball was looking for growing cities such as Atlanta, Toronto and San Diego. Of course putting a team in Montreal didn't make a lot of sense either, the city had no stadium, and no ownership group in place, it would have made more sense to put the team in Milwaukee where both of those problems were already addressed, and was a proven MLB town.
 
Pilots and Royals

It was also demographics, the long term abilities of Buffalo supporting a team did not look too good in 1969, the city was losing population hand over fist and baseball was looking for growing cities such as Atlanta, Toronto and San Diego. Of course putting a team in Montreal didn't make a lot of sense either, the city had no stadium, and no ownership group in place, it would have made more sense to put the team in Milwaukee where both of those problems were already addressed, and was a proven MLB town.

If they would have put that fourth team in Milwaukee, where do the Pilots move then? Dallas? Buffalo?

Now the 1969 expansion draft is likely not to happen in 1969, MLB was wanting to do it in 1971/1972 when Senator Symington got involved and said theres no way in hell he will allow KC to wait that long, so it was bumped up a couple of years. The rushed expansion cost Seattle, the Pilots, and nearly cost San Diego the Padres.

If Symington wanted a team for KC so bad, they should have just had the Royals and Montreal join MLB in 69, and then the Pilots and Padres in 71. Then, maybe the Pilots stay in Seattle, and, in 77, Toronto still gets a team, but Denver comes in with them instead, and has Marvin Lewis as the owner. They would have called them the Bears. As for Milwaukee, maybe they get the Senators instead of Dallas, who might have had to wait until the late 80's or 91 to get a team.
 

Xen

Banned
If they would have put that fourth team in Milwaukee, where do the Pilots move then? Dallas? Buffalo?

Dallas seems likely, I did a baseball mogul dynasty where this occured, Milwaukee gets the fourth team in 1968 after Montreal can't guarantee a stadium for the next season. As a result of butterflies, Bob Hope outbids Bob Short for the Senators, and keeps the team in DC.

Short comes back a year later to bail out the struggling Pilots and moves them to Dallas-Ft Worth for 1970 as the Texas Rangers. The Senators are eventually purchased by, brace yourself, George Steinbrenner who turns them into a powerhouse and keeps them in Washington indefinately.

Montreal has to wait until 1977 when the AL expands due to a lawsuit from Seattle (Montreal has one against the NL). The Seattle Mariners and Montreal Olympiques begin play.

Toronto and Denver get an expansion team in 1982 and play in the NL


If Symington wanted a team for KC so bad, they should have just had the Royals and Montreal join MLB in 69, and then the Pilots and Padres in 71. Then, maybe the Pilots stay in Seattle, and, in 77, Toronto still gets a team, but Denver comes in with them instead, and has Marvin Lewis as the owner. They would have called them the Bears. As for Milwaukee, maybe they get the Senators instead of Dallas, who might have had to wait until the late 80's or 91 to get a team.

It probably should have been KC and SD in 69 and placed in the AL, this would give Montreal and Seattle time to build new stadiums and both teams would begin play in the NL.
 
Had KC retained the Athletics, the name Royals probably would have not been used because it was chosen to commemorate the American Royal livestock show, held in Kansas City since the nineteenth century.
 

Xen

Banned
Had KC retained the Athletics, the name Royals probably would have not been used because it was chosen to commemorate the American Royal livestock show, held in Kansas City since the nineteenth century.

And the basketball team Cincinnati Royals moved to Kansas City in the early 70's chose to rename itself the Kansas City Kings so not to be confused with the baseball royals, would become the Kansas City Royals. Something else we have yet to discuss, if the A's remain in KC, then the baseball team located in Montreal will almost certainly become the Royals or should I say Royales (which is the name of the minor league team there for years, including the one Jackie Robinson played for)
 
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