Atlanta Daily World

Baseball Czar Favors Creation Of Third Major League Circuit

No:

would appear to have a sound agreement when he proposes that many cities with at least a population of 2,000,000 should have two major league teams.

The commissioner also seems on solid ground when he urges the major leagues rather than an expansion of the two current leagues.

And we feel he is right when he suggests that every city seeking a major league franchise would do well to have a civic field of suitable size and parking space which could be rented out to baseball, and used for many other purposes.

As of today, there are only five cities- New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Philadelphia and Washington- which come within the two million class fication and of these only Chicago now has two clubs.

What are the chances of all of these cities getting another club?

Well, Los Angeles is having a time finding a suitable place for the one club-the Dodgers- it now has and is not likely to have another in the foreseeable future.

Philadelphia has shown that it will not support two clubs. New York could, and probably will again, provided reluctant city officials build a suitable park.

That leaves Detroit, a great ball town, which undoubtedly could support two major league clubs.

It has often been said, and with a good deal of truth, that there are not enough players of major caliber to supply two leagues.

But we think that if there were a third major league the added inducements for rapid advancement would lure many fine prospects into organized baseball youngsters who now pass up pro ball.

If Cincinnati and Kansas City are big enough to support major league teams, certainly several other cities just as big or even bigger could do so.

We have in mind such towns as Buffalo, New Orleans, Dallas, San Antonio, Newark, Seattle, Minneapolis and Denver, not to forget Montreal and Toronto.

The way in which a team may have supported a minor league club is no criterion of how it would support a major league club. Look at Milwaukee for example.

Distance no doubt played a big part in days was before the days of the airplane and it will be even less important in the years ahead. The National League is now spanle.