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    N American League structures.

    Do all the major N American sports use a divisional and conference structure?

    Teams play the other teams in their division most often, and other teams in their conference occasionally? Will a team have scheduled games against all other teams in the competition?

    How did this system develop? Who decides what a balanced schedule is? Is it the same every year? For example will a baseball team always play X games against their divisional rivals?

    Obviously answers are going to vary based on sport but my limited knowledge makes it all look very similar from here.

    #2
    Short answer: yes, every major sport is organised this way

    It began in the NFL in the 30s, with Eastern and Western Conferences, though at that time neither Major League Baseball (two leagues of eight teams each, with none west of St Louis) or the NHL (six teams, none west of Chicago) used such a system. There was no NBA.

    The NFL wanted to give rivals home and away matches every season, while not having the season get over long or bankrupt teams with travel. It was adopted by other leagues as they grew, by MLB with the expansion from 20 clubs to 24 in 1969, in the NHL from 6 to 12 in 1967. The NBA had geographic divisions (like the NFL's) from its origins in the late 40s

    None of the leagues play a "balanced" schedule. The NFL makes an effort to create schedules that have teams play a portion of their out of division games against teams that finished with a similar record in the previous season. The other leagues don't do this.

    There are lots of details, complications and changes over time, but these are the basics.

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      #3
      I think the NFL employs a kind of rota for out of division games, so for example teams in Eastern Divisions will play teams in Central one year, South the year after and West the next, so ensuring that eg the Dolphins will play the 49ers every 3 years. Something like that.

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        #4
        At least once every four; details of the process are here:

        https://operations.nfl.com/gameday/n...-nfl-schedule/

        Except there will now be changes to this:

        https://www.nfl.com/news/nfl-owners-...games-per-team

        So now a schedule consists of:

        - Six games against divisional opponents — two games per team, one at home and one on the road.
        - Four games against teams from a division within its conference — two games at home and two on the road.
        - Four games against teams from a division in the other conference— two games at home and two on the road.
        - Two games against teams from the two remaining divisions in its own conference — one game at home and one on the road. Matchups are based on division ranking from the previous season.
        - One game against a team from a (further) division in the other conference. Matchups are based on division ranking from the previous season.

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          #5
          I guess that because of the playoff systems that they all use there is no need for absolute fairness in the normal season?

          So the NL and AL were originally just leagues with x home and away games? (I was listening to a podcast about how MLB is backfilling their existence in baseballs history, I don't know why I end up listening to so many baseball podcasts and don't watch of follow it) It makes sense that if expansion is gradual and you want to keep the same length of season you couldn't just add a whole new 'conference'.

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            #6
            The NL and AL were technically separate business entities until pretty recently, the late 90s I'd say. It was Bud Selig who really killed off any pretense of separation.

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              #7
              Right. The two conferences in the NFL began as separate leagues. When they merged, the Steelers, Browns, Colts and maybe somebody I forget were shifted from the NFC to the AFC to balance the numbers. More recently, the Seahawks were moved into the NFC for reasons I can’t recall.

              It’s unfortunate because it means teams that are very close together rarely play each other. Giants-Jets, Ravens-WFT, 49ers-Raiders, Rams-Chargers, Eagles-Steelers, etc.

              The NHL and NBA’s divisions and conferences are just geographical, so it creates more regional rivalries.

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                #8
                The current NFL conferences (NFC and AFC) began as separate leagues, though each of those leagues (the NFL and AFL) had themselves had subdivisions before the merger (four divisions of four teams each in the NFL, two divisions of five teams each in the AFL). Pittsburgh, the original Cleveland Browns (now the Baltimore Ravens) and the Baltimore (now Indianapolis) Colts were given incentives to move from the NFL to the AFC of the new league in order to balance the numbers.

                The playoff systems do diminish the "need" for a truly balanced schedule, though it is worth noting that they existed before the conferences. The NHL had a four team playoff for the almost 50 years it had six to eight clubs (usually six) and a balanced schedule and MLB had a World Series between the two winners of leagues that had eight clubs playing each of their peers 22 times (11 home and 11 away)) for over a half century,

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                  #9
                  The play-offs don't completely fix the problem of getting the best teams to the top. In the current NLWest, the Padres play the Giants and Dodgers 19 times each. When 25% of your games are against two of the best teams in the country, it's meaningfully harder to get a high enough win-rate to make the play offs in the first place. If your division is really strong it's hard to break out.

                  It's easier now we have the expanded playoff, but two years ago one of those three teams would definitely be missing out, and the other one might miss out because they just have a harder schedule every year.

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                    #10
                    I don't think that anyone seriously suggests that they do.

                    That recognition is what underlies the existence of the President's Trophy in the NHL and the Supporters' Shield in MLS, each of which provides formal recognition to the club with the best "regular season" record.

                    BTW, I also don't know of anyone who isn't very surprised by the Giants' strong start. The preseason Vegas over/under line on their expected win total was 75.5 (81 meaning an equal number of wins and losses), so the expectation that they will regress is rife.

                    The expanded playoff was explicitly created with the AL East in mind at a time when the Yankees, Red Sox and Rays were all widely thought to be among the five best teams in the league.

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                      #11
                      Originally posted by San Bernardhinault View Post
                      The play-offs don't completely fix the problem of getting the best teams to the top. In the current NLWest, the Padres play the Giants and Dodgers 19 times each. When 25% of your games are against two of the best teams in the country, it's meaningfully harder to get a high enough win-rate to make the play offs in the first place. If your division is really strong it's hard to break out.

                      It's easier now we have the expanded playoff, but two years ago one of those three teams would definitely be missing out, and the other one might miss out because they just have a harder schedule every year.
                      Although not that long ago the NL West was considered a joke division and the winners considered real outsiders for the championship.

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