Off to Splitsville

Byron once observed that all comedies end in marriage. Last week the 65-year-old marriage of convenience be tween baseball's two major leagues seemed to be turning into a comedy.

The National League decided to go international; it expanded to twelve teams -- by adding new franchises in Montreal and San Diego -- while retaining its traditional monolithic league structure and 1 62-game schedule. The American League, on the other hand, decided to go intramural. It split into two six-team divisions, with each team scheduled to play 156 games (90 games against its own division, 66 against the other) and the divisional champions left to battle for the pennant in a best-of-five play-off before the World Series.

The reasoning behind the moves was something less than reassuring. In the National League, Milwaukee lost its bid for a franchise because, as League President Warren Giles explained, "it is only 90 miles away from two major-league clubs in Chicago." San Diego is located little farther from Los Angeles (the Dodgers) and Anaheim (the Angels), but it got a team -- because Dodger Owner Walter O'Malley wanted to reward a friend: E. J. ("Buzzie") Bavasi, who will take over as president of the San Diego club after eleven years as the Dodgers' general manager. Dallas and Fort Worth were turned down for a franchise simply because Roy M. Hofheinz, owner of the Houston Astros, did not want to give up his radio and television baseball monopoly in the Southwest. Instead, the team will go to Montreal, which despite its 2,436,000 population failed in the past to support even a minor-league club.

Hardly more logical was the Amer ican League's decision to split in two. "Nobody," explained one club owner, "wants to finish twelfth in a twelve-team league." But the way the divisions are set up, two clubs could wind up hurting in first. The Minnesota Twins and Chicago White Sox are assigned to the league's western division, along with two expansion teams -- in Kansas City and Seattle -- and the lackluster Oakland Athletics and California Angels. They will play 21 fewer home games against the more attractive easte:rn teams -- Boston, Cleveland, Detroit, Baltimore, New York and Washington -- and the loss of those games is likely to be reflected in gate receipts. To be sure, the Twins and White Sox will have only each other to beat for the western-division championship. But, says Minnesota Owner Calvin Griffith: "Teams have won pennants before --and lost money doing it."

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