MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred spoke Tuesday in advance of the MLB Playoffs commencing. Among the topics Manfred discussed was the prospects of Major League Baseball returning to Montreal.
The city of Montreal has not housed a Major League baseball team since the 2004 season. After the 2004 campaign, the Montreal Expos departed, moving to Washington, D.C to become the Washington Nationals.
By 2004, the Expos’ franchise was plagued with issues and a move to America’s capital made sense. It uprooted a franchise, but it was done, ultimately, for the longterm benefit of the Expos-turned-Nationals.
Now, 12 years later, there is a bit of a different perception of the city of Montreal as it pertains to Major League baseball.
Commissioner Rob Manfred said Tuesday that he would love to eventually have Montreal become an MLB city once again.
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Speaking to Sportsnet 590 The Fan, Manfred cited the success of the Blue Jays in Toronto as reason for optimism in Montreal. “The most important development with respect to Montreal is the tremendous success that baseball has had in Toronto, to be honest,” Manfred said. “Toronto is one of our real bright spots right now. Amazing attendance up there this year, great television performance, all of the measures of fan all across Canada for the Blue Jays are unbelievable. I think that shows the fundamentals of baseball in Canada are really good.”
Manfred has said in the past that Montreal may once again garner attention as a potential MLB city. The trouble is that no current team — even those that desperately need new stadiums — is a true threat to move to Montreal. It seems that any voyage back to Montreal would be achieved through expansion.
Along those lines, Manfred said, “I would love to have Montreal available as a potential expansion location. I think 32 teams would help us. I think another team in Canada would help us. I remain positive on that prospect.” MLB expansion would not just include one team, but two. Mexico City has also been floated as a potential destination in the future.
Before MLB can expand, though, it has a few stadium issues to work out with existing teams. Most notably, the Oakland Athletics and Tampa Bay Rays are in dire need of new ballparks. The city of Oakland, with the NFL’s Raiders, hasn’t made a ton of progress, and Tampa Bay seems a ways off as well.
Montreal has gotten a small amount of baseball recently, and fans have made the most of it. The Blue Jays have played exhibition games in Montreal over the past few years. Last year, nearly 100,000 fans attended the two-game set. 46,314 attended game one of a Blue Jays exhibition series against the Cincinnati Reds, and over 50,000 attended game two, for a total of over 96,000.
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This year, when the Blue Jays took on the Boston Red Sox in Montreal, a whopping 106,102 fans attended the exhibition series.
There were certainly justifiable reasons why the MLB departed the market of Montreal 12 years ago. However, it doesn’t seem implausible that Major League Baseball could one day make its return.