Alternate History: The Pacific Coast League Goes Major

[FlyingMugOfJustice]

The year is 1951. While baseball has taken root as America’s Game, it is far from an equal proposition. If you want to catch a Major League Baseball game, you have to be east of the Mississippi River.

On the other coast, the baseball world is, for the most part, left to its own devices. The vast expanses of the Wild West are full of baseball outlaws. Airline travel is in its early days, not to the point where an American League or National League team could be viable on the West Coast.

It’s in this world that the Pacific Coast League has risen, with teams stretching along the I-5 corridor from San Diego to Seattle. These teams have an independent streak to them, constantly at odds with the MLB rulers who seek to control all aspects of the game, and are rewarded with fiercely loyal fans. Like the teams, the people of the West fancy themselves as outlaws seeking more independence from the fat cats of the East Coast.

It is here, in 1951, that we break from reality. In the real world, the PCL was granted Open Status, a step above AAA, for the 1952 season and beyond. The eight teams were no longer affiliated with Major League organizations, they had control over their own rosters, and they had protections against poaching by Major League teams.

It was widely thought that the next step would be Major League status for the PCL, giving the nation three Major Leagues.

But soon after the promotion to Open Classification, minor-league attendance dropped around the nation, a reflection of Major League games becoming widely available via television broadcasts. The PCL was as much a victim of plunging attendance as the rest.

Disunity and infighting among the PCL teams didn’t help. The PCL dropped back to AAA classification in 1958, the same year the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants moved to California to put the nail in the coffin of the PCL’s Major League dreams.

That’s not the world we’re diving into.

In this alternate universe, the Pacific Coast League makes an organized push in 1951 and is accepted into the Major Leagues for the 1952 season. Under the Major League umbrella there are now three leagues with 24 total franchises, a total the MLB didn’t hit until 1970.

The new Major League teams from the PCL are, from north to south, the Seattle Rainiers, the Portland Beavers, the Sacramento Solons, the Oakland Oaks, the San Francisco Seals, the Hollywood Stars, the Los Angeles Angels, and the San Diego Padres.

The minor leagues undergo major reorganization as well, getting sorted into three separate systems. Each league has seven or eight minor-league teams under them. The American Association is the AAA league for the American League, the International League is AAA for the National League, and the Western League has be elevated to the AAA league for the Pacific Coast League. A handful of minor leagues were left out of the reorganization, and they have banded together to form the Congress of Independent Baseball, with its own championship.

While the eastern side of the country has its minor leagues intermingled, the PCL and its minor-league system have much more of a regional monopoly.

There is no interleague play, and the season is standardized at 154 games for all three major leagues. With milder winters and longer summers, the PCL had been having 180-game seasons.

While a lot has been done to make an even playing field for the PCL, there is still one sign that the west doesn’t garner the same respect. The playoffs have been expanded to an eight-team bracket – three each from the AL and NL, and two from the PCL. There are no league championship series, the teams go straight into the bracket as follows: AL1 vs. NL3, NL1 vs. AL3, PCL1 vs. AL2, and PCL2 vs. NL2.

An agreement has been signed by all three leagues that the PCL will have two teams until it wins a World Series, at which point the playoffs will expand to nine teams – the third-place teams from the leagues that did not win the World Series the year before will have a one-game play-in.

That is where we stand heading into 1952, the first year of the PCL experiment. The Yankees have won three World Series titles in a row.

I am using historic players, but game-engine progression, so we’ll see how this turns out. I have made some judgement calls on team movement, and have everything planned out with a timeline for relocation, expansion, even stadium upgrades. For instance, neither the Dodgers nor the Giants would move to become the third MLB team in a market, but they would still have their stadium disagreements. So would they move to another city? Stay in NY? We will find out when we get there. The somewhat volatile movement of the PCL will tone way down now that it’s a major league, with a few moves still I could still see happening.

There will be a domino effect here. Where the Dodgers and Giants wind up will affect the historic expansion to that area. Will the A’s still jump from Philly to KC to Oakland? With a team already in Seattle, do the Milwaukee Brewers still happen? With more prominent baseball in the West, does expansion still creep up to 30 teams by the current day?

Things are going to get weird.

[FlyingMugOfJustice]

YEAR 1 (1952)

As play begins, eastern players begin to filter into the PCL through trades and the waiver wire. Most of them are fringe-type players, but some names begin to appear. We’re not talking Joe DiMaggio type guys, but serviceable, productive MLB veterans like Harry Byrd (Oakland), Connie Johnson (Hollywood) and Tom Sturdivant (Portland) come out west via trade.

The Stars and the Padres battle for the top spot in the PCL for most of the season, but San Diego drops off hard over the final month. The Seals (85-69) wind up taking the PCL’s second playoff spot on a tiebreaker, with the Stars (98-56) up by 13 games.




In the National League, the Brooklyn Dodgers come one win away from tying the MLB single-season record, set by the Cubs in 1906, going 115-39 for a .747 winning percentage. Pure dominance. Brooklyn finishes 26 games clear of second-place Philadelphia (89-65). Those two plus the NY Giants (86-68) will represent the National League in the playoffs.



Over in the American League, the Yankees go 99-55 to win their fourth straight AL pennant, nine games ahead of Cleveland (90-64). The Tigers (81-73) will join them in the playoffs.



The Yankees’ Mickey Mantle and the Boston Braves’ Eddie Matthews tie for the MLB home run lead at 40. Seattle’s Russ Rosberg, a 22-year-old left fielder, leads the PCL with 33. Youngsters make the most waves on the West Coast, with 21-year-old Hollywood first baseman Bobby Prescott leading the league in average (.352) and RBIs (111). He comes six homers shy of a PCL triple crown.

The playoff field is set, with the first two representatives of the Pacific Coast League, the Hollywood Stars and the San Francisco Seals. The PCL-champion Stars will match up against Cleveland, the second-place team from the AL, and the Seals will face the Philadelphia Phillies, the second-place team from the NL.

The top of the bracket features an all-New York series, with the AL-champion Yankees facing the NL third-place Giants, while on the other end the Tigers get the unenviable task of taking on the NL-champion Brooklyn Dodgers.



The Stars win the first game of their series against Cleveland, but the Indians respond with a 15-0 mauling, spurred by a four-hit shutout by Early Wynn, and the rout is on. Hollywood doesn’t win another game in the series. The Seals manage to not embarrass themselves in a 4-2 series loss.

Meanwhile, the Giants upend the Yankees 4-2, and the Dodgers cruise 4-1 against the Tigers. All three National League teams win their first-round series.

In the semifinals, the Dodgers again cruise to a 4-1 series win, this time against the Indians, and the Phillies handle NL foe New York 4-2 to advance to the World Series.

But there is no stopping Brooklyn – the Dodgers sweep the Phillies for the World Series title. We’ll never know who the World Series MVP is, because OOTP doesn’t do that for associations. Bummer.




Prescott is the unanimous choice for the PCL’s Rookie of the Year, and a near-unanimous choice for MVP, with seven of the eight first-place votes. The Yankees’ Mickey Mantle is the AL’s MVP, and the Cardinals’ Stan Musial, who batted .384, is the unanimous vote for the NL’s top player. Dude raked this year.

As we get into the offseason, the winds of change are blowing. OK, they blew last year too, what with the PCL rising to Major League status and all that. But the MLB hasn’t had a team relocate in 50 some-odd years, and now two teams have their sights set on… Milwaukee? Did I read that right? Yeah, it says here Milwaukee. Early in the offseason, the St. Louis Browns ask the American League for permission to move to Milwaukee. The National League's Boston Braves, which have their AAA team in Milwaukee and thus own MLB rights to the place, raise an objection, and the AL owners vote down the Browns’ attempt to escape being the second team of their market.

The MLB first-year draft is in December, and the first five picks are 21-year-old SS Ernie Banks to the Reds, 17-year-old CF Frank Robinson to Portland, 17-year-old RF Al Kaline to the Philly Athletics, 21-year-old C Ed Bailey to the Cubs, and 21-year-old C Oscar Rodriguez to Pittsburgh. Also of note is 18-year-old LF Roger Maris, who goes eighth overall to the Sacramento Solons. Will be interesting to see how that works out.

Also, the game only did a five-round draft when it should have done a 40-round draft. Weird, I wonder how that will affect the minor leagues.

Of the top five picks, one goes unsigned – Portland fails to come to terms with Frank Robinson, who enrolls at Oregon State University. The Reds, meanwhile, assign Ernie Banks straight to the Major League squad and hand him the starting shortstop spot, putting Roy McMillan out of a job. McMillan, 23, should have a bright career ahead of him, so I hope the Reds trade him someplace where he can start again.

In early 1953 it becomes apparent why the Boston Braves objected so vehemently to the Browns slipping away to Milwaukee. Braves owner Jim Duvall, also tired of his team being second place in its market and watching attendance trend downward every year, announces that he has bought out his partners and has asked the National League for permission to move the franchise to Milwaukee.

With no objections, the NL owners approve the relocation, and the Braves bid farewell to a stunned Boston fanbase. The Braves set up shop in Milwaukee County Stadium, and send their AAA team to Des Moines.

The move sends shockwaves around the league, as owners start to look at their attendance numbers with raised eyebrows, especially those in two-team markets. Will they uproot entire organizations and hundreds of lives, and strike a dagger into the hearts of millions of fans, all for a few extra bucks?

This is America. Of course they will.

[nebben]

Following. Did you move players from PCL teams that were MLB affiliates, or did you keep all PCL players on their teams? For example, the Angels were a Cubs affiliate in 1951. Did you move Angels players to another Cubs affiliate?

[FlyingMugOfJustice]

I started with the 1952 historical start and moved teams around, but didn't move around individual players. Looking at it now, I see some Cubs prospects were still on the Angels in my file, guys like Dee Fondy and Tommy Neill.

[nebben]

Cool. Concepts like this are currently my favorite way to play OOTP, so I'm interested to see how this plays out.

[niu354]

Neat concept! How do you make the schedule and playoffs work with three leagues?

[FlyingMugOfJustice]

The playoffs work through an association. All three leagues are completely separate, with no league championship series, and the association picks up the playoff teams. For now, there is no interleague play, and all three of them are on 154-game schedules. I may try for a custom schedule later when interleague play comes into vogue. There will come a time when the leagues split into divisions, at which point each will have a league championship series before the actual playoffs.


So on to the story.


YEAR 2 (1953)

As the second season of the PCL experiment unfolds, there is yet to be a blockbuster trade that lands a star player on the West Coast. Serviceable starters are still coming, though mostly older fellas who are just past the crest of the hill on their careers.

Charlie Ray and a young Frank House come to Hollywood in March, Paul Owens hits Portland and Neil Berry hits Oakland in April, and Bobby Harrison joins San Diego in June. There’s a flurry of moves on the eve of the trade deadline that brings Sam Zoldak to Oakland, Spec Shea to Sacramento, and Joe Haynes to Seattle, among others. Until the PCL teams build up some capital through the draft, these are the types of deals we'll see.

Across all three leagues, the pennant isn’t really in question. The PCL is the closest, with Oakland slowly pulling away. Portland makes a run, closing to within five games with about a month to play, but the lead never gets any closer.

The drama at the end of the season comes in the battle for playoff spots. In the PCL, the Angels lead the Beavers by a game on the final day. Portland needs a win and an L.A. loss. They get one – L.A. loses 3-2 to San Francisco, but Portland loses 3-1 to Seattle. The second playoff spot belongs to the Angels.





In the National League, Brooklyn runs away with the pennant, with Milwaukee 10 games back. Meanwhile, the Phillies lose their last four games and the Cardinals win their last four to overtake the third spot. Fans in Philly riot in the streets.





In the AL, the Yankees rack up 111 wins to finish 23 games clear of second-place Cleveland. The Philadelphia A’s hold off the White Sox by three games for the third playoff spot. Rioting stops in Philly.






There are two triple crowns this year – the Yankees’ Yogi Berra bats .404 with 50 home runs and 159 RBIS. The 50 dingers tie with teammate Mickey Mantle, so maybe there should be an asterisk on his triple crown? In the NL, Duke Snider goes .357/53/170.

The playoffs are set. The Yankees will face the third-place Cardinals, the second-place Braves and Angels will face each other, the Oaks will face the second-place Indians, and the Dodgers will face the third-place Athletics.






The two PCL teams get swept in the first round. The league is still not quite on par with the other two, so not a huge surprise. The big surprise comes at the bottom of the bracket, where the defending World Series champion Dodgers are swept by the AL third-place Athletics. The streets of Philly swell with celebratory riots.

All three American League teams advance to the semifinals.

In the semifinals, the Yankees take down the Braves, 4-2. On the other side of the bracket, it looks like Cleveland has once again run into a buzzsaw in the second round, but the Indians rebound from a 2-0 deficit to beat the Athletics 4-2.

Philly fans once again take to the streets to voice their disappointment through riots.

In the World Series, the Indians go up 3-0 on a stunned Yankees team. The Yankees battle back to 3-2 before the Indians seal the championship with a 2-0 victory, courtesy of a complete-game shutout by Steve Gromek, who allows three hits and two walks. Not to be overlooked is an heroic effort by the Yankees’ Vic Raschi, who also throws a complete game, allowing two runs on four hits and four walks, with five strikeouts.






Berra and Snider are the obvious picks for MVP. Snider is the unanimous pick, while Berra has one first-place vote stolen by teammate Mickey Mantle. In the PCL, Hollywood’s Bobby Prescott is the unanimous choice for his second MVP, with Rookie of the Year Wally Moon of Portland a distant second. Prescott went .344 with 28 homers and 96 RBIs. He led the league in runs (109), triples (16), slugging (.581) and batter WAR (8.9).

The draft rolls around in December, and sees 17-year-old SP Don Drysdale go first overall to the St. Louis Browns. 18-year-old CF Frank Robinson, back for a second attempt at catching on, goes second to Detroit, 19-year-old SS Andre Rogers is third to Portland, 22-year-old 1B Joe Cunningham goes fourth to Cincinnati, and 17-year-old 3B Harmon Killebrew is drafted fifth by the Chicago Cubs. Also worth mentioning is 19-year-old RF Roberto Clemente, sixth overall to Pittsburgh.

Of last year’s top five, four signed, and two ended the season with the Major League Club: Ernie Banks, who was first overall in 1952, wins the NL Rookie of the Year award for Cincinnati after batting .327 with 24 home runs, and Ed Bailey, who was fourth overall by the Cubs, finishes .275 with 19 homers in 93 big league games.

All of this year’s top five picks sign with their MLB organizations. In fact, the only first-round pick to go unsigned is 17-year-old 2B Bill Mazeroski, who was 24th overall to Oakland. Frank Robinson, meanwhile, goes straight to Detroit to take over the starting CF position, putting Johnny Groth out of a job. Groth batted .304 last year, so that’s not a trivial move. He did have just four home runs, though.

More relocation drama happens early in 1954. The St. Louis Browns have had basically no fan support after last offseason’s attempt to flee back to Milwaukee, from whence they came in 1902. Ownership has given the team no support – they had to recycle the least-damaged game balls late in the season. After a disappointing 53-win season, the Browns ask for permission from the AL to move to Baltimore, which has been lobbying for a team for years.

The AL ownership agrees, on the condition that part-owner Bill Veeck, persona non grata among AL ownership, is bought out. Owner Jamie Taylor takes majority control of the organization, and the Browns slip out of town to set up shop in Memorial Stadium as the Baltimore Orioles.

The Great Migration is just getting started as owners take a hard look at old facilities, difficult city councils, and lackluster fan support. Team owners have dollar signs in their wandering eyes.

[thehef]

Very cool, definitely following...

Are you doing anything to somewhat keep the spirit of certain player-team relationship, or letting the game completely handle it via draft & trades? What I mean by that is, I see Frank Robinson did not go to Cincy, so I would assume you are letting OOTP handle it as new players come in. But maybe you are making exceptions?

Curious to see where the Dodgers & Giants end up, *if* they move. The Dodgers would've been highly-unlikely to work out a deal for a new stadium in New York. Robert Moses was not going to allow anything that would've worked for Walter O. Nor could they have stuck around and played in Ebbets any longer. Not sure, in your sim, which cities will be off the table by 1958, but New Jersey and Dallas would've been best bets... The Giants, owning their Minneapolis AAA club, and having already had talks about moving there, likely would've ended up there.

In reality, there was at one time an idea to make the PCL and the strongest 8 teams from the AA and IL the 3rd and 4th major leagues. Had the PCL become the 3rd major league in 1952, there likely would've been an enormous push from AA & IL to create that 4th major league out of their top teams. And this push would've been completing with the owners of the 2nd-fiddle teams (in two-team markets) wanting to move their teams into those same markets (KC, Milw, Balt, Toronto. Montreal, etc...)

It'll be interesting to see where your journey takes us

[FlyingMugOfJustice]

1. No assistance, it's all on the game engine. I should note that I am controlling the Oakland Oaks rather than going full commissioner mode, but I leave everything except hiring and trades up to the assistant GM.


2. Since I got the impression that the Dodgers sort of pulled the Giants along as a travel partner to make the relocation more palatable to the rest of the league, I will have them move together in this alternate universe.


3. Yeah, I agree that if three leagues happened, then the fourth would be much more likely, if just to balance things out for postseason stuff. But here we'll be sticking with three.

[splat58]

Very entertaining. Great concept.

[Sizeman21]

Cool league! There are realistic logos for the teams if you ever want to spice up your PCL ever. TXRanger has made lots of styles over the years on his GoogleDrive page if you are interested. Will be following.

[FlyingMugOfJustice]

Thanks Sizeman, I'll take a look at those logos




YEAR 3 (1954)

As we get into the third season of the Pacific Coast League experiment, the trade market has slowed somewhat. The Oaks trade former starting shortstop George Noga for a pair of prospects in June, the Beavers pick up a pair of prospects for aging outfielder Clint Conatser in July, and the A’s send starter Bob Kuzava to Portland for some prospects a few weeks later.

Things stay fairly quiet at the trade deadline, with Harold Charnofsky from Baltimore to San Francisco the biggest move.

Nobody manages to separate and pull away in the PCL. With weeks to play, there are four teams with a realistic shot at the title – San Francisco, Los Angeles, Sacramento, and Hollywood, all within three games. With about a week remaining, the Seals and the Solons build a small gap, but the Angels creep back in. On the final day, Sacramento sits two games behind San Francisco, with Los Angeles a game behind them.

The Solons win and the Angels lose on the final day, giving Sacramento the second playoff spot.




The National League has some drama at the top as well, as the Phillies end Brooklyn’s two-year reign atop the NL standings, finishing with just a two-game gap clear of the Dodgers. (In case you were wondering, yes, Philly fans rioted in celebration.) Milwaukee holds off St. Louis for the third playoff spot despite losing their final two games.




In the American League, the Yankees are the only MLB team to break 100 wins this year, going 101-53 to take their sixth consecutive AL pennant. And for the fourth straight year, Cleveland places second. I swear, the AL is the more boring league.

The drama is for the third playoff spot, where the White Sox lose their last four games and the Red Sox win their last four, but Chicago holds onto the playoff spot by one game.




The Yankees’ Mickey Mantle comes four RBIs away from repeating his AL triple crown. He leads majors in home runs with 48 and average at .362. Milwaukee’s Eddie Mathews leads the NL in home runs with 38, and San Diego’s Ricky Colavito leads PCL with 39. The Phillies’ Curt Simmons leads majors with 24 wins, and scores a pitching triple crown in the NL with a 1.86 ERA and 183 strikeouts. Hollywood’s Herb Score leads the majors in strikeouts with 215.

The playoffs will see the Yankees vs. the Braves, the Dodgers vs. the Solons, the Seals vs. the Indians and the Phillies vs. the White Sox.




In a surprising development, both the Seals and the Solons go up 3-0 on their first-round opponents. Could this be the year the PCL makes some waves in the postseason?

The Seals lose Game 4 of the series, but the Solons hold a lead before blowing it in the ninth. For the second game in a row, the Solons and the Dodgers go to extra innings. Solons center fielder Don Demeter knocks a solo home run in the top of the 12th inning, and Roger Osenaugh thorws his third scoreless inning to give Sacramento the win and the PCL’s first MLB playoff series win.

The Seals join them two games later with a 4-2 stunner over the defending champion Indians. The Yankees win 4-1, and the Phillies win 4-2. The PCL makes up half of the semifinal teams.

But that’s where it gets rough for the PCL. Both the Yankees and Phillies go up 3-0 on the PCL squads. The Seals win one game before Philadelphia finishes them off, 4-1, but the Solons battle back to make it a 3-3 series against the Yankees.

Game 7 is scoreless through five innings before the Yankees score four runs in the top of the sixth, with most of the damage coming from a three-run Billy Martin home run. A Mickey Mantle RBI double puts the Yankees up 5-0 in the top of the ninth. But Sacrament’s engines start to rev in the bottom of the ninth, starting with a two-run Don Demeter home run. That dude is clutch.

A Harry Chiti double scores Roger Maris to cut the lead to 5-3, and Chiti scores when Bobby Howard grounds into a fielder’s choice. It’s a one-run game, but pinch hitter Billy Klaus flies out for the final out of the game. The Yankees have escaped by the skin of their teeth, with a complete-game effort from Eddie Lopat, showing the trust his manager has in him.

The World Series is not as kind to the Yankees. The Phillies win the first two games, then they trade games, and Philadelphia seals the deal with a 10-inning, 4-3 victory in Game 5. Is there rioting in Philly? You bet your sweet behind there is.




San Diego’s Rocky Colavito is named the PCL MVP after going .301/39/109. The Braves’ Eddie Mathews (.326/38/89) is the NL MVP, and the Yankees’ Mickey Mantle (.362/48/133) takes his second consecutive AL MVP trophy.

The draft rolls around, and the top five are 20-year-old CF Norm Cash to Washington, 20-year-old C John Romano to Baltimore, 23-year-old Ken Boyer to the NY Giants, 20-year-old RF Bob Allison to the Cubs, and 24-year-old LF Bob Hazle to Seattle. Also of note is 17-year-old 1B Orlando Cepeda 7th overall to the Philly A’s, 18-year-old SP Sandy Koufax 9th overall to Detroit and 17-year-old 3B Brooks Robinson 12th overall to Portland.


From the 1952 draft, three of the top five are now MLB regulars: Ernie Banks hit .284 with 26 homers for the Reds, Ed Bailey went .287/18 for the Cubs, and Oscar Rodriguez hit .264 in 80 games with the Pirates. Al Kaline finished the season in AA. Roger Maris batted .300 with 34 homers for Sacramento.

From the 1953 draft, three of the top five finished with MLB squads: Frank Robinson was the AL MVP with a .329/30 season for Detroit, Andre Rogers went .292/14 in 70 games for Portland, and Joe Cunningham goes .340/17 in 128 games for Cincinnati. Former No. 1 overall pick Don Drysdale is, for some reason, retired at 18 years old. He pitched 36 games in the Orioles system, finishing 1954 at AAA and as the No. 1 prospect in the AL, then up and retires. Said something about not wanting to miss out on the college experience. No injury or anything. Go figure.

Of the 1954 top five picks, the Senators fail to come to an agreement with top overall pick Norm Cash. The 20-year-old returns for his junior year at George Mason University.

Over the past few seasons, it’s become apparent that the Athletics are unsustainable in Philadelphia. The Macks took out a $17 million mortgage on the team in 1950, with Shibe Park as collateral, to buy out the Shibes and the youngest Mack brother after an ownership dispute. The $200,000 mortgage payment is killing the team’s finances. While the team has had some success on the field, with a third-place finish in the American League last year, the cost-cutting has really ramped up, and it’s pretty obvious that the Phillies are the top dog in town.

The Macks line up a buyer who promises to keep the team in Philadelphia, but the Yankees want the team to go to Chicago businessman Arnold Johnson, whose interests include Blues Stadium in Kansas City and Yankee Stadium, among others. Rumors spread about the financial viability of the Philadelphia buyers, possibly from the Yankees camp trying to run interference for their business partner.

The AL owners vote against sale to the local group (one vote shy), and an aging Connie Mack is forced to sell the team to Johnson, who immediately announces a move to Kansas City. The Athletics set up shop in Kansas City Municipal Stadium.

A sad riot ensues in Philadelphia.

[RMc]

Good stuff, but one thing: whenever I do one of these "PCL to the Majors" things, I usually move Sacramento. Sacto is just too small; it had only 137K people in 1950, about one-fourth of the average size of the other seven PCL cities.

Possibilities include Vancouver (344K in '50), Salt Lake City (182K) and Spokane (161K) -- indeed, the PCL actually moved into all of these cities in 1958. (The fourth "new" PCL city in '58 was Phoenix, which was still smaller than Sacramento in 1950 but growing fast.)

Denver is also a possibility with 415K, but it's 800-1,000 air miles away from the other PCL cities (plus, you know, mountains). If the Dodgers and Giants don't move west and the PCL survives into the 60s, maybe they'll think about snarfing up Denver, Phoenix, Albuquerque...maybe even into Texas...?!