With no time to waste before next week’s non-waiver trade deadline, the Yankees management met in Tampa on Thursday to discuss possible trade options.  Beefing up the roster to make a run at the AL East title is business as usual for the Yankees brass, but there’s more competition this year.  It turns out this new team that’s replaced the Devil Rays is pretty good…at baseball I mean.  (The Devil Rays were always pretty good at certain things, such as making rainbow-colored uniforms, but they never got the baseball thing down.)  This got me thinking: If the Yankees are willing to dispense with prospects and heaps of cash to make the team more competitive, why don’t they nip this thing in the bud and use their resources to eliminate the competition.  I’m not suggesting foul play here, just savvy business maneuvering.

The Yankees can just about guarantee a spot in the playoffs if they trade for the NL West.  No, I don’t mean they should trade for every player in the division.  That would be silly.  I mean that they should negotiate with the National League to trade for a spot in the division.  League executives love money every bit as much as team executives, and who has more money to offer than the Yankees?  (Insert Cynthia Rodriguez joke here) If money’s not enough on its own, the Yankees can make it a legit trade by throwing in some prospects.  With constantly-expanding drug testing across professional baseball, the NL offices will obviously need more people to collect urine samples.  And who’s more qualified than guys who spend all their time in clubhouses?  The NL has to bite on an offer like that.  The teams currently in the division can’t complain, as they’ve all shown no interest in winning this season.  This way someone else can deal with the hassle of playing baseball in October.  The new competition would also see its ticket revenue grow, as the Yankees always draw a big crowd on the road.

The only problem I can see is that there would be an odd number of teams in each league.  This can be easily solved by sending the Brewers back home to the AL Central.  If you’re not sold on that idea, just picture the look on Eric Wedge’s face when he spots CC Sabathia taking the mound for the competition.