Curtis Granderson, playing against Detroit for the first time since being traded to New York, had two hits and made a spectacular one-handed catch against the center-field wall to help the Yankees beat the Tigers 9-8 on Wednesday. Johnny Damon, who signed with Detroit after four seasons with the Yankees, did not play because of a sore big toe on his right foot.

Word got out the other day that Major League Baseball’s “special committee for onfield matters” has discussed a “radical floating realignment” idea.

While I believe that competitive imbalance issues in baseball are widely overstated (more on that later), I understand the need for new, revolutionary ideas.

One idea struck me as I read the story: Why do we need divisions, anyway?

Why not just eliminate the division model altogether?

It would be much easier than figuring out which team is in which division year in and year out

It would be much easier to ensure that each team in each league plays the same schedule—or at least a much more similar schedule than what we see now. At the end of the season, the top four teams in each league would make the playoffs.

But eliminating divisions would eliminate much of the rivalry we see in baseball. Sure, the Yankees and Red Sox would remain a heated rivalry, but the smaller, regional rivalries would diminish.

I guess we need to know what exactly this “competitive imbalance” is that we hear so much about.

In the past 10 years, eight separate teams have won the World Series. Compare that with seven NFL Super Bowl champions and just five NBA champions.

That doesn’t do it for you? Fourteen separate teams have made it to the World Series. Compare that with 14 Super Bowl teams and 12 NBA finalists.

Baseball isn’t being dominated by a few teams any more than the other major sports are —maybe even a bit less.

The competitive imbalance claimed in baseball is based entirely on the AL East. Boston and New York are usually very good, and Baltimore, Tampa Bay, and Toronto just can’t compete with them year in and year out with the unbalanced schedule.

This problem is compounded by the fact that comparatively few baseball teams make the postseason. In all the other sports, it’s possible for the third team in a division to make the playoffs—this isn’t so in baseball.

So I don’t really know what my pondering has concluded—maybe that we do need divisions. I like the regional rivalries in the current divisions, and there really isn’t much of a competitive balance problem in Major League Baseball.

But you say you still want to fix the alleged competitive balance problem?

Start by doing away with the unbalanced schedule—or at least work toward a more balanced schedule. I do like the principles of an unbalanced schedule, but it would be nice to see Toronto, Boston, and New York come another time to Detroit, and it would make the differences in schedule difficulty across divisions much less severe.

And while you’re messing with the schedule, take interleague play away, too. Please.

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The first shakeout in the Detroit rotation is … well, one, two or three weeks away.

“It’s going to be a tough spring,” manager Jim Leyland said as his rotation candidates wound their way through their first outings of the spring. “But we all know it. There’s nowhere to hide. There’s nowhere to duck it. So let’s see how they all look.”

First time through meant nothing, and it’s quite likely the second and third appearances of the spring for starter candidates won’t mean squat for the hurlers trying to line up behind right-handers Justin Verlander, Rick Porcello and Max Scherzer.

“I know three of them, knock on wood,” Leyland said, “and there’s (Armando) Galarraga, (Dontrelle) Willis, (Nate) Robertson and (Jeremy) Bonderman with possibly (Phil) Coke …

Johnny Damon didn't get to play Wednesday, but Curtis Granderson made the play of the day in the first meeting between the New York Yankees and Detroit Tigers since their winter exchange of outfielders and pitchers. Granderson's catch against the center-field wall robbed Miguel Cabrera of at least an RBI double in the fourth inning, keeping the Yankees in the game before Greg Golson hit a…

Detroit Tigers outfielder Johnny Damon is sitting out against his former team because of a sore toe.

Stephen Strasburg battled some nerves and location issues during his spring training debut. Other than those minor hiccups, the top prospect was pretty impressive. Strasburg threw two scoreless innings in the Washington Nationals' 9-4 loss to the Detroit Tigers on Tuesday, responding well to the hoopla surrounding his first exhibition start.

Stephen Strasburg’s solid spring debut for the Nationals began a high-velocity ascent to the big leagues.

I try not to get too carried away with spring training stats. Usually at least one veteran will slump heavily only to perform as expected in the regular season, and at least one minor leaguer will get hot only to be assigned to a farm club where he fails to impress.

But that doesn’t mean I ignore spring stats—I’m a stats geek at heart.

Today—as usual—I checked up on the Tigers box score to see who’s hot and who’s not down in Lakeland.

It was impossible to miss the headline on the Tigers’ Web site: “Willis has second scoreless outing of spring.”

I was intrigued, to say the least. Sure enough, Dontrelle Willis’ line was good—two innings pitched, zero hits, one walk, and two strikeouts.

But he’s only toed the hill for four innings so far, and we’ve heard this song and dance before, haven’t we?

Just last May, Willis pitched six-and-a-third innings of one-hit-five-strikeout ball en route to a win over the Rangers. Many thought Dontrelle was back—or at least back to a serviceable form.

Many were wrong.

Dontrelle ended up with only the one win last year. In fact, he only pitched seven games and finished 1-4 with an ERA of almost 7.50. Dontrelle wasn’t back—not even close—and we all knew it by the middle of June.

So why did I find myself with the same feeling of hope today? Why did I let myself—if only for a moment—wonder what the Tigers’ rotation would be like with a healthy D-Train?

I don’t know the answer, but I do know that the time for hope is gone. Dontrelle Willis will never again be the pitcher he was in 2005.

It’s long past the time for me to admit that.

Don’t get me wrong, I truly hope the “Train Man” comes to Detroit in April, but I’m not holding my breath.

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Jason Heyward made his first spring training homer a memorable one. The Atlanta Braves' 20-year-old right fielder almost cleared the batting cage behind the right-field wall Monday with a two-run homer off Max Scherzer in the first inning of a 12-4 exhibition victory over the Detroit Tigers. "That's one of the longer ones I've seen hit in this ballpark," said Braves manager…

Jeremy Bonderman struggled with his control again, and this time it hurt him. Bonderman failed to make it out of the first inning in his second spring start, yielding Randy Ruiz's grand slam in the Detroit Tigers' 8-5 loss to the Toronto Blue Jays on Sunday. "Rough day, to say the least," Bonderman said.