Editing American League (section)

==Teams==

===Charter franchises===
There were eight charter teams in 1901, the league's first year as a major league, and
the next year the original [[Milwaukee Brewers (1894–1901)|Milwaukee Brewers]] (not to be confused with the current [[Milwaukee Brewers]]) moved to St. Louis to become the [[St. Louis Browns]], and the year after the [[New York Yankees|New York Highlanders]] replaced the disbanded original Baltimore Orioles. Those eight franchises constituted the league for 52 seasons until the Browns moved to Baltimore and took up the Orioles name. The eight original teams and their counterparts in the "Classic Eight" were:

*Original [[Baltimore Orioles (1901–1902)|Baltimore Orioles]] (not to be confused with the current [[Baltimore Orioles]], see Milwaukee Brewers) folded after the 1902 season,<ref name=baltimore>{{cite web|title=Bankrupt Orioles |url=https://www.sports-reference.com/blog/2014/07/1901-02-orioles-removed-from-yankees-history/ |website=Baseball-Reference |access-date=July 20, 2014 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140723231519/http://www.sports-reference.com/blog/2014/07/1901-02-orioles-removed-from-yankees-history/ |archive-date=July 23, 2014  }}</ref> and was replaced by the New York team that began play in 1903. The New York franchise was nicknamed "Highlanders", "Americans", and "[[New York Yankees|Yankees]]" until the latter became official in 1913.
*Boston Americans (became the [[Boston Red Sox]] in 1908)
*[[Chicago White Sox|Chicago White Stockings]] (name shortened to White Sox in 1904)
*[[Cleveland Guardians|Cleveland Blues]]<ref>Officially "Bluebirds", a form seldom used</ref> (became the [[Cleveland Guardians|Cleveland Indians]] in 1915 and the [[Cleveland Guardians]] in 2022)
*[[Detroit Tigers]] (name and locale unchanged from 1894 forward)
*Original [[Baltimore Orioles|Milwaukee Brewers]] (became the [[St. Louis Browns]] in 1902 and the current [[Baltimore Orioles]] in 1954)
*[[Philadelphia Athletics]] (became the [[Kansas City Athletics]] in 1955, the [[Oakland Athletics]] in 1968, and the [[Athletics (Major League Baseball team)|Athletics]] in 2025)
*Original [[Washington Senators (1901–1960)|Washington Senators]] (became the [[Minnesota Twins]] in 1961)<ref name=chicago>{{cite web|title=American League|url=http://www.chicagotribune.com/topic/sports/baseball/american-league-15007001.topic|work=Chicago Tribune|access-date=August 25, 2013}}</ref>

===Expansion, renaming, and relocation summary===
{{see also|Major League Baseball relocation of 1950s–1960s}}
*1902: Original [[Milwaukee Brewers (1894–1901)|Milwaukee Brewers]] moved to St. Louis, renamed [[St. Louis Browns]]
*1902: [[Cleveland Guardians|Cleveland Bluebirds/Blues]] players attempted to adopt the nickname [[Cleveland Guardians|Cleveland Bronchos]], which failed to catch on
*1903: [[New York Yankees|New York Highlanders]] replaced original Baltimore Orioles; dubbed "Highlanders" by press after their field, [[Hilltop Park]], and "Yankees" as an alternate form of "Americans"
*1903: [[Chicago White Sox|Chicago White Stockings]] officially renamed [[Chicago White Sox]]
*1903: [[Cleveland Guardians|Cleveland Blues/Bronchos]] renamed [[Cleveland Naps]] via newspaper poll, after star [[Nap Lajoie]]
*1905: [[Washington Senators (1901–1960)|Washington Senators]] renamed [[Washington Senators (1901–1960)|Washington Nationals]]; Senators name continued to be used by media
*1908: [[Boston Red Sox|Boston Americans]] (informal nickname) formally named [[Boston Red Sox]]
*1913: [[New York Yankees|New York Highlanders]] nickname dropped in favor of already-established alternative, [[New York Yankees]]
*1915: [[Cleveland Guardians|Cleveland Naps]] renamed [[Cleveland Guardians|Cleveland Indians]]
*1954: [[St. Louis Browns]] move to Baltimore, renamed [[Baltimore Orioles]]
*1955: [[Philadelphia Athletics]] move to Kansas City
*1957: [[Washington Senators (1901–1960)|Washington Nationals/Senators]] formally renamed [[Washington Senators (1901–1960)|Washington Senators]]
*1961: [[Washington Senators (1901–1960)|Washington Senators]] move to Minneapolis-St. Paul, renamed [[Minnesota Twins]]
*1961: [[Los Angeles Angels]] and ''new'' [[Washington Senators (1961–1971)|Washington Senators]] enfranchised.
*1965: [[Los Angeles Angels]] renamed [[Los Angeles Angels|California Angels]] in late-season on September 2, 1965. For the following season, the Angels moved within the Los Angeles metropolitan area from the city of Los Angeles to the [[Orange County, California|Orange County]] suburb of Anaheim.
*1968: [[Kansas City Athletics]] move to Oakland
*1969: [[Kansas City Royals]] and [[Seattle Pilots]] enfranchised.
*1970: [[Seattle Pilots]] move to Milwaukee, renamed [[Milwaukee Brewers]]. (Four years earlier, in 1966, the National League's Milwaukee Braves had moved to Atlanta.)
*1972: [[Washington Senators (1961–1971)|Washington Senators]] move to the [[Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex]], renamed [[Texas Rangers (baseball)|Texas Rangers]]
*1973: [[Oakland Athletics]] renamed [[Oakland Athletics|Oakland A's]]
*1977: [[Seattle Mariners]] and [[Toronto Blue Jays]] enfranchised
*1980: [[Oakland Athletics|Oakland A's]] officially renamed [[Oakland Athletics]]
*1997: [[Los Angeles Angels|California Angels]] renamed [[Los Angeles Angels|Anaheim Angels]]. The change came more than 30 years after the team's move to Anaheim.
*1998: [[Tampa Bay Rays|Tampa Bay Devil Rays]], representing Tampa-St. Petersburg, enfranchised
*1998: [[Milwaukee Brewers]] transfer from the American League to the National League. (See above.)
*2005: [[Los Angeles Angels|Anaheim Angels]] renamed [[Los Angeles Angels|Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim]]
*2008: [[Tampa Bay Rays|Tampa Bay Devil Rays]] renamed [[Tampa Bay Rays]]
*2013: [[Houston Astros]] moved from the National League.
*2016: [[Los Angeles Angels|Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim]] renamed [[Los Angeles Angels]]
*2022: [[Cleveland Guardians|Cleveland Indians]] renamed [[Cleveland Guardians]]
*2025: [[Oakland Athletics]] renamed [[A's|Athletics]] following temporary relocation to [[West Sacramento, California]]

===Current teams===
====American League East====
{{main|American League East}}
*[[Baltimore Orioles]] enfranchised 1901 as the Milwaukee Brewers, moved to St. Louis (1902) and to Baltimore (1954)
*[[Boston Red Sox]] enfranchised 1901, nicknamed the Americans<ref>To distinguish them from Boston's National League team, then called the Red Stockings or the Nationals</ref> (adopted name Red Sox in 1908)
*[[New York Yankees]] enfranchised 1903, replacing the [[Baltimore Orioles (1901–1902)|original Baltimore Orioles]], nicknamed the Highlanders<ref>after their home, Hilltop Park, and a pun on their owner's name, Gordon's Highlanders, referencing the famous Scottish regiment.</ref> ("Highlanders" dropped out of use after move to the [[Polo Grounds]] in 1913; officially adopted alternate nickname Yanks/Yankees by 1923)<ref>Sources recently have dissociated the 1902–1903 Baltimore Orioles from the Highlanders/Yankees. [https://www.sports-reference.com/blog/2014/07/1901-02-orioles-removed-from-yankees-history/ Sports Reference.com] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140723231519/http://www.sports-reference.com/blog/2014/07/1901-02-orioles-removed-from-yankees-history/ |date=July 23, 2014 }} and sources cited on that page. Retrieved July 23, 2014.</ref>
*[[Tampa Bay Rays]] enfranchised 1998 as the Tampa Bay Devil Rays (team name changed in 2008)
*[[Toronto Blue Jays]] enfranchised 1977<ref name=mlb>{{cite web|author=Edgarf|title=Baltimore Orioles History – American League East|url=http://mlbbaseballbetting.com/baltimore-orioles-history-american-league-east/|publisher=MLB Baseball Betting|access-date=August 25, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160610123121/http://mlbbaseballbetting.com/baltimore-orioles-history-american-league-east/|archive-date=June 10, 2016|url-status=dead}}</ref>

====American League Central====
{{main|American League Central}}
*[[Chicago White Sox]] enfranchised 1894 as the Sioux City Cornhuskers, moved to St. Paul (1895) and to Chicago (1900)
*[[Cleveland Guardians]] enfranchised 1896 as the Columbus Buckeyes, moved to Grand Rapids (July 1899) and to Cleveland (1900)
*[[Detroit Tigers]] enfranchised 1894
*[[Kansas City Royals]] enfranchised 1969
*[[Minnesota Twins]] enfranchised 1894 as the Kansas City Blues, moved to Washington (1901), and to Minneapolis-St. Paul (1961)

====American League West====
{{main|American League West}}
*[[Athletics (baseball)|Athletics]] enfranchised 1901{{efn|See commentary on [[Western League (1885–1900)|Western League]] page. The Indianapolis and Minneapolis teams were replaced by teams in Baltimore and Philadelphia in 1901, but it is unclear and disputed as to which team went where.}} in Philadelphia, moved to Kansas City (1955), Oakland (1968), and to West Sacramento (2025)
*[[Houston Astros]] enfranchised 1962 in National League as the Houston Colt .45s (team changed name to Astros in 1965), transferred to American League (2013)
*[[Los Angeles Angels]] enfranchised 1961 as the Los Angeles Angels, then as the California Angels after moving to Anaheim (1966), then the Anaheim Angels (1997), then the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim (2005).  This last remains the ''legal'' name of the franchise, but in actual practice, the team is known as the Los Angeles Angels, officially so since 2016
*[[Seattle Mariners]] enfranchised 1977
*[[Texas Rangers (baseball)|Texas Rangers]] enfranchised 1961 as the Washington Senators, moved to the [[Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex]] (1972)