How Far is Baseball from Your State Capital?

I was bored last night and started a little game on Twitter: which MLB teams were closest and farthest from a state capital? Enough people nerded out with me over this that I figured I'd turn it into a blog post. Below are the distances from each MLB team to the nearest state capital, measured as the crow flies from each team's home ballpark to the closest state capitol building using this tool.

Following the trend of state capitals tending not to be states' biggest cities, only four MLB teams are based in state capitals: the Boston Red Sox, the Atlanta Braves, the Colorado Rockies, and the Arizona Diamondbacks. (The Toronto Blue Jays are also based in a provincial capital, while the Washington Nationals are obviously based in the nation's capital.) Of these, the Braves are based the closest to the seat of power, which is less than a mile up Hank Aaron Dr. (which becomes Capitol Ave. in Atlanta). When the Braves move to Cobb County, the Nats will, appropriately, be closest to a capitol building—the U.S. Capitol. If you just want to count state capitals, Coors Field will be closest.

The farthest MLB team from any state capital is the Marlins: 406 miles from Tallahassee. If you are just wondering about the farthest team from its own state government, though, the Padres take the cake—Petco is 472 miles from Sacramento.