The mayor of Vancouver wants to bring Major League Baseball (MLB) to Vancouver and has introduced a motion to City Council to attract a team.

In light of the MLB’s recent expansion plan, Ken Sim says in a written statement that the motion would launch an “expression of interest process.”

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That means nothing other than identifying investors who could be part of an ownership group for a potential Vancouver franchise.

“Vancouver has long been identified as a potential expansion market for the MLB and continues to demonstrate strong support for baseball at both the major and minor league levels,” Sim said.

While Sportsnet MLB Insider Ben Nicholson-Smith says it would be great to have another Canada-based baseball team in the league, he says that there are pressing questions that have to be answered first.

“The mayor presumably is not going to be the one providing those dollars. So, who is? Who is the group?” he told CityNews.

“Who is the person that is going to be bidding billions of dollars to potentially bring a franchise to Vancouver?”

He adds that the money, among other things, would be needed for bankrolling an expansion team and necessary renovations to BC Place.

“There’s no way Major League Baseball is going to award one of these expansion franchises to a city or to a bidder that doesn’t have these questions answered,” Nicholson-Smith explained.

B.C. Place Stadium hosted several MLB exhibition series between 1984 and 1994 featuring the Toronto Blue Jays, Seattle Mariners, and Montreal Expos.

However, a $500-million renovation in 2011 — including a centre-hung scoreboard and a cable-supported retractable roof — made the 54,000-seat stadium less suitable for baseball.

The MLB is looking at expanding from 30 teams to 32 teams. It is expected that league commissioners would do so within the next five years.

MLB commissioner Rob Manfred told Sportsnet during an interview in October that another Canadian city in the league could work when asked about possibly adding a team in Vancouver.

While Sim markets this “opportunity to bring something truly special to Vancouver,” Nicholson-Smith is more hesitant, considering that the expansion would only include two cities.

“There are some significant logistical questions about what would have to happen, and there are a lot of politics and backchannelling that have to happen as well,” he said.

“Plus, there is going to be a lot of competition.”

Currently, the only Canadian team in the MLB is the Toronto Blue Jays, who made it all the way to the World Series Final last year, losing against the Los Angeles Dodgers.

– With files from Michael Williams and The Canadian Press.