MLB has released the 2011 schedule.
Many aspects of it appear to be pretty good this time around. At first glance, it appears that games against the Cubs biggest rivals, the Brewers, Cardinals and Reds, are fairly well spread throughout the season. But, as usual, I have to sit and scratch my head about the logic of the interleague play schedule.
The Cubs go to Boston this year. People are making a big deal about it because it is the first time this has happened in like a bajillion years. The other high profile interleague series will be a home set against the Yankees in the middle of June. The last time the Yankees came to town was in 2003, and I have to say, the atmosphere at those games was awesome. I look forward to that again!
Then, of course, there are the stupid 6 games against the White Sox.
And, finally, the head scratcher…3 games in Kansas City. Huh? Where the hell did that come from? Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad the Cubs get to play 3 games against a traditionally awful team, but I’m not sure how this is supposed to fit in to anything.
It’s crap like this that really pisses me off about the MLB scheduling process. With the Red Sox and Yankees on the schedule, you are to assume, then, that the NL Central is supposed to be matched up against the AL East this year for interleague play. Obviously this becomes problematic because of the fact that there are 6 teams in the NL Central and only 5 teams in the AL East. And then there are the “rivalry” games which hurt things too.
Well, I’ve written to posts about this already, and have been prepping the third one for some time now. I understand the difficulties in trying to set up a fair and balanced schedule for each team in baseball, but it seems that, now, as far as interleague play is concerned, that the MLB office is more concerned about creating interesting matchups then creating a fair schedule. It looks to me like they set some objectives out there (“well, the Cubs should play the Red Sox and Yankees this year because that would be a great draw”), and then just try to jumble the rest of the schedule together around that. Result? An inexplicable series against the Royals in the middle of June.
So I guess I better finish up that last post about the MLB schedule.
I’m sure all of you will want to get plane tickets for that series in KC. It should be
