I don’t know why Milwaukee was chosen to move to the National League. But if they stayed in the AL there would have been 15 teams in each league, which would have necessitated at least one interleague series going on at a time.

It just screws with the schedule way too much. I’d rather see it done away with, but if they are going to keep it, they’ve got to find a better way than having some teams play 18 interleague games and some teams 15. For strength of schedule and many other reasons, the way they do it now just doesn’t make any sense.

As a “Baseball Purist” I hate interleague play and to play these games throughout the season would only be an additional poke in the eye to people like me. The game feels diluted enough!

I don’t know why MLB ever went to interleague play unless they thought they had to be more like the NFL? Baseball was unique in that their two leagues only met in the All-Star Game, World Series and Spring Training competition. That was enough IMO! As far as rivals go , they already have enough in each league.

Playing one another less often created greater pride and a more competitive feeling that their league was different and better. Some of that is lost when they play regular season games with each other. In turn it makes for a slightly less intense All-Star Game and World Series Meeting IMO.

I believe football and basketball already have all the intensity they need by the nature of their games. Baseball not so much.

Off topic – can someone tell me why Selig moved Milwaukee to the National to make the League totals unbalanced?

Nonetheless, I am not a fan of interleague play. The scheduling issue is my biggest complaint. Some teams play 15 interleague games. Others play 18. With the “rivalry” series, teams in the same division don’t play the same teams – so the end result is an uneven break in the season that can skew standings dramatically impact playoffs, world series, etc.

Expect it to come into play this year with five of six divisions separated by four or fewer games.

To me, it’s just one more example of how Bud Selig has tarnished the game. He’s taken the tradition of American League and National League only meeting in the all star game and the World Series and turned it into a half-assed attempt to raise revenues.

If you want to do interleague play, intersperse it throughout the entire schedule rather than forcing all the games to be played at the same time. That would give schedule makers the flexibility to create a schedule that makes more sense.

It’s not like the individual markets couldn’t still market those as their interleague games, even if they happen throughout the year. As it is, with the unbalanced leagues, two national league teams still have to meet in NL games while Interleague play is going on because there aren’t enough teams in each league for a full slate of IL games.

If you do it the way I propose you can put five teams in each division and someone will always be playing interleague.

This continues to be one of the things Selig points to as an example of what baseball has accomplished during his tenure. If this is what he wants to hang his hat on it’s just further illustration in my eyes that a change in leadership is long overdue.