There has got to be a better way - - problems with the 2009 season schedule

Isn't it about time the forces running baseball found someone new to put together the MLB schedule? Every year, the travel and scheduling gets more bizarre. While it is certainly true that the use of an unbalanced schedule(where a team plays as many as 18 games against each of their divisional rivals) and "inter-league play" clearly limits the schedule maker's flexibilty, there has got to be a more common-sense way to put together each team's travel schedule. As I see it, there seem to be three major problems with the system the way it's currently configured. 1.)Teams are flying across the country with seemingly no regard for geography. 2.) Teams are too frequently playing certain opponents twice in a 10-day span and then not again all season. 3.) The inter-league scheduling is itself unbalanced and gives an unfair advantage to certain teams in the same division.

To demonstrate what I'm talking about, let's look at a few examples from the 2009 schedule. On June 23, the Phillies begin a 10-day road trip by travelling to Tampa Bay for a three-game inter-league series with the Rays. The schedule makers then have Philadelphia flying all the way north to Toronto for another three games before sending the Phillies all the way back south to Atlanta for three more games before returning home to face the Mets the next night. Have these guys ever looked at a map? Why not put the Tampa and Atlanta series back to back? Don't tell me it's because the league wants to keep all the inter-league matchups strung together in June as there are several May inter-league pairings such as Yankees/Phillies and A's/Diamondbacks(both 5/22-24) already on the 2009 schedule.

Speaking of Arizona, in August, the Diamondbacks fly to the East Coast for a three-city/9 game road trip with stops in New York, Pittsburgh and Washington. They then return home to host the Mets and the Dodgers. OK, no problem. But then they immediately jet all the way back east to play in Philadelphia before making additional stops in Houston and San Francisco. These last three stops are in three completely different time zones. That's the best the schedule makers can come up with?

Even more baffling is this one. In late September, the schedule shows Texas flying to the West Coast for a four-game series at Oakland. Then the Rangers return to Texas to host Tampa Bay for three games. The very next day, the Rangers fly all the way back out west to play Anaheim and Seattle back-to-back to end the season. Now how much sense does that make? Why not simply make the western road trip a 9-game/3-city affair and return home to finish out the season with Tampa Bay? Or vise versa.

Secondly, when facing opponents in another division, why bunch the "home and away" games into such a short period of time? Tampa Bay doesn't play Detroit for the first time in 2009 until Aug. 28 and then they play 6 games in 10 days. Likewise, the Rays face Cleveland for a total of 8 games between May 14 and May 28 and are done for the entire season. Florida and Houston don't see each other until August 10 and then face off 7 times in 11 days. In June, the Phillies and Blue Jays play 6 games in 13 days. And they're not even in the same league! How much sense does that make? Can't these match-ups be spread out! There are literally dozens of other similar scheduling quirks involving almost all 30 teams, but you get the idea.

And finally, the handling of inter-league play gives certain teams an unfair advantage over their divisional rivals. In 2009, the N.L. East teams are supposed to face the A.L. East teams in this year's inter-league scheduling. Each division has 5 teams, so scheduling would seem simple enough. So, then why does Philadelphia play Toronto twice(along with Boston, Baltimore and Tampa Bay once each), but not face the Yankees at all? The same thing is true for the Boston Red Sox in 2009. Their inter-league schedule against the NL East teams has them playing one series each with Washington, Florida and Philadelphia. But Boston plays the Atlanta Braves twice in 10 days and doesn't face the Mets at all. How balanced is that? This idea of facing a different set of opponents from your division rivals goes directly to the issue of fairness. Why should the other teams in your division play a stronger (or weaker) set of opponents from the ones you face?

I realize it's entirely too easy to nit-pick apart someone else's work, but these are just a small example of the numerous problems encountered when a closer look is given to the 2009 MLB schedule. I don't think its asking too much for a multi-billion dollar industry to put a little more effort into developing a far more sensible and equitable system.