On scheduling killing the Cubs/Sox series

[LittleHurt05]

With the NFL Draft Thursday and the Blackhawks potentially sweeping the Wild that night, it could be rough attendance wise. I won't even have the baseball game on tv on Thursday.

 

Game 4 is Friday night.

[caulfield12]

Katy Feeney was on the Score this morning. She sounds like a pleasure.

 

http://chicago.cbslocal.com/audio/986-670-...-interviews#986

 

Sox and Cubs will play 3/3 next year when it's AL Central vs NL Central.

 

 

Is she related to Charles "Chubb" Feeney?

 

I'm going to say it's a 99.8% likelihood....

[Kyyle23]

Is she related to Charles "Chubb" Feeney?

 

I'm going to say it's a 99.8% likelihood....

 

Hanley said that is his daughter after she hung up

[cabiness42]

The Sox should play the Cubs, Cardinals, Tigers, Indians 6 games and the Brewers 3 18 games every year.

 

[flavum]

The Sox should play the Cubs, Cardinals, Tigers, Indians 6 games and the Brewers 3 18 games every year.

 

If they ever put the Sox and Cubs in the same division with 18-19 games, I'm done with baseball.

[hogan873]

My view may not be a popular one, but I really don't care about the series. I don't care who the Sox are playing, I want them to win. I just think that this series (especially now with both teams being not so good) is just another series of games. This cross-town rivalry usually brings out the worst in people, at the games, on social media, etc. The Sox beating the Cubs is great, but the Sox beating the Tigers, Indians, Twins, or Royals is better.

[cabiness42]

If they ever put the Sox and Cubs in the same division with 18-19 games, I'm done with baseball.

 

I think it will happen within the next 10-15 years.

[flavum]

I think it will happen within the next 10-15 years.

 

I sometimes think they should put the DH in the NL, but then I think: once they do that, they're one step closer to radical realignment--which would be terrible, as far as I'm concerned.

 

I'd eliminate divisions, play 144 league games, plus 18 interleague games. Top 3 get seeded in the right order, and the 4th and 5th best place teams play one game to get in. It's still 5 of 15, but based on merit, not geography or "rivalries" that don't even exist.

Edited May 6, 2014 by flavum

[southsider2k5]

Wayne Randazzo ‏@WayneRandazzo 2h

 

#Cubs and #WhiteSox will go back to two separate three-game series next year as NL Central and AL Central will match up again in interleague

Sounds like MLB's take is that the first two seasons of odd teams in each league have caused this scheduling snafu for #Cubs and #WhiteSox.

[Texsox]

I don't think they should do anything special for the Cub / Sox series than they would for whomever the Rockies have an interleague rivalry with. When you start looking at the scheduling and looking at the entertainment value or the ability to sell tickets, you get one step further away from athletic competition and closer to show business. There is a blend that has to happen or the sport collapses, but I don't necessary want to sell the soul of baseball and athletics for staged for profit series.

[ChiliIrishHammock24]

All of the geographical AL/NL rivals play a Monday-Thursday 2 and 2 series. It's not just the Sox/Cubs, it's Yankees/Mets, Giants/A's, Dodgers/Angels, etc. Why can't they just make all these a Friday-Monday, or Thursday-Sunday series instead though? Do they figure they will take advantage of average weekday series' by giving them bigger story lines to boost the attendance?

[LittleHurt05]

I don't think they should do anything special for the Cub / Sox series than they would for whomever the Rockies have an interleague rivalry with. When you start looking at the scheduling and looking at the entertainment value or the ability to sell tickets, you get one step further away from athletic competition and closer to show business. There is a blend that has to happen or the sport collapses, but I don't necessary want to sell the soul of baseball and athletics for staged for profit series.

 

You are about 10-20 years too late on that.

[Kyyle23]

I don't think they should do anything special for the Cub / Sox series than they would for whomever the Rockies have an interleague rivalry with. When you start looking at the scheduling and looking at the entertainment value or the ability to sell tickets, you get one step further away from athletic competition and closer to show business. There is a blend that has to happen or the sport collapses, but I don't necessary want to sell the soul of baseball and athletics for staged for profit series.

 

MLB has been scheduling for entertainment value for as long as I have been a fan(*cough* redsoxyankees*cough*). They absolutely should consider the fact that certain teams have bigger draws for specific reasons, and try and cash in on it.

 

Scheduling the games for maximum revenue doesnt take it closer to show business, affecting the result of the game with decisions within the game takes it closer to show business.

[cabiness42]

All of the geographical AL/NL rivals play a Monday-Thursday 2 and 2 series. It's not just the Sox/Cubs, it's Yankees/Mets, Giants/A's, Dodgers/Angels, etc. Why can't they just make all these a Friday-Monday, or Thursday-Sunday series instead though? Do they figure they will take advantage of average weekday series' by giving them bigger story lines to boost the attendance?

 

Yes, I think the theory is that 2 weekday games vs Cubs plus 3 weekend games vs Royals nets more attendance than 3 weekday games vs Royals and 2 weekend games vs Cubs.

 

[IlliniKrush]

Katy Feeney was on the Score this morning. She sounds like a pleasure.

 

http://chicago.cbslocal.com/audio/986-670-...-interviews#986

 

Sox and Cubs will play 3/3 next year when it's AL Central vs NL Central.

She couldn't have been more full of crap. No logic given, just said "it's because of 15/15" 10 times. Which doesn't actually explain anything.

 

Oh and the best part was saying how you have to have a week with 3 series in it. OK, great....so, what exactly would prevent, say, Arizona from playing the Sox Monday-Wednesday this week and having the Cubs series Thu-Sun? Still 3 series.

[flavum]

She couldn't have been more full of crap. No logic given, just said "it's because of 15/15" 10 times. Which doesn't actually explain anything.

 

Oh and the best part was saying how you have to have a week with 3 series in it. OK, great....so, what exactly would prevent, say, Arizona from playing the Sox Monday-Wednesday this week and having the Cubs series Thu-Sun? Still 3 series.

 

Theoretically, they absolutely could do a Thursday-Sunday or Friday-Monday 2/2 series, but the only difference would be traveling on Friday or Saturday night, and having a day game the next day. Since the Sox and Cubs play in the same city, that's fine. But when the Tigers and Pirates are treated the same way, the 2/2 series becomes easier to go Monday-Thursday with all night games, and do that for all of the "natural rivals".

 

It's tough to schedule 52 series for 30 different teams that have their own requests, but the truly local series should have some more attention.

[witesoxfan]

OK, I'll say it. This series needs Ozzie.

 

I think you mean AJ. No green.

 

This series is probably the one reason I miss him the most.

[Iwritecode]

They're a rival to me. I see 40,000 people pack the stands every night to watch a consistent product of minor league baseball, meanwhile the White Sox scrath and claw to hold onto a measley 15,000. It is bulls***, and I will not stand for it. Cubs need to be taken down.

 

Not anymore you don’t. The Cubs averaged about 32,000/game last year and it’s been going steadily down for years. Even that number isn’t exactly right since the announced attendance last night was around 33,000 and at least half of those people showed up dressed as empty seats.

 

I really wish they would re-work interleague play in general to make it more balanced.

 

Year 1:

ALC vs NLC

ALE vs NLE

ALW vs NLW

 

Year 2:

ALC vs NLE

ALE vs. NLW

ALW vs. NLC

 

Year 3:

ALC vs NLW

ALE vs NLC

ALW vs NLE

 

and then go forward like that. Each team plays each team in the other division home and away. Makes it more fair for each team in the division to play the same teams out of the division the same amount of times each year.

 

That’s exactly what they are doing. They played the NLE last year and the NLW this year. They’ll play the NLC next year. The only thing is they keep the “natural rivalry” games every year.

 

All about the money folks. If this were a sox/royals series ticket sales would a tenth of what they will sell for this one. They figure they will sell alot of tickets for an otherwise unattractive date.

 

All of the geographical AL/NL rivals play a Monday-Thursday 2 and 2 series. It's not just the Sox/Cubs, it's Yankees/Mets, Giants/A's, Dodgers/Angels, etc. Why can't they just make all these a Friday-Monday, or Thursday-Sunday series instead though? Do they figure they will take advantage of average weekday series' by giving them bigger story lines to boost the attendance?

 

This is exactly it. It’s the reason the Sox hosted the Cubs in 2012 on weekdays while the Cubs still had weekend games vs. the Sox.

Edited May 6, 2014 by Iwritecode

[IlliniKrush]

It's not an exact science, though. Sure, you increase your weekday ticket sales this Wed and Thu, but the weekend date is now down from what you would have had if it was the Cubs, and the Cubs games have higher ticket prices. You don't gain in both places. You're banking on cubs weekday + royals weekend > cubs weekend + royals weekday.

 

You take a family of 4 or a group of 4 buddies, maybe they bite on the cubs/sox series if it's a Saturday night. Now, a lot of them aren't. Does it mean they are making it up by going to the KC weekend game (or a better example, are they going to the Arizona series this weekend)? Not necessarily. As a result, you got $0 from those fans since you flip-flopped those games.

 

I think this theory really only works if there is a super high demand for the series. Then you can put it whenever, wherever and you're going to sell tickets. They aren't at that point anymore.

 

With baseball already falling behind the NFL as the national past time, you'd think they'd try to market the hell out of the big city teams and rivalries and put them on the weekends, not only for the gate, but for TV as well.