# Reason for this early-season baseball scheduling oddity?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reason-for-this-early-season-baseball-scheduling-oddity/536016>\
**Category:** The Game Room\
**Created:** [April 14, 2010, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reason-for-this-early-season-baseball-scheduling-oddity/536016 "2010-04-14T02:22:44Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Ponch8](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ponch8/32/9883_2.png) [@Ponch8](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ponch8)\
**Post date:** [April 14, 2010, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reason-for-this-early-season-baseball-scheduling-oddity/536016/1 "2010-04-14T02:22:44Z")

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This year, the Cubs opened the season at Atlanta last Monday, and then had a day off before they played the final two games of the series on Wednesday and Thursday. This week is the same thing–they played Milwaukee yesterday (Monday), have a day off today (Tuesday), and play the rest of the series Wednesday and Thursday.

I’ve also noticed this pattern in past seasons, but it almost invariably occurs very early in the season. Later in the season, the off days are always in between series rather than within a series. Is there a specific reason for this scheduling?

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**Author:** ![RetroVertigo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b38774/32.png) [@RetroVertigo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RetroVertigo)\
**Post date:** [April 14, 2010, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reason-for-this-early-season-baseball-scheduling-oddity/536016/2 "2010-04-14T02:26:43Z")

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It is for each teams home-opener. In case of rain the game can just be moved one day down the schedule.

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**Author:** ![ZipperJJ](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zipperjj/32/211_2.png) [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)\
**Post date:** [April 14, 2010, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reason-for-this-early-season-baseball-scheduling-oddity/536016/3 "2010-04-14T02:27:57Z")

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This is how the Indians’ first two weeks are set up too. It sucks because I am all set for BASEBALL and there’s no BASEBALL. That, and the games have been at a different time every day so far ☹

Good explanation, **RetroVertigo**.

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**Author:** ![Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f475e1/32.png) [@Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jimmy_Chitwood)\
**Post date:** [April 14, 2010, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reason-for-this-early-season-baseball-scheduling-oddity/536016/4 "2010-04-14T03:08:11Z")

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> [@RetroVertigo](#):
>
> It is for each teams home-opener. In case of rain the game can just be moved one day down the schedule.

Just to expand a bit on this - it’s actually because opening day tickets are a special thing. If the schedule followed the rules that it follows for the rest of the season (off-days on Mondays and Thursdays), and there was some weather disaster on opening day proper, all those folks with tickets to that game would suddenly have tickets to game 3 of the season on Thursday, and all the people who bought (possibly much cheaper) tickets to game 2 would have opening day seats all of a sudden.

This way, opening day can be pushed back a day, and still be opening day.