I’m conflicted.  

Thus far this year, I’ve denigrated the entire practice of interleague play in MLB exactly 87 times (what, you can prove me wrong?). My primary gripe with it is the incredibly unbalanced schedules it creates. Is it fair that the Mets and Braves must play the Yankees and Red Sox six times this year while the Phillies play Toronto and Kansas City? Of course not. You could ask anyone who even has a passing interest in baseball and they can tell you that.  

Another aspect that I take issue with is the sense that it lowers the profile of the World Series. Interleague play has made the world of MLB feel smaller, and that is no compliment in this instance. That final best-of-seven series is supposed to be the moment when two superpowers collide. Now it may well be a rematch of three games that were already played in June. Imagine Rocky VII being centered around Balboa/Drago Pt. II. We’ve seen it already, The Cold War is over and Apollo Creed has long been avenged. So what’s the point? 

Then why did I care so much that the Mets were obliterated by the Yankees these past two games? Sure, I always feel some resentment whenever the Mets lose, no matter who they play. But I wasn’t prepared to feel as irritated as I did last night as I listened to the game in a car on my way home. Before I knew it, the Mets were behind 5-0 and if you followed that game, you probably got the sense that it didn’t even feel that close. It was a dominant 5-0 with a microscopic hope of return. And I was despondent.  

Perhaps I wasn’t being entirely honest with myself. Maybe I cared much more about this interleague thing than I’d like to admit. It’s even possible – and I can’t believe I’m writing this willingly – that I bought into the hype.  

To all you younger (i.e. young enough that when you look at Johnny Pesky’s wrinkly skin you feel slightly disgusted) Red Sox fans out there: remember what it was like pre-2004, when you couldn’t bear the thought of being harassed by Yankee fans because you had nothing to stand on? Now think of how much worse this experience would have been if 70% of the people around you were Yankee fans. At least you could hide from the antagonism in Boston. It wasn’t the case for me. I watched the Yankees climb back towards dynasty-status as my Mets crumbled to “Worst-Team-Money-Can-Buy” status. And I heard about it everyday from fair-weather Yankee fans who couldn’t even name their starting nine.  

The 2000 World Series was a total kick in the grundle. Five games and it was over. The Mets were outscored that series by merely three runs. Three runs were the difference. And yet, the Mets went down 4 games to 1. When Mike Piazza flied out to deep center to finish it off, the jackasses in the dorm room next to me began blaring “New York, New York” from their stereo, apparently failing to recognize the irony of celebrating a New York victory over New York in such New York fashion. 

So I am admitting it. I still care about interleague play. Not just for its propensity to handicap certain teams, but also because the Mets-Yankees games still mean something to me. If you had asked me three days ago if I would ever miss anything about interleague play if it were to be banished from the face the earth, I would have said absolutely not and good riddance. And at the time, it would have been the most honest answer I could give you.

Now, I’m not so sure anymore. I still feel that the state of the game would ultimately be better if it were scrapped. I just can’t say in all sincerity that I would not miss it.

I tend not to get too excited over the prospect of interleague baseball. In fact, I’d wish they’d get rid of it entirely.  While the baseball fan in me is glad to have the opportunity to see Oakland play at Shea in July, I still find the whole affair rather impractical. And when I find myself agreeing with Chipper Jones, it’s worth exploring. 

It is difficult not to wonder how much of an impact these interleague games have on the final standings. If the Braves miss the playoffs by a game or two, I feel that they would have a legitimate gripe. As would the Mets, since they inexplicably are scheduled to play the Yankees, Tigers, Twins and Athletics – the four teams that made the playoffs in the AL in 2006. Combined with their usual NL schedule, the Mets are the only team in baseball to have to play seven of the eight playoff teams from a season ago. The only reason why they don’t play all eight is, well, they’re the eighth.  

While I must admit that my fondest memory of watching a game at Shea remains the July 10, 1999 game against the Yankees when Matt Franco singled to bring  home the tying and winning runs off of Mariano Rivera with two outs in the bottom of the ninth, it’s a short-term gratification when viewed through the context of an entire baseball season. Would I turn in my experience of that game if it meant that the Mets would make the playoffs? Absolutely, I would.  

As ESPN’s Rob Neyer wrote in his blog on Monday, even the financial benefits to doing this are limited. Neyer points to an MLB press release from 2006 that announced the results of the season’s interleague play. It reads:

“The average Interleague attendance of 34,097 is 15.5 percent higher than the intraleague average of 29,520 per game thus far in the 2006 season. The 2006 Interleague average is up 3.4 percent over last year’s Interleague average of 32,985 fans per game. Since its inception in 1997, Interleague Play has drawn 13.2 percent more fans than intraleague games. Interleague Play has averaged 32,842 fans per game, compared to the intraleague average of 29,023 fans per game during the same time.”

So roughly speaking, that’s 5,000 more attendees in 2006 for the interleague games. What this report fails to point out is on what days of the week these games took place. Looking back at the Mets’ 2006 schedule, I found that 12 of the 15 interleague games that took place fell on a Friday, Saturday, or Sunday. Should we be surprised, then, that the Mets had better attendance during these games? Knowing this, is interleague play still financially beneficial? If not, then is this unbalanced schedule within divisions merited?