Friday, June 07, 2002
Schedule crunch squeezes Reds-Indians
Battle of Ohio's absence felt by teams and fans
By Neil Schmidt, nschmidt@enquirer.com
The Cincinnati Enquirer
A press release this week from Major League Baseball describes the new rotational-division format of interleague play, which begins tonight, and concludes, “In addition, clubs will continue to play their prime rivals.”
Not here.
To fans of the Cincinnati-Cleveland series, which drew most of the largest Cinergy Field crowds of the past four years, the rivalry's interruption is like Christmas being canceled.
“It's very disappointing,” said Melissa Mosser, 36, of Springboro, who wore a Reds jacket over an Indians T-shirt at the Reds-Cardinals game Thursday. “It was the highlight of my summers.”
In switching the divisional alignment for the first time — it's now the National League Central playing the American League West, the NL East against the AL Central, and the NL West vs. the AL East — Baseball tried to preserve geographic rivalries established in the first five seasons of interleague play.
Nine such matchups remain, with teams playing home-and-home series (six games total) against their rivals. The Reds and Indians didn't make the cut.
“It's a great idea to mix up the divisions,” Reds chief operating officer John Allen said. “The only thing I'm disappointed with is, the intent was to get a natural rivalry going in interleague. ... (Not playing Cleveland) bothers me.
“It's disappointing to see Chicago play Chicago, New York-New York, Houston and Texas — to see those. Obviously, Cincinnati and Cleveland is a great rivalry. Hopefully, we can get it back in place.”
Why was this rivalry left out? Katy Feeney, the NL's vice president and schedule authority, calls it a numbers crunch.
“(Matching) prime rivals is a concern, but it's not as clear-cut as that,” she said.
Look at some of the schedule quirks:
The National League has 16 teams and the American League 14. The NL Central is the only six-team division in baseball; the AL West has four teams. NL Central teams play 12 interleague games this season; every other team plays 18. Atlanta epitomizes the matchup mess, playing teams from all three AL divisions.
“Cincinnati and Cleveland is one of our more difficult prime rivals,” Feeney said. “Pittsburgh also considered themselves a prime rival with Cleveland, so you've got three teams trying to be rivals. We tried to rotate them, but (NL Central teams) are playing fewer games this year.”
Allen lobbied hard to keep the Indians on the schedule. He has an ally in Dennis Lehman, Cleveland's executive vice president. But by the time they saw the preliminary schedule, there was little hope of changing it.
“We don't really get a vote,” Lehman said. “They hand you the sked and say, "Go get 'em.'”
Lehman said he considers Cincinnati more of a rival than Pittsburgh. He has talked to Allen and Feeney about restoring the rivalry, even if only for one series per year. Feeney, who could make no assurances the Battle of Ohio would resume, said it's not as simple as Cleveland choosing Cincinnati over Pittsburgh when making schedules.
Cleveland leads this series 13-11. The average crowd for the 12 games played in Cincinnati has been 46,139 — 21,353 more than the Reds' average for all other home dates the past four years. The total of 159,025 for the series in 2000 was a club record for a three-game set.
“That's one of the most fun weekends of the year playing — good games, great crowds, tremendous energy,” Reds shortstop Barry Larkin said. “I would think that's what Baseball would want.”
Said Reds first baseman Sean Casey, who has also played for Cleveland: “The interstate rivalry is great for the fans. We enjoyed it, too.”
The Reds instead get home dates with Oakland and Seattle. Allen said tickets for those series are going well, expecting all crowds to be in the high 20,000s or low-to-mid 30,000s.
“(Sales) aren't doing as well as Cleveland possibly would have,” Allen said. “But we think these will be entertaining games, with teams and players fans want to see.”
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Schedule crunch squeezes Reds-Indians
