54 Games Too Many

The Yankees and Red Sox played tonight for the 54th time in two seasons. This is, in a word, utterly ridiculous. The "rivalry" between the big, bad, Bronx Bombers and the small, lovable losers from Beantown is not only a sham (the teams have the two highest payrolls in all of sports, so there's no disparity there), but it's boring.

Major league sports has a problem: the nerds at the home office seize upon any successful matchup and schedule it over and over and over again until it becomes meaningless.

For example, about ten years ago it came to pass that the Detroit Red Wings and the newly-created Colorado Avalanche played a great series in the playoffs, replete with last-second goals, goalies standing on their heads to make saves, bench-clearing brawls (even Roy and Osgood--the goalies--fought each other). It was such a huge hit with fans that the NHL, cash-strapped as always, began scheduling the Wings and Avalanche to play on a regular basis. Though they aren't even in the same division, they suddenly found themselves playing practically all of their non-division games against each other. I mean, they played every Friday night for the whole season, at least a dozen games a year, plus the Western Conference playoffs, where you could count on a seven-game series. The shame of it is that the hockey was great most of the time, but the matchups grew stale very fast, and I for one began to wish for Calgary Flames, Buffalo Sabres, or even Edmonton Oilers games just for some variety. The Wings/Avalanche phony rivalry killed NHL viewership.

Basketball got a similar deal with the New York Knicks/Chicago Bulls, although the schedule couldn't be rearranged at the drop of a hat just so the teams could play more. But when the playoffs began, you could bet that the Bulls/Knicks would go seven games just to maximize revenue for the NBA.

Football, God bless 'em, doesn't have anough slots on the schedule to put up fake rivalries, though they still try to pimp that Giants/Philly thing (hint: nobody cares).

And now, baseball is at it. If you watched last season, you must have been disappointed by the playoff matchups, especially after seeing Boston and NY play at least twenty times during the regular season--every game on national TV. And then seven extra ones before the World Series. Did anyone care by that time? I didn't. And now, in a new season that's only two weeks old, the Yankees and Red Sox have already played 6 of their 9 games against one another. And, as the announcers consoled us tonight, they "won't play again for a long time, not until May 27, in fact." So, let me get this straight: I have to wait a whole six weeks before I can be forced to watch this contrived bullshit again?!