Baseball Brunch: Imbalance, Irregularities Abound in Interleague Play

Every Sunday, MLB FanHouse empties out its notebook in Baseball Brunch.

"This concludes our test of the emergency attendance enhancement system. We now return to the regularly scheduled season."

Yes, the 13th season of interleague play wraps up Sunday, except for a Cubs-White Sox makeup game. We have survived six San Diego-Seattle games (that's more zeroes than an A-Rod paycheck).

We didn't learn much we didn't already know: the system has inherent flaws and the American League rules.

For the sixth straight year, the AL has had** the better record in interleague play – 129-108 going into today.

Take out Cleveland and Oakland, and the AL is 119-84.

"It probably is" as big a gap between leagues as in past years, one AL team official said, "until you get to the World Series. Then it doesn't matter."

Why is the AL better? Well, the four lowest payrolls in the majors are all in the NL: Washington, Pittsburgh, San Diego and Florida. And other than the Marlins, the franchises that have figured out how to compete on the cheap are all in the AL: Oakland, Tampa Bay and Minnesota.

So the American League has most of the money and most of the smarts.

As for interleague play itself, the biggest complaint is the inequity of the schedule. Major League Baseball tries to rotate the matchups while keeping two series between "natural rivalries" (Padres-Mariners and Blue Jays-Phillies, really?). But that combined with the differing numbers of teams in leagues and divisions creates havoc.

"Some years some teams play a harder schedule," Phillies manager Charlie Manuel said. "Definitely it affects the outcome of your division.

"When we first started interleague play, I thought it was going to be great, and I thought for a while it was. You saw different teams, and fans got to see different ballclubs. ... But then when I watch it now, and when we play it, and when I think about it, I think about the affects that it has on some teams winning the championship."

Interleague play most affects the wild-card race, since teams in different divisions play vastly different interleague schedules. But with the unbalanced intraleague schedule, the wild card was already based on differing strength of schedules (and the NFL wild card has the same issue).

But to have teams in the same division playing significantly different variations of the interleague schedule, that's an issue.

So how has it been unfair this year?

Check the NL Central. St. Louis got to play Kansas City twice, going 5-1, and missed the White Sox. Meanwhile, the Brewers and the Cubs didn't play the Royals at all, with the Cubs playing the White Sox twice and the Brewers getting a White Sox series and an extra Twins series.

As a result, the Cards are 9-5 in interleague to the Cubs' 6-7 and the Brewers' 5-10. Think that won't make a difference in such a tight division?

In the AL West, the Angels made hay. They were 29-29 and 4 1/2 games behind the Rangers when interleague play started back up June 12. Now the Angels are a half-game up, having gone 13-4 in interleague to Texas' 9-8.

Interestingly, though, the Rangers seemed to have the easier schedule, with two series against the Astros while the Angels played the Dodgers a second time and the surging Rockies.

There are other flaws too. As Manuel said, "It takes some of the glitter away from the World Series." And we haven't even gone into the DH problem, which Cito Gaston has already addressed.

But interleague play has become a fixture. Major League Baseball likes to trumpet the increased attendance, although it's imprecise to compare one weekend in May and a 2 1/2-week period in June that includes Father's Day and comes just as schools are letting out to the rest of the season.

Overheard and Understood

• Seattle has been scouting Philadelphia's minor-league system and is said to have interest in right-hander Jason Knapp, a second-round pick in 2008. The Phillies need a starter; fly-ball pitcher Jarrod Washburn wouldn't be a good fit for Citizens Bank Park, so maybe the teams are laying the groundwork for talks when (if) Erik Bedard is healthy.

•

Chart of the Week
Omar Vizquel last week became the all-time leader in hits by a player born in Venezuela. What about the rest of the world?
Nation	Player	Hits
U.S.	Pete Rose	4,256
Panama	Rod Carew	3,053
Cuba	Rafael Palmeiro	3,020
Puerto Rico	Robto. Clemente	3,000
Dom. Rep.	Julio Franco	2,586
Canada	Larry Walker	2,160
Mexico	Vinny Castilla	1,884
Australia	Joe Quinn	1,797
Source: baseball-reference.com

Ian Snell, the right-hander who requested a demotion last week, is proving a double-edged sword for the Pirates. They admire his talent, but fear he may need a change of scenery for it to come out, in which case Pittsburgh could look bad for trading him. But it may come down to that, and a team that can look past his performance the past season and a half might be willing to take a chance on Snell, especially considering his age (27) and his contract ($4.25 million next year and options 2011-12). And Pirates fans might not roast the team too bad for getting rid of Snell; when the team posted a message on the scoreboard Thursday that Snell had been sent down, the crowd cheered.

• The Mets, Yankees, Padres and Red Sox have scouted Yusei Kikuchi, a high school left-hander in Japan. If Kikuchi does not declare for the Japanese draft this summer, he could sign with a major league organization in the fall – and he'd get quite a sum. One person who saw him compared him to a "mid-first-rounder" in the U.S. draft.

• An executive from another team doesn't think Cleveland needs to fire manager Eric Wedge. "They're still playing hard, just not playing well," the executive said of the Indians. "I don't see that they've quit on him. ... I don't see a bad environment." Cleveland general manager Mark Shapiro said Friday: "We all go through junctures where we're evaluated. To me now is not one of those junctures. ... The arrow shouldn't point at Eric. It should point toward a broad spectrum: the players, our staff, Eric, myself, the front office. There's shared responsibility."

The executive also suspects the Tribe will keep Victor Martinez and lefty Cliff Lee rather than dump the pair, since they are still under contract for 2010. That makes impending free agent Jamey Carroll a more likely trade candidate - like Mark DeRosa was when he was sent to St. Louis. "The problem with Cleveland," one AL team official said, "is they ask for so much."

• Minnesota has been seeking a reliable setup reliever since spring training, with no luck yet. Maybe the solution is lefty Francisco Liriano; the Twins could conceivably move him to relief and call up Anthony Swarzak – who was 2-2 with a 3.90 ERA when called up for the injured Glen Perkins – to fill Liriano's spot in the rotation.

• As first reported by FanHouse via twitter, Pittsburgh and Washington have been discussing a swap of outfielders Nyjer Morgan and Lastings Milledge, with the Pirates also seeking right-hander Craig Stammen as part of the deal.

• Seattle's Franklin Gutierrez has seven homers – four against San Diego.

• The Cubs are 35-35 all-time against the White Sox, 1,014-1,014 vs. the Dodgers, 7-7 against the Indians and 337-336 against the Mets.

• With Mike Burns replacing Dave Bush (microtear of triceps) in the Brewers rotation, the Giants became the last team to use only their Opening Day five-man rotation all year, and their streak is expected to end today when Ryan Sadowski replaced Jonathan Sanchez. And while Milwaukee would like to trade for a starter and a left-handed reliever, the Brewers "aren't willing to dish off their better players," according to an official from another team.

• The Dodgers last lost a series to an NL team May 8-10, against San Francisco.

• When Bruce Chen got called up Saturday to start for Kansas City, it marked his 10th major league team (also: Braves, Phillies, Mets, Expos, Reds, Astros, Red Sox, Orioles and Rangers). Mike Morgan and Ron Villone share the record by playing for 12 different teams, but Chen is still only 32.