Why doesn't MLB adjust the times of East vs West games?

[Loophole]

Simple question. East coasters don't like staying up to watch 10 PM games on the west coast, west coasters probably don't like games starting at 4 PM on the east coast.

So why don't they just split the difference and start all coast-to-coast games at 8:30 ET/5:30 PT?

[Frobby]

Because that would be incredibly inconvenient for the people attending the games.

The way I see it, the West Coast folks have it easy. Just DVR the game and watch it when you get home. You can skip the commercials, too. Win-win.

[Gurgi]

Why dont they just reorganize the sport and have the Orioles play almost all their games east of the Mississippi river and let the West Coasters play all their games against west coast clubs. If they merge the Leagues they could make an Eastern League and a Western League.

Eastern League

Northern Division

Boston

NY Yankees

NY Mets

Toronto

Phillies

Midwest Division

Pittsburgh

Detroit

Cleveland

Cincinatti

St. Louis

Southern Division

Baltimore

Washington

Atlanta

Miami

Tampa

Western League

California Division

SF

Oakland

LA Dodgers

LA Angles

San Diego

Texas Divsion

Arizona

Colorado

Rangers

Astros

Kansas City

Chicago Division

Milwaukee

Chicago White

Chicago Cubs

Seattle

Minnesota

[TGO]

Swap St. Louis and Milwaukee (St. Louis is on the west bank of the Mighty Mississip'). But then you still have the Chicagos in the "wrong" league.

But yeah, in any event, I'm sure the answer as to why they wouldn't do that is tradition. Though really, if you look at those teams, I'm not sure you lose any great rivalries by splitting that way, since most of the best ones are geographical. I guess Cubs/Cardinals IF you manage to get Chicago into the east where it should be.

[Gurgi]

I tried to keep all divisions very very close together. So Minnesota, Milwaukee, Chicago, Chicago were a no brainer. And since I wanted a California division I stuck Seattle with Chicago.

TV ratings wise it would help having all the East Coast teams playing almost all their games at 7pm. And it would cut down on travel expenses by a lot. It would foster a lot more local rivalries. The SF vs Oakland/San Jose, LA Dodgers vs LA Angels, Texas vs Houston, Chicago vs Chicago, NY vs NYMets and keeping Boston with NY. That would help TV contracts.

[TGO]

I think move SD to the Texas (or Southwest) division and Seattle to the Pacific. California Division sounds nice but SD is closer to Phoenix than it is to SF.

[DrungoHazewood]

Simple question. East coasters don't like staying up to watch 10 PM games on the west coast, west coasters probably don't like games starting at 4 PM on the east coast.

So why don't they just split the difference and start all coast-to-coast games at 8:30 ET/5:30 PT?

Because it would royally suck to have a bunch of games on the schedule, in OPACY, that won't end until midnight. I'll trade a few west coast games that I basically don't see, for a quarter(?) of the schedule where I'm going to go to bed in the 4th inning.

Why dont they just reorganize the sport and have the Orioles play almost all their games east of the Mississippi river and let the West Coasters play all their games against west coast clubs. If they merge the Leagues they could make an Eastern League and a Western League.

I love it, but West Cost teams probably wouldn't as much. Teams would love the impact on their travel budgets. You'd think TV revenues might increase with more baseball on in prime time.

[Pedro Cerrano]

Call me crazy, but whenever I'm visiting the West Coast I find it very very weird that east coast games are over at 6:45 PM.

I don't mind a few 10 pm starts, I usually can watch most of the games (my bedtime is midnight) and in the rare event that it goes over, I can either turn the game off or suck it up and be tired the next day.

[Orioles0615]

Why dont they just reorganize the sport and have the Orioles play almost all their games east of the Mississippi river and let the West Coasters play all their games against west coast clubs. If they merge the Leagues they could make an Eastern League and a Western League.

Eastern League

Northern Division

Boston

NY Yankees

NY Mets

Toronto

Phillies

Midwest Division

Pittsburgh

Detroit

Cleveland

Cincinatti

St. Louis

Southern Division

Baltimore

Washington

Atlanta

Miami

Tampa

Western League

California Division

SF

Oakland

LA Dodgers

LA Angles

San Diego

Texas Divsion

Arizona

Colorado

Rangers

Astros

Kansas City

Chicago Division

Milwaukee

Chicago White

Chicago Cubs

Seattle

Minnesota

ESPN would drop their panties like a drunk prom date for that division.

[SeaBird]

When I used to travel to the WC, I enjoyed having the games over by 4 p.m. That freed up the evenings for dinners or movies.

Same thing with football. Games on at 10 a.m. and then the beach at 1 or 2 p.m.

[byrdz]

Because that would be incredibly inconvenient for the people attending the games.

The way I see it, the West Coast folks have it easy. Just DVR the game and watch it when you get home. You can skip the commercials, too. Win-win.

You don't even have to record it these days with MLBTV. I usually watch it on any PC, tablet, phone, or TV via Roku and start watching from any point of the game.

[orayole]

I would do it more like this

------------------------------------------------

Eastern League

North East Division

Boston

NY Yankees

NY Mets

Toronto

Phillies

Eastern Division

Pittsburgh

Baltimore

Cleveland

Cincinnati

Washington

Southern Division

Rangers

Astros

Atlanta

Miami

Tampa

Western League

Pacific Division

SF

Oakland

LA Dodgers

LA Angels

Seattle

Leftover (haha) Divsion

Arizona

Colorado

St. Louis

Kansas City

San Diego

Northern Division

Milwaukee

Chicago White

Chicago Cubs

Detroit

Minnesota

[Moose Milligan]

From a sports fan perspective, I think I'd love living on the West coast. Orioles games would be done by 7, there'd still be time to go out and do things after. NFL would start at 10 am on Sunday...sleep in a little, wake up and watch the Skins while making an awesome breakfast and then the 1pm game would be done by 4.