July 8 - edmonton at portland [R]

[seether]

quote:Originally posted by zico

I don't know of any other league in the world that plays back-to-back games; it's ridiculous. I think the fans lose out. I guess it's a money-saving arrangement and I know some teams manage to win the second game. But it doesn't make sense to have a fully rested team play against a team that has played the night before. If the back-to-back games invole the same two teams then it's a fairer arrangement, but really the quality of the second game is likely less. I think there should be a minimum of one day between games.

In the old NPSL the Drillers would usually have at least one strectch a year with three games, in three nights, and three different cities. Once they actually swept them too!

[DarnCherry]

Don't get me wrong, it's awful and I wish they'd stop having them. It's really a rip off for the fans, especially if the team plays the second night at home in front of the home fans. Basically fans are paying full price to watch a tired team.

Luis, it has nothing to do with how few teams there are in the west. The eastern team have back to backs, and even when there were 30 teams in the league they were still doing it. It's done because teams claim they save money on hotels etc by scheduling like this. For instance, Edmonton played Seattle travelled the same night and played in Portland the next night. That way they didn't have to spend extra nights in Portland hotels. They also could have travelled back to Edmonton and played the following week in Portland. However that just makes for more travel costs. Travelling to Portland right after the game and playing the next night saved costs and got a road game off their schedule.