How Game Schedules Are Created
There is no short explanation. It is a long process, aided by a few computer programs, but at the end, it comes down to simple work.
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Some of the factors are
- Priority
- Majors have priority at Garfield Park
- Minor A gets the remaining space at Garfield
- Minor B has priority at Redwood, and may play a game or two at Garfield
- Rookies have priority at McPherson, and usually play a game at Garfield near the end of the season
- Randomness
- The schedules are created with no idea of which team will "get" which schedule.
- After the schedules are created and proofed, teams are "assigned" to a schedule at random. The methods which may and have been used are:
- Alphabetically (forward and reverse) by team name
- Alphabetically (forward and reverse) by manager last names
- Draft order (forward and reverse)
- Order the managers sent in their contact information
- Writing the team names on paper slips and picking them up at random
- Schedules are created as soon as we have a count of teams, long before team names and managers have been assigned. This helps ensure the schedules are as fair as can be. For instance, one major division team had 2 double headers in 2006, but only has one out of town game. Another team had no double headers, but has 3 out of town games. Which team got which was random.
- Other issues
- Only Majors can play double headers
- All should have two games per week
- Majors should play three games a week when possible
- School breaks
- Holidays
- Daylight Savings Time
- End of season tournaments (need to finish by a certain date)
- When school gets out for the summer (player attendance is a problem if our season extends more than a week or two into summer recess)
- Games on back to back dates can cause pitching issues - but can also be used to force teams to use more pitchers
- Playing some games against other leagues is highly desirable - it it a great experience for the kids
- Balancing the number of games at each field/day of week/time for each team - when practical
- For our Championship games, having only two games at a time is best, to ease the impact on the neighbors
- Having each team play each of the other teams in their division at least once
- Even number of games as the home team and the visiting team
- A "perfect" schedule for youth sports is to have as many games as possible. Nothing more, nothing less. A balanced schedule (playing opponents the same number of times) is a nice thing, but not a big factor.
- No considerations are made for families with players in multiple teams, people coaching two teams, work or vacation schedules, etc. WIth 50+ teams and 600+ players, it just is not possible to do.
- The only "human" choice the scheduler makes is which teams play what we consider the "opening" game each season.
- The opening game is the Major Division game played on Volunteer Field at 10am on Opening Day.
- Typically, this game is a rematch of the previous season's Championship game. Exceptions are made, such as in 2006 when the two expansion teams were scheduled to be the opening game.