2010 schedule I see no break.

Great point. I believe football also avoids Sunday/Monday night football games during the WS, if there is a game scheduled that night. Phooey.

Even though the broadcasters and the advertisers can somewhat account for additional people watching games that are at a bar, they also realize that you are even less likely to watch and pay attention to the ads when you are at a bar than when you are at home. Ad rates are a lot more complicated than just total number of viewers - demographics of the viewers are heavily factored in as well.

Unfortunately the reality is that games aren't scheduled to maximize the number of people who can see them, but rather to maximize the revenue from the broadcasters. My perception is that in recent years (last 10-15 years) the major sports have made an effort to avoid scheduling things opposite each other so that they don't compete, which is another reason baseball might avoid the weekend during the postseason - to avoid competing with football.

Additionally, the more "legitimate" the post-season is, the more legitimate the sport is. Would you watch 162 baseball games if the WS was decided by a coinflip? Probably not. As much as I love soccer, I struggle sometimes to watch it because the lack of modernization makes the results seem almost entirely random. At times, I think, "Why watch any of this, if the winner is going to be decided by a bunch of rules invented 100 years ago before we had digital clocks?" The more people think that the players and their interaction with the game itself determine the outcome, the more people will follow. When postseason success is dependent on getting the preferred schedule or whatever, people lose interest.

If you were a Phillies fan in September when (despite me calling them "done" earlier) they had wrapped up a playoff berth pretty early on, who cared at all on days when the 4th and 5th starter were pitching? Everybody tuned in to see Roy, Roy, and Cole, but if the 4th and 5th starters mattered, people would tune in every day.

Andy, I don't follow this line of reasoning at all. As I see it, the casual fan watching the playoffs won't care one way or the other, and the more devoted fan will prize the post-season more because it more closely replicates the playing conditions of the regular season. I have trouble seeing the "valuing effect" working back into the regular season, even for passionate fans.

Am I missing a factor that you've taken into account?

And the long delays between series are infuriating. It's no wonder fans tune out. By the time the LCS or WS gets started, the casual fan has forgotten about what happened in the round before. It's almost impossible to feed on the excitement from round to round.

BSK, I'm in my early 50's, but even so I like to saddle up to a bar (or my own fridge) to watch a game as well. I am much more likely to get together with friends on a weekend to watch a game when I don't need to worry about getitng my kid or myself to bed on time to get up the next day. And that shared comraderie is part of the enjoyment of the game. It's just not the same sitting around by myself wearing sweats and deciding if I dare watch one more inning, or if that will make the next work day that much more difficult.