Expert: Tom Schott - 6/10/2006

Question
Thank you for your quick response, Tom.
The train travel of the early 20th century might have necesitated many doubleheaders.  I've noticed the very different scheduling of offdays during some World Series because of the lengthy train travel between St. Louis & the east coast.  That was less of a problem starting in the 50s.
By the 80s, attendance was skyrocketing around the league.  I went to Angels games in the early 70s & they were getting 14,000 or so to many of their games.  That seems to be when the Angels discontinued double headers.
If you do find something more, let me know.
Thx!
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Followup To

Question -
When I grew up (late 60s & 70s), doubleheaders were very common.  I can't find anything online that tells the number of doubleheaders in MLB every year throughout the years.
My guess for the reason there are less today is improved travel & greater attendance (thus less need to give 2 games for the price of 1).
Thx!

Answer -
You're right, Kc. I poked around a bit on the Net and could not find specific information about the number of doubleheaders each year. But I can shed some light: I grew up with baseball in the 1950s and 1960s. The common practice going back deep into 20th century baseball history was to schedule doubleheaders =every= Sunday and on holidays such as July 4th and Labor Day. The reasons for the eclipse of doubleheaders--actually they're rare today, aren't they?--are  mostly economic, as you surmise. Think of the TV contracts: stations would not want to tie up 6+ hours of broadcast time, and they would have trouble selling advertising time for game #2 anyway. You also cannot overlook the fact that most players don't like them, and these guys have much more clout than they used to. Interesting topic. I'm going to do a little more searching around.

Tom

Answer
Rest assured, Kc, that I will let you know if I can find anything else on this, but it really appears to be a stumper. There is one other resource I can think of you might try: the librarian at the Hall of Fame. I know they undertake research questions, but I think a fee might be involved. Good luck.

Tom