The Kansas City Royals’ 2023 schedule will look radically different from years past
For the first time since 2014, the Dodgers will be playing at Kauffman Stadium this season. But Kansas City fans won’t have to wait nearly as long to see LA play the Royals again.
As part of a new collective-bargaining agreement, Major League Baseball plans to institute a change to scheduling beginning in 2023. USA Today baseball columnist Bob Nightengale reported “teams will play at least one series against every opponent in both leagues” starting next season.
As CBS Sports noted, the old schedule format had a rotation of interleague games.
The Athletic’s Jayson Stark took a closer look at how the schedule will work.
This season, the Royals will play 19 games against their AL Central foes, the Twins, White Sox, Guardians and Tigers. That will be reduced to 14 games in 2023, Stark said.
The Royals will face the 10 other AL opponents six times (three home games, three road games) next year.
And the Royals will play every NL opponent three times, with one exception. Their in-state rivals, the Cardinals, will be on the schedule four times (two games in KC and two in St. Louis).
The Royals will play seven other NL teams at home in 2023 and face seven more on the road. In 2024, they’ll switch the site of those games.
That’s 162 games, which is what baseball fans expect. However, Royals fans now can count on every MLB team playing at Kauffman Stadium in either 2023 or 2024.
And Royals fans wanting to take a road trip to any MLB ballpark will have a perfect excuse in the near future.
Why the change?
“It’s an attempt, in an increasingly regionalized sport, to allow fans in every city to see their team play against every team and every star in the other league at least once a year,” Stark wrote. “Also, with new wild-card teams added to the mix, it makes the schedule more comparable for teams fighting for those spots.”
This story was originally published March 14, 2022 at 11:21 AM.
