Major League Baseball will reintroduce “Rivalry Week” in 2025, with all 32 teams scheduled to meet with their fiercest rivals during weekend series from May 16-18.
The Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees will meet with one another, right?
Wrong.
The Los Angeles Dodgers and the San Francisco Giants? The St. Louis Cardinals and the Chicago Cubs?
Nope.
MLB made the decision to primarily focus on geographical locations (NY vs. NY, LA vs. LA, Chicago vs. Chicago, etc.) for the matchups, with team history coming as the secondary factor in throwing the whole thing together. The Red Sox, despite having centuries of history with and a fairly close proximity to the Yankees, will instead be matched up with the Atlanta Braves.
Atlanta kind of makes sense, given the franchise eventually settled down south after starting in Boston. Does anyone still have much of a care, though? The Red Sox have participated in rivalry week twice, and have yet to face the Yankees, which is more of the problem.
It’s not that big of a deal, we’ll get our fix of the best rivalry in baseball at other points in the season, but if you’re marketing hatred between two franchises it’s odd to leave out the most heated duo of all.
