Image via Milwaukee Brewers
After months of uncertainty and negotiation, at least one thing is now clear: There will be baseball soon. With spring training camps set to open this week, the first Cactus League games scheduled for February 28 and the game times filled in for almost all of the regular season schedule, it finally appears safe to start penciling games into the calendar for the months ahead.
Starting with an April 1 opener at American Family Field, the Brewers are scheduled to fit 162 regular season games into a span of 186 days. This year’s schedule features good news for fans of day baseball as the Brewers have 59 matinees on their schedule, tied for the most they’ve played in the last several years. They also have six weekday late games, however, up from just two on the pre-pandemic 2020 schedule.
With game times filled in for 155 of the Brewers’ 162 contests (and reasonable assumptions for late season series in Los Angeles and San Francisco), here’s a day-by-day breakdown of the baseball ahead:
Monday:
- Day Games: 2
- Night Games: 11
- Late Games: 3
- Off Days: 10
For the second consecutive season Monday is the lightest day on the Brewers’ calendar, with off days scheduled for ten of the 26 regular season weeks. The lone day games on the calendar are both holiday matinees at home: The Brewers host the Tigers on May 31 for Memorial Day and the Phillies on September 6 for Labor Day.
Tuesday:
- Day Games: 0
- Night Games: 22
- Late Games: 3
- Off Days: 1*
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As is typically the case, Tuesday night is baseball night for Brewers fans: The only Tuesday night without a Brewers game this season is July 13, the night of the All Star Game, and the Brewers haven’t had a non-ASG Tuesday off since at least 2016. They also haven’t played a scheduled Tuesday day game since 2018. The late nights on Tuesdays are spaced throughout the calendar: They’ll play after bedtime on April 20 in San Diego, June 22 in Arizona and (likely) August 31 in San Francisco.
Wednesday:
- Day Games: 10
- Night Games: 13
- Late Games: 1
- Off Days: 2
This mix of midweek matinees and night games mirrors last season’s schedule and is also pretty close to 2019. The Brewers have just five Wednesday night home games in 2020, with two in May and three in the season’s final six weeks. Their only Wednesday off days, however, fall during the All Star break in July and after the conclusion of a brief two-game series with the Tigers in June.
Thursday:
- Day Games: 11
- Night Games: 7
- Late Games: 0
- Off Days: 9
Thursday night games are something of a declining tradition across the sport: Thursday is nearly always a travel day before teams open a new series on Friday, and so evening baseball is somewhat limited. The Brewers also had just seven Thursday night games on their pre-pandemic schedule for 2020, and only four of them in 2019.
Not every home team gives their opponent the courtesy of an early start on a getaway day, however: The Brewers have night games scheduled for the series finale of a July trip to Pittsburgh and an August trip to St. Louis, meaning they will have been up late the night before series openers the next night in Atlanta and Milwaukee, respectively.
Friday:
- Day Games: 1
- Night Games: 23
- Late Games: 1
- Off Days: 2
The lone Friday day game on the calendar is, per usual, a matinee when the Brewers visit the Cubs at Wrigley Field in April. The Brewers only play one weekend series in Chicago this season, however, so the rest of their Friday games will be under the lights. The two rare Friday off days come in the first two weeks of the season, following the Brewers’ home opener in Milwaukee and the Cardinals’ home opener in St. Louis.
Saturday:
- Day Games: 8
- Night Games: 17
- Late Games: 2
- Off Days: 0
These numbers are perhaps the most likely to change, as MLB often exercises the right to move Saturday contests around to accommodate national broadcasts. At present, however, the Brewers are largely scheduled to play during the day on Saturdays early in the season (seven of their eight day games are in June or before) before switching to nearly exclusively night games for the season’s warmer months.
Sunday:
- Day Games: 27
- Night Games: 0
- Late Games: 0
- Off Days: 0
This number is also subject to change as ESPN selects games for Sunday Night Baseball telecasts, but 12 of those contests have already been announced and the Brewers are not a part of any of them. Last year at this time Milwaukee had already been announced for three such games, including the first scheduled SNB broadcast of the season. If the Brewers (or their opponent) remain in contention, they could be a candidate for ESPN to pick up their games on July 25 against the White Sox, August 1 against the Braves, August 22 against the Nationals, September 5 against the Cardinals or October 3 against the Dodgers.
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