MLB's "first attempt at interleague play did not
deliver 100 percent of what it promised, but is 98 percent
so bad?," writes Murray Chass in the N.Y. TIMES. Chass: "Of
all of the figures that emerged from the first round of
interleague games, the most dramatic was attendance." The
84 games averaged a 35% increase over all previous games.
Chass writes that N.Y., Chicago and Seattle were strong
markets, but "most stunning, though, was the reception
interleague play received in Pittsburgh" (N.Y. TIMES, 6/20).
The WALL STREET JOURNAL's Frederick Klein: "It was a great
week for the diamond sport, and the erstwhile National
Pastime hasn't had many of those in recent years" (WALL
STREET JOURNAL, 6/20). In Dallas, Ken Daley writes "it is
hard to judge the interleague experiment anything but a
smashing success" (DALLAS MORNING NEWS, 6/20). But USA
TODAY's Mike Lopresti writes, "Momentary romance should not
be confused with long-term success" (USA TODAY, 6/20). SI's
Gerry Callahan calls it "a commonsense idea whose time had
come" (SI, 6/23). ESPN's Linda Cohn: "[I]nterleague play is
a hit -- at least with the fans" ("SportsCenter," 6/19).
