Year 3 of Major League Baseball's balanced schedule brought with it an interesting wrinkle: The Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres, the sport's most heated rivals at the moment, didn't face each other in March, April or May -- the first time that had occurred in 25 years. Instead, they played seven times over the course of 11 days in June, a stretch that saw six games decided by no more than three runs and one spill into a benches-clearing fracas.
This month, the Dodgers, Padres, San Francisco Giants and Arizona Diamondbacks, the top four teams in the National League West, staged 17 games against one another in a span of 18 days.