When baseball created its three-division format — ominously enough,for a 1994 season doomed to be shut down by the game’s most bitterlyfought labor confrontation — one of the advantages it brought was an unbalanced schedule that would capture some essence of the game’s old format, when clubs played in eight-team leagues. With more playoff spots available and more teams looking to reach October, head-to-head play allows rivals to manage their own destinies, and with the added fun of a wild card to chase after, the thrill of playoff races is multiplied more than twice over.

Consider the Twins’ current situation. Despite trailing the Tigers (who played in the old AL East) by 11 games and the White Sox by nine, their destiny remains in their own hands because they still have 47 games left against the teams in their own division. Eleven of those games are against the hapless Royals, but they’ve also got 10 games against the Tigers and 12 against the Sox.

Both the Tigers and the White Sox have scheduling issues of their own. The defending world champions will have to start their second half with four series against teams with playoff aspirations, starting with the Yankees and Tigers.After one series against the Royals, they then dive into an August 4–26 stretch of 24 consecutive games without a off day, leading off with the Blue Jays, the Yankees, and the Tigers.

Jim Leyland’s surprising squad Motor City has a slightly different challenge: a schedule “hump” in August — seven games against the White Sox, plus road trips to Fenway Park and Yankee Stadium. If the Tigers can survive that stretch,they will have the significant advantage of playing two of their final three series against the Royals.

The misfortune for the Twins, Yankees, Red Sox, and Blue Jays is that somebody from the AL West gets to go to the postseason no matter what they do. However, again because of scheduling quirks, the Yankees’ chances at overtaking the competition in the East won’t solely depend on what they do themselves. Instead, the road to the title in the East may have to go through Oakland.The A’s have to play 17 of their next 45 games against the Red Sox and the Blue Jays, including seven matches with Boston in their first 13 games after the break.

That’s also the product of baseball’s runt division: with only four teams comprising the AL West, it’s impossible for its teams to play as many in-division games as their AL rivals. That makes it even more likely that the West will have trouble generating a division leader significantly above .500. The Angels’ August is a case in point: they’ll have to play 10 games against the Yankees and Red Sox at a point where every game for those teams might be desperately important; then they’ll have to worry about 16 games and five series within their own division.

Although the Rangers, with 35 games in the division yet to play, have more direct possibilities to win at the expense of their parity-stricken divisional brethren (versus Oakland’s 28 and the Angels’ 30), they run the risk of being knocked out of contention later this month by a 10-game stretch against the Jays, Yankees, and both Sox teams.

A problem with the current schedule is that it also introduced interleague play,which created an uneven situation because not all teams play the same interleague opponents. It’s even more perverse when you consider that the National League houses two more teams than the American League, meaning NL pennant races are permanently unbalanced because of the different allotments of interleague games. The Phillies had to play 18 games against the titans in the AL East, the Mets only 15. Yet because those games count in the NL East’s division race and the wild-card picture, the Phillies’ 5–13 interleague record not only cost them relative to the Mets (6–9 in their games against the AL East), but now they’re well back in the pack of the wild card chase.

In part, that’s because the current league leader in the wild-card race, the Dodgers, also only had to play 15 interleague games. After going 5–10, the last thing L.A. wanted was three more matches with the DH league.

Although it’s a canard of the statistical analysis community that all games are equally valuable in the standings, the possibility of a losing streak suffered at the hands of some of the league’s strongest teams might force a general manager’s hand, encouraging him to fold up or make a more significant deal than the ones we’ve gotten accustomed to in recent years. Those expecting deadline-deal drama last season were disappointed: the most significant move might have been Atlanta’s acquisition of Kyle Farnsworth, the Yankees’ pickup of Shawn Chacon, or the Giants adding Randy Winn. But with all four teams in the AL West in the running, and three teams in both the AL Central and East having shots of their own at their division titles and perhaps the wild-card, it’ll be particularly interesting to see how teams adapt and make additions in the next three weeks.

The danger is to teams that don’t have that sort of pressure to improve to survive the stretch run and reach October. A big lead in a division, like the one the Mets are enjoying, can be a considerable disincentive to address potentially significant problems. Instead of finding a good starter for the front of their rotation to protect against losing Pedro Martinez for any length of time, the Mets might instead spend the next two and a half months dabbling in debuts for the Pelfreys and Solers, auditioning the Maines, and seeing if Jose Lima really can lose every game he starts.

That would be a significant mistake, one that Omar Minaya should avoid. In years past, how many times did the Braves not have to worry about really fixing their bullpen, or shoring up their outfield, because of how far ahead they were? Fourteen straight division titles, one world championship. Complacency can be the death of a great team.

Ms. Kahrl is a writer for Baseball Prospectus.For more state-of-the-art analysis, visit www.baseballprospectus.com.