I've been thinking about the natural handicaps certain sports teams have. Things like weather, elevation, travel distance in a season, etc.
I think it's interesting to think about how much something like that might affect the career of an athlete, especially early in their career or someone who is on the margin of getting into professional sports. Would choosing to play at a university that has a lot of natural handicaps be the difference between making it into pro sports? I wonder.
Anyway, I ended up making a page showing how much baseball teams in MLB have to travel this season: https://calcubest.com/sports/mlb2025 which I think does an OK job of highlighting how much less time athletes playing on central division teams have to travel.
I think it's interesting to think about how much something like that might affect the career of an athlete, especially early in their career or someone who is on the margin of getting into professional sports. Would choosing to play at a university that has a lot of natural handicaps be the difference between making it into pro sports? I wonder.
Anyway, I ended up making a page showing how much baseball teams in MLB have to travel this season: https://calcubest.com/sports/mlb2025 which I think does an OK job of highlighting how much less time athletes playing on central division teams have to travel.