Introduction
What kind of sports experience naturally blends into everyday life and becomes a routine? One helpful example is how baseball games are scheduled. Top professional baseball leagues — in East Asia such as Japan (NPB), South Korea (KBO), and Taiwan (CPBL), and also in the United States (MLB) — have historically based their operations on holding games almost every day and at roughly fixed times. That high frequency and temporal consistency create a culture that integrates into fans’ daily lives beyond mere scheduling differences. This article organizes the mechanisms that make baseball easy to fit into daily life and clearly explains the constraints that time zone differences within the U.S. impose on MLB.
Main Discussion
Characteristics of baseball game frequency and start times
A major characteristic of baseball is the clarity of its game frequency and start times. For example, Japan’s professional baseball (NPB) plays a large number of official games across both Central and Pacific leagues, compressed into roughly half a year from opening. After the season starts, games are held almost every day except Mondays, and weekday night games generally begin around 18:00, making it easy to form an evening routine.
South Korea’s KBO and Taiwan’s CPBL are similar: weekday games are concentrated in the evening and weekend schedules include earlier day games, reflecting regional daily rhythms and a strong emphasis on fixed timing. This mechanism of “repeating at the same time slot many times” provides a foundation that makes it easy for baseball to become a shared routine within families and local communities.
MLB also has many games and there is almost always a game being played somewhere on any given day, but an important difference is that the United States spans four major time zones: Eastern, Central, Mountain, and Pacific. As a result, even games that start “at 19:00 local time” will be viewed at very different times across the country. For example, a 19:00 start in the Eastern time zone corresponds to 16:00 on the Pacific coast, while a 19:00 start on the Pacific coast may be 22:00 in the Eastern time zone.
Why MLB’s time differences make it harder to create a nationwide habit
- Sharing the same time is difficult: It’s hard to create a single nationwide “evening routine” because viewing times split by region.
- Common routines at home or work are less likely to form: Differences in commute and dinner times across regions make it difficult for “everyone watching baseball at the same evening time” to spread nationwide.
- Broadcast scheduling variability: Local broadcasts are often emphasized over simultaneous national airings, reducing the sense of “turn on the TV at a set time and there will always be a game.”
| City (example) | Local start time (example) | Corresponding time in other regions |
|---|---|---|
| New York (Eastern) | 19:00 | Los Angeles 16:00; Chicago 18:00 |
| Los Angeles (Pacific) | 19:00 | New York 22:00; Denver 20:00 |
Comparison
Comparison with other popular sports (summary)
Soccer, American football, and basketball are not held “daily at the same time” to the same extent as baseball. Soccer and the NFL are centered on roughly weekly schedules with variable kick-off times, and while the NBA has many games, its back-to-back scheduling and rest-day adjustments weaken strict regularity. In contrast, leagues like NPB, KBO, and CPBL that operate within a single time zone and prioritize night games make it easier to create a shared understanding of “evening = baseball,” which is advantageous for habit formation.
Why daily fixed-time scheduling aids habit formation
For a habit to form, it is important that an action is repeated with the same cue and that the satisfying result continues. Empirical behavioral research (Lally et al., 2010) shows that repetition in the same situation and at the same timing helps automate behavior and is effective for habit formation.
- Triggers are easier to establish: If games are held at almost the same time, that time becomes a natural cue for action.
- Repetition leads to automation: Watching repeatedly in the same time slot helps the viewing behavior become established.
- Frequent small rewards: The chance to experience joy or excitement almost daily accumulates satisfaction in short cycles.
From these points, the “almost daily, almost fixed-time” cycle seen in NPB, KBO, and CPBL naturally satisfies the conditions for habit formation.
Exceptions
Alternative views and caveats
That said, there are points to consider. Enthusiastic communities can grow around sports like soccer even with a weekly cadence, and the spread of streaming services allows viewers to optimize viewing times individually. Therefore, baseball-style “daily and fixed-time” value is not the only correct approach in every situation.
Conclusion
Overall, baseball’s practice of holding games “almost every day and at almost fixed times” is an important factor that makes the sport easy to integrate into daily life and promotes habit formation. In single time zone countries such as Japan, Korea, and Taiwan, the evening time slot serves as a common trigger that helps form nationwide routines. By contrast, although MLB’s game frequency is high, domestic time zone differences weaken its ability to create a uniform nationwide “evening habit.” Not only frequency but also the uniformity of viewing time is an important condition for a sport to take root in everyday life.