It's not unusual to find issues with the major league schedule in April. Warm-weather teams will face one another in the early days of the season while two other clubs are playing in ski masks and near-freezing temperatures in a northern locale. Last weekend, at the same time the Angels were hosting Oakland and two dome teams, Tampa Bay and Toronto, were squaring off in Florida, the Mariners and Indians had a four-game series snowed out in Cleveland.

Undoubtedly arranging a schedule that fully accomodates April conditions is a difficult task, but it's hard to understand why the Mariners, who make only one visit to Cleveland, would have that trip planned for the first week of the season. No games are more difficult to reschedule than those involving teams from different divisions, which visit each other only once a summer. A friend of mine suggested the person responsible for such decision-making "has a future in Strategic Planning at the Bush Defense Department."

If you live in Milwaukee and preferred having the Brewers play in the American League, you'll be pleased to know Cleveland's next series -- against the warm-weather Angels -- has been moved to your fair city. Meanwhile, the Mariners have departed Cleveland for Boston, where temperatures will hover around 40 degrees and snow may fall on Thursday. Keep those snow shovels handy.