This Saturday’s Opening Day marks the first time since 2003 the league has opened outside the divisions as many coaches pushed for the change so they could ease into the season before the all-important divisional games. Obviously this is a good idea this spring, given how the poor weather has limited practice.

But teams should not think of the first two weeks as practice games. For playoff contenders—especially the wild-card likelihoods—the first two weeks of the season could be your dive bomb before getting into the division. This year’s schedule is reminiscent of 2001, when NewsChannel 8 lost the final wild-card berth because it dropped seven non-division games.

Opening Day features a handful of matchups with serious playoff ramifications—notably defending champ USA Today against Aspen Hill Division champion Comcast SportsNet, which has championship ambitions of its own.

There’s also Post.com vs. WRC, WTTG vs. The Gazette, ABC News vs. Associated Press, and National Press Club vs. CNN—all playoff teams a year ago in games that could hold seedings implications from the get-go.

On the flip side, opening with two weeks of non-division games gives lower-tiered teams a chance to build some early victories and confidence, and create pressure on the better divisional teams playing a harder schedule. The Washington Post, CBS News and Discovery Channel are among the teams that could fly out of the gate.

If you thought the Dawg Days of June had bite before, don’t put your hands near the growling beast this year. Two of the three weeks of divisional games finish off the season at a time when weddings, graduations and vacations are stripping rosters. In 2004, CBS News took advantage of such a two-week, six-game stretch in late June against struggling CNN and ABC News to snag its only division title.

Also to be watched: Rainouts. Once again there are three rain dates, but only two before the scheduled end of the season. The third comes July 7, a week after Final Day and a week before the playoffs. So, in theory, if we have a rainy spring and all games can’t be made up, the scheduling priority on rain dates goes to division games, meaning wild-card hopefuls better get these non-division victories when they can.

The 2007 schedule was drafted using a component of old and new methods. It’s imperative that division winners and playoff teams from the previous year play each other the following season. That helps to break potential playoff seedings ties and creates a base of parity for the entire league.

This system has worked very successfully over the years because many teams, including NewsChannel 8 in ’02, CBS News in ’04 and the National Press Club last year, have taken advantage of their lower-tiered games and captured postseason berths.

This year, we scheduled a few more sets of games in which divisional opponents matched up against like division opponents. The nature of the MMSL competitive balance does not allow for a full matching of division vs. division—no salary cap, no revenue sharing, no parity. So it’s up to the schedule to create that balance, which is what makes the wild-card races so exciting each year.

Based on last year’s records, USA Today has the most difficult schedule by playing 10 of the 2006 playoff opponents. WRC, CNN, AOL, WTTG, The Gazette and Press Club play nine. Comcast SportsNet, AP and ABC News face eight.

No doubt, there are a handful of mismatched games because nothing about the schedule is easy or precise. But the league has a long scheduling history of accommodating big rivalry games, making sure the potential playoff teams break seedings ties, and the lower-tiered teams have games that will be close, competitive and, thus, discourage forfeits or disinterest.

All of this should be accomplished again through this schedule. The Washington Times and Washington Post will play for the 23rd consecutive year. The two new Allbritton teams will play at Layhill June 23 in what will be a corporate-amped playoff atmosphere no matter how many wins either team has at the time. They're already talking about a massive picnic after the game.

And on June 2, Layhill will host USA Today, WRC, WTTG and AOL in what very well could be the Championship Sunday teams this season.

Of course, the games are played on the fields and not on paper. But upon closer review, the paper on which this year’s schedule is drafted sure provides a glow of what might transpire in Season 17.