Dodgers-Angels schedule, series preview, pitching duels and TV info

For the third year in a row, the Dodgers’ series against the Angels will feature a no-game Sunday just before the All-Star break. That means this weekend’s Freeway Series game will again be played on Friday and Saturday only.

Because the Dodgers and Angels are considered natural rivals under MLB’s interleague play rules, they now play two two-game series against each other each season. That will be the case since 2023, when the league moved to a schedule in which each team plays all 29 other teams each year. That format increased the interleague portion of the schedule from 20 to 46 games, and the breakdown is three-game series against the 14 “non-rival” opponents, plus a series of two-game series between the natural rivals.

The majority of these two-game series typically take place during the week, often on Tuesday and Wednesday. When the Dodgers and Angels meet in Anaheim later this year, this is actually the plan: They’ll play at Angel Stadium on September 3 and 4.

But this weekend, the Dodgers and Angels play Friday and Saturday and then have a rare Sunday off. However, this is not that rare in the Freeway Series. In both 2022 (July 15-16 in Anaheim) and 2023 (July 7-8 in Los Angeles), the Dodgers and Angels had a break on the last Sunday before the All-Star break. This year, this free Sunday is three weeks before the Midsummer Classic.

The Dodgers and Angels aren’t the only ones facing this particular baseball oddity this year. On Sunday, August 11, not only are the Cubs and White Sox off after their two-game South Side, but so are the Cardinals and Royals after two games in Kansas City.

Another oddity about this weekend’s version of the Freeway Series is that the Dodgers are only at Dodger Stadium for these two games before heading back on the road next week. That’s right, that three-game series against the Rockies in Los Angeles from May 31 to June 2 was not the Dodgers’ shortest home game in 2024.