Most people here are ignoring the main reason: the writers were just a bunch of baseball loving rat pack fans who took their love of those things maybe a little too far. In the case of baseball, we only had Take Me Out to Holosuite to deal with (which is a great episode–provided you like baseball, I suppose). In the case of the rat pack, we inexplicably got Vic Fontaine who you either love or hate. I wouldn’t hate Vic Fontaine so much myself if they didn’t force him to basically take up the space that Quark’s Bar was supposed to be, and for him to be an integral part of the show so late in the series. And yes, the musical numbers take up too much time, if you ask me.