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My life following baseball has been primarily laced with an ever-present public persona that baseball needs to change and get with the times. The mound was lowered, the DH brought in, thoughts were given to 3-ball walks and orange baseballs.
Howard Cosell would occasionally appear on the Tonight Show touting how boring and antiquated baseball was, and how football is the greatest spectator sport man ever invented. Yet here we are some 50 years later, and while the NFL is king with some $20 billion in annual revenue, baseball has done very well.
Some of my thoughts on the grand old game. First, you cannot stop progress. The current mantra that the way to win games is to hit home runs and strike guys out cannot be legislated away. 100 years ago the same debate was being raised when Babe Ruth took away what people said was the “scientific game” of speed, and moving runners along.
I do like the idea of putting some limits in place though. Making it so there has to be two infielders on each side of second base until contact is made is probably going to happen at some point. I am okay with that.
Some comments were made about the abuse on pitcher’s arms that the current system incentivizes. I believe the Cardinals are guilty of that in their handling of Jordan Hicks. Hicks should have been brought along slowly, and groomed as a starter and coached to keep from throwing so hard on every pitch. Instead he was rushed to the majors and put in a high-stress role right away. It is not hard to understand why he is missing significant active roster time despite still being early in his career.
But how do we keep that from happening? If that is perceived as the way to win ball games, it is not going to change until something else comes along that is considered better. Maybe someday guys who throw sinkers will be the rage, and the double play will be in vogue.
I don’t think the game needs changed as much as the media espouses about it. The showmanship does not bother me at all. After all if you cannot have fun, why play? Focus primarily on keeping the hitter in the box, keeping the pitcher delivering the ball, and coaching pitch selection for hitters and pitch location for pitchers.
If pitchers throw strikes, and hitters swing at balls in the zone, things will work. It seems hitters let too many hittable balls go by, resulting in a big advantage to the pitcher. Pitchers are so good today, if you don’t jump on that pitch in the zone you are really putting yourself in a disadvantaged position.
Are hitters coached to think anymore? When I played during my teen years and early 20s in local leagues, I would always be up there thinking “Okay, if this pitch is on the outer half I will go the other way with it, but if it is something I can drive I am going to turn on it”. With two strikes it was always “Don’t get too greedy and just get some wood on the ball.”
If you are Matt Carpenter, you gotta be saying “Look for a pitch mid-to-outer half and keep your hands back and front shoulder down.” If he just focused on thinking that way, instead of the shoulder flying out and upper-cutting at everything he would still be in the lineup 4 days a week.
When I was a freshman in high school trying to impress enough to make the varsity team when I became eligible that next summer, I found that I could not hit curve balls, having not seen any good ones in little league. My coach wrapped tape around the bat handle about 3 or 4 inches up, making a second knob and forcing me to choke up. You know the rest. I could suddenly hit curveballs and made the Varsity squad as a Sophomore. Some kids would lift the leading leg way up as a timing mechanism, and if they did it in practice the coach would chuck a heater right at him. Let him get out of the way standing there like a stork. It forced the batter to internalize the timing mechanism and stand with both feet on the ground, well balanced, and able to control the bat.
I watch some high school and small college ball and I can tell you they don’t teach kids how to hit any more. So I guess the answer is to move back the mound and tell fielders where they can stand.
Good stuff Bling. Yeah, I really question whether hitters are actually coached today. I think it might be all video viewing, which should help. But a lot of the basics are pretty easy to work on if you have a coach that will work with your approach.
The actual hitting is not easy, but the mental part and the approach to each pitch can get you halfway there. You have to be ready for pitches in particular zones, dependent on the count, and know what you are going to do when the pitch is delivered.
I watched that first at-bat Wong had last night, and thought “Man, if Carpenter would just get back to the approach Wong has, taking those pitches on the outside the other way, he could extend his career.” Wong had gotten into the Carpenter style several years ago, where he was upper cutting and trying to crank everything out of the park. But he made himself an excellent player by making better contact and using the entire field.
Carp had the big run the second half of 2018, and I think he got to thinking he is a 35-40 homer guy and has tried to hit everything to right field and elevate. Just has not worked for him though.
I may be in the minority but I would certainly be in favor of banning the shift. I think the shift has hurt the game a lot. That is not how the game was designed. The NBA banned certain defenses at one time so it wouldn’t be a precedent.
I also think the 3 man pitch rule for relievers makes no sense. It completely hamstrings the managers and I see no evidence it speeds up the game.
The DH in the NL is a no-brainer to me. That should have already been implemented. If I am paying a pitcher $20M a year I do not want him to risk injury in the batter’s box or running the bases. And it should be a full time DH, not that hybrid proposal of removing the DH when the pitcher comes out.
As for roboumps, I am leaning no on that. Removing the human element is probably a mistake. The replay system should be able correct the human mistakes although I admit there may not be a good way to use replay for balls and strikes. The biggest problem I have with replay is that the replay officials seem too hesitant to overturn a call because they don’t want to offend or embarrass the ump who made the call on the field.
I have no problem with the shift. If a hitter can’t figure out how to hit to beat the shift, maybe he shouldn’t be in the majors. The object is to get more runs than the other team. That is usually accomplished by getting on base. It doesn’t mean to hit the most home runs. If a player learns to hit to beat the shift, the shift will stop.
One of the things the majors needs to do is to get rid of the umpires who are poor behind the plate. It should be based on consistency of calls and accuracy of calls. I don’t mind an umpire who consistently calls a wide strike as long as it is not 6 inches off the plate. He should also be fairly consistent from game to game.
As far as replay goes, the play should be overturned only if it is quickly clear that the wrong call was made. It shouldn’t be need to be replayed 10 times just to determine the umpire on the field was wrong. It is for the plainly bad calls, not the really close calls. As an example, I think the stolen base that was overturned to an out call in last night’s game should not have been overturned. Edman may have blocked the bag with his foot but I didn’t see a replay angle that showed the runner’s hand was off the bag when the tag was made.
I agree on the shift, gscottar. Good comparison to things that have been done in other sports such as the NBA. When Wilt came into the league the NBA changed several rules, and widened the “key” to keep him from being so dominant.
A simple rule of keeping two infielders on each side of second base until contact is reasonable. You could still have the shortstop just to the left of second and the third baseman in the traditional shortstop position. But at least keep things reasonably traditional in playing the bags.
The DH should be in place. There is no doubt it will be next year with the abysmal offensive numbers we are seeing in 2021. Heck, they may allow it in the NL after the all-start break the way it is going. MLB is at odds with itself on this, as they promote the big stars who can really rake, yet they have the pitcher hitting in NL home games.
I would be okay overturning the three batter minimum, and the runner on second in extra innings as well. If you want to compromise, maybe have a rule that states a manager can only use one pitcher per game that faces only one batter. Once you burn that guy, barring injury, remaining pitchers need to face at least two batters. And on the runner-on-second deal, maybe put it in place after the 12th inning, or some other later inning.
The article also touched on the broadcast blackout situation. I have always been a critic of that. It comes down to whether or not MLB feels it’s marginal revenues from local cable providers are more valuable than allowing regional viewing for everyone. I think it is archaic and short-sighted to force your regional fans to buy a cable television service to be able to view the local team’s games. Times have changed. Hard core fans with some reasonable computer skills can find local games on the internet anyway, so let’s open up the game for all regardless of location.
Then there are the costs of a game, but they will have to be in a later post. I am starting to be like jager with my posts in this thread.
Good point about the blackouts mike. I don’t know if that will be in the new CBA or not (I would think not) but it is still something that needs to be addressed. We are in the year 2021 and most consumers now have the ability to find and watch on almost anything at their fingertips if they are willing to spend the money. There isn’t much you can’t find on Amazon Prime, Netflix, Hulu, HBO, Disney+, YouTube, etc…not to mention the plethora of cable or satellite channels. The one exception is watching your favorite MLB team if you live in the wrong place.
MLB is literally going in the exact opposite direction of most in the entertainment industry. It is mind boggling really.
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