Another Bush League Move by MLB

ESPN is reporting Major League Baseball will cut the length of doubleheader games from nine innings to seven innings effective immediately.

This is just another bush league move, more closely associated with high school baseball than major league baseball.  There have been very rare occasions in the past where MLB allowed teams to play seven inning doubleheader games, but never a whole season.  This is more proof MLB and its "management" are making the rules up on the fly.  The question that comes to mind is why wasn't this rule implemented prior to the start of the season instead of now, eight days after the 2020 season started?

MLB and its players will tell you this is for the safety of its players.  But, the question then becomes why play the games at all?  As I wrote Tuesday night.  Just cancel the whole season and come back next spring.  Just shut it down now.  Rob Manfred you're still an idiot and should be canned immediately.

Opening Day for MLB...Why Bother?

It's been over 200 days since America last saw Major League Baseball played before the pandemic shut things down.  And the way MLB is going they should have stayed shut down.

Normally, I count down the days to the start of the regular season. But, this year I could care less.  Here are some random thoughts on the state of the game as it opened today.

-MLB and its players approved expanded playoffs this year.  In a money grab to expand the number of games available for ESPN and Fox Sports, both sides approved expanding the playoffs to 16 teams.  That means more than half of the teams in MLB will be in the playoffs. Which raises the question why bother playing a regular season.  Expanded playoffs cheapen the regular season and reduces the talent pool in the playoffs.  What's even worse is once playoffs are expanded they never contract.

-I've been watching baseball for over 60 years and the thought of a designated hitter makes me want to puke.  The addition of a DH to the National League creates an uneven playing field for NL teams that have not cultivated the spot in the lineup as have their junior circuit cousins for the past 40 plus years.  It's been a gimmick since it was implemented and it still is.

-The 60 game season is a joke.  Why is a third of the season being spent playing teams that aren't even in the same league.  Yet, those games will count as much as any division game.  I am a fan of the St. Louis Cardinals and agree playing two thirds of the season against its division rivals is a good idea.  But, why the heck are the Cardinals playing the Detroit Tigers, Kansas City Royals and Chicago White Sox?  They are bad baseball teams.  It's another gimmick that MLB has forced on the public.  And MLB hasn't publicized it yet, but all teams will be playing the same other league division they are playing this year again next year.  What does that tell you?  ESPN AND Fox want to match up major market teams on the East coast to inflate ratings.  Hopefully, this will backfire and MLB, ESPN and Fox will lose their ass as the public sees through yet another worthless gimmick.

-One final thought;  if commissioner Rob Manfred is involved, you can be assured he will do the wrong thing and piss off the fans who support the game.  But, what does Manfred and his owner buddies care?  They're making money hand over fist without a single person in any stadium.

I guess I will continue to watch the Big Bang Theory and Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives rather than this bastardization of the American past time until the NHL starts its playoffs in a week and a half.

Rob Manfred, you're an idiot.

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MLB Games are Just Too Long and Boring

Greetings oh  blog reader.  As I write this I am watching the St. Louis Cardinals and Cincinnati Reds play a divisional game from Great American Ballpark in Cincinnati.  The game is being played at a snail's pace and honestly isn't any fun to watch.  It just moved into the top of the 5th and is almost two hours old.  Major League Baseball is boring because the games are too long.  I was offered tickets by a friends to a Cardinals game earlier this week and fortunatly I had other plans.  Fortunate because it was 93 degrees and I knew the game would last over three hours.  The seats were great seats, but also in the sun.  So while I love the game of baseball I was glad I didn't go to the Cards and Marlins game.

I've written about these long games on several occasions.  The average game time is well over three hours in the National League and even longer in the American League.  There are several reasons that the times have gotten out of hand.

For starters, umpires are not calling the strike zone as it is written in the rule book.  The book says a pitch over the plate from the letters to the knees is a strike.  But, for must umps, the strike zone exists between the waist and knees.  Batters take extra pitches looking for a free pass.  This results in more pitches seen in each at bat, which results in a longer game time.  For most hitters and pitchers the game is a cat and mouse contest.  The pitcher gets the ball back from the catcher and he steps off the rubber and does any number of things from rubbing up the ball, to walking around the back of the mound to blowing on his hand to God only knows what he will do next.  While the pitcher is wasting time the batter is stepping out of the batters box.  The hitter goes through a litany of tightening his gloves, looking down the foul line to the base coach for signals, knocking dirt out of his cleats, taking a couple of practice swings and then stepping back into the box.  If you're lucky the pitcher will throw to the hitter and the game resumes for one pitch.  If not they go through this routine again. Each at bat is too long, the inning becomes even longer and the fans get bored waiting for something to happen.  This could be resolved by the Commissioner of Baseball, Rob Manfred, issuing an order that the hitters will stay in the box and the pitcher on the rubber.  If they don't the pitcher is assessed a ball for each violation and the hitter is assessed a strike each time he steps out of the box.  It wouldn't take long for them to learn their bad habits won't be tolerated.  The commissioner also needs to order umpires to call strikes as they are written in the rule book.  If not they get a warning, that if repeated enough could result in suspension or termination.  The commissioner needs to realize fans do not go to the games to watch the umpires call balls.

If MLB is serious about picking up the pace it would also limit the amount of times between innings to 90 seconds.  As it is now MLB allows some networks to run up to three minutes of commercials each half inning (ESPN/ABC is a prime offender).  Baseball makes a ton of money off of TV rights so its TV partners need to show as many commercials as possible.  But, if the TV networks went to a grid system, they could charge more for each spot and reduce the number between innings.  MLB has to remember the fans in the stands who have to sit and wait every time TV shows a commercial.  These are the same fans who in some cases are paying over $100 per ticket to get into the ballpark. Baseball needs to show some consideration to those paying for tickets and not roll over for broadcast rights holders. If baseball would reduce the amount of time between innings it could result in a savings of at least 24 minutes per game.

If baseball is serious about shortening its games it's not that difficult.  My guess is nothing will change any time soon because of the amount of money being made by MLB and its business partners the way things are at this time.