MLB 2018 regular season thread

Nothing spectators like more than pitching changes. That's why the All-Star game gets such great ratings. Then they wonder why games take longer. Maybe it works as a strategy for winning, but as a marketing strategy, you couldn't do worse.

 

You’re 100 percent correct. And I don’t know what can be done about it. It’s like a bug built into the game.

 

I'm actually okay with the way the game is going because it's often relievers pitching for an entire inning.

The bullpen usage I couldn't stand was the push-button match-up usage that developed in the 1990s where a lefty would come in and throw two pitches.

Changes to start innings are not an issue for me. In-inning changes make it hard to watch.

 

I watch a lot less baseball than I used to. How are we doing with the Papi/Nomar guys who go through a whole routine in the box after every pitch?

 

Instead of requiring pitchers to face one batter, require them to face two.

 

Joe Sheehan has a fairly radical concept that I'd like to see adopted (though I don't think it would ever would): a pitcher must face six batters or give up a run before he can be removed.

 

Bartolo showed pretty good reflexes last night. Pujols hit a liner back at him, he got his glove on it and the ball popped up to the second baseman. Runner doubled off first. However, it was 11-1 and I think the guy on first was laughing so hard he didn't even try to get back to the base.

 

Six seems extreme.

If you eliminate the possibility of batter-on-batter matchup -- LOOGYs, essentially -- a large proportion of the problem goes away.

Bochy is the best at it. Especially in the playoffs. But my God, sometimes I think he's doing it just to run a four corners on the other team.

 

This has been the talk of my Facebook feed the last two days - mostly giddy Cubs fans who totally don't care about the White Sox.

It's tiresome. It's an organization that is openly in the process of a tear down, playing a 1-8 opponent on a 25-degree weekday in April.

Before the Cubs became a thing in the '80s, they had plenty of days like that at Six Flags Lakeview.

Like a friend of mine said, 974 is also the over-under number of fans in attendance at Wrigley Field on a standard day who could name three current Cubs players.

 

What would baseball do without Marc Smith Rzepczynski?

 

Who was older?