MLB 2022: The Long and Winding Thread

And what’s the definition of pitch? When the pitcher begins his delivery? Or when the ball crosses the plate? Second baseman can theoretically take a couple of steps back onto the grass.

 

it’s all those things. It’s also the fact that nobody knows how to do it anymore because it’s not taught at the lowest levels or anywhere else. Kids are paying $45 an hour for private hitting coaches and it’s not to learn the finer points of bunting. I bet most guys good enough to get drafted have never laid a bunt down in their life. And they’re not going to start when they get to the minor leagues.

 

As I posted long ago, the idea that big leaguers can't hit to the opposite field is heartbreaking.

 

These decisions aren’t being made by the players

 

It's pathetic. And if Moneyball meant anything. this is a trend due for a market correction. Suppose some kid decides he's gonna be the next Rod Carew and has the talent to fulfill that. All of a sudden he's maybe the next .400 hitter and the hottest news in the game.

 

These might be dumb questions:
1) Does the "feet on the dirt" rule apply to infielders who are playing in? That could cause havoc in bunt situations.

2) Is the late-inning, do or die staple of the five-man infield (when a team brings an outfielder into the infield; always fun to see) now considered a shift and banned?

 

1) playing in allowed
2) 5 man infield also allowed

 

They've been raised and trained on one set of rules and now they're changed? It'd be astonishing if the players thought that was a good idea.

I thought the players would be smart enough to realize that 3:30 games are helping to kill the sport with fans. Especially those who watch games on TV. Do they not notice the in-person fans bailing in the seventh and eighth innings, after three hours? Do they not talk with friends? Do they not realize that all former players who bemoan the current state of the game - a big part of which is the glacial pace of play - might not all be bitter old men, that they actually want what is best for baseball?

Players adapted to the DH, a huge fundamental change, with ease. They've adapted to the 3-batter minimum for relievers. They adapted to the lower mound in 1969, and to strike-zone changes over the years. For them to think the game is stagnant, and the rules should be exactly like they were in 1978, is ridiculous. Can you image if the NBA, NFL and NHL had a similar mindset? Evolve or die.

I also think the players (at least off the record) are going to like quicker-paced, shorter games, so a 7 p.m. game gets over before 10:30 or 11. Has anyone who ever played baseball at any level ever complained about a fast-moving game? Do minor leaguers really miss 3:15 games, now that they're taking only 2:35 or so? My brother works for the Greenville Drive and he told me the fans think the pitch clock and quicker games are great.

I think these rules are going to be insanely popular with the rank-and-file baseball fan.

 

This is such an important point. As young players come up from the minors, this is the way they'll be playing the game already. It'll be moot before too long.

 

(Read this in the late David McCullough's voice ... or Liev Schreiber, I don't give a fuck ...)

"When change comes to baseball, that change is inevitably met with the hue and cry of the chattering class of the offended. It's a baseball tradition as big, perhaps bigger, than Take Me Out To The Ballgame or the midnight hue of Yankee blue.

"From the Gilded Age, the time when batters could no longer call their pitches, to the banning of the spitball, to lifting the color line, to expansion, to the 162-game schedule, to lowering the mound, to divisional baseball, to the designated hitter, to the expanded playoffs and the Wild Card, to interleague play, to steroid testing and meaningful penalties for offenders, to a pitch clock and the banning of the shift, baseball has never been able to snuff that percentage of its fan base which intractably holds on to the notion that the sport should never, ever fucking change. Much less? Make changes which may turn out for the better.

"The venting of spleen, the bitching and moaning, the boiled piss and vinegar? It has long fermented. The private papers of Bartholomew von Dodger, scion of the House of Dodger, a Gilded Age family that made it's fortune supplying cocaine to Coca-Cola, and the possible origination of the Dodgers nickname, had this all not been made up for a sports message board, offer insight into the minds of a certain sub-set of baseball fans, now and forever, from 1886 ..."

(Read in Peter Coyote's voice ...)
"Hurlers tossing whatever pitches they want? This gives me the morbs! Deception on an anarchic level! Batters will be mafficking in the streets when they find they can no longer pound Pud Galvin's whizzer-ball when they no longer know it's coming! Eegads! Next we'll have Papists running this grand old land! I suggestionize that we send those who conceived of this rule change back to Ireland, where this drunken folly no doubt had it's baleful origin."

(Back to McCullough ...)
"Since this is fake Ken Burns special made up for a message board, we inevitably turn to Doris Kearns Goodwin ..."

(Doris Kearns Goodwin)
"It all went to hell in a handbasket when my city had its rightful, blessed by divinity, birthright to have three teams. Stripped from us, like the tunics of Perpetua and Felicitus in Carthage! Thieves in the night! Gufs in the soul of baseball are missing! ..."

GIGANTIC RECORD SCRATCH

(Bubbler voice)
Yeah. It's me. You might know me from my supple ass and other delights. So you kind of get the point.

Every time baseball makes a change, people bitch, moan and say it's end of days. It never is. It almost certainly never will be.

Why is it that baseball is the only sport expected to stand still? Why is baseball's game theory considered to be sacrosanct above and beyond the entertainment factor it creates? Fuck that.

And, moreover, how many times have the vanguard of those who Must Protect Baseball (copyright) been dead-ass wrong? You could do a mini-series on how many times pedantic fuckers like Bob Costas have been wrong about changes that came to the game and what effect they'd have.

"Baseball was more pure with two/four (your generational mileage may vary) playoff teams!" Fuck that. I feel like I was ripped off in my youth. I don't hold any nostalgic candle to any of it.

No other sport is held to the same standard. You get one bad call in a NFL game and you have people wanting to install replay review over what they bought at concessions. The NBA literally made several defenses illegal for several generations to make the product better and then once game theory adjusted and it was no longer advantageous? They drop-kicked it into touch without a thought.

Baseball isn't sacred. It needs to be entertaining. I'm fine with what gets it there.

Big bases? OK, the image in my head is of some giganto Fischer-Price yellow plastic bases with an attached slip-and-slide or some shit. I really don't see the benefit and can do without bigger bases, but I'm also not ready to go all "let's burn the motherfucker down" about it either.

The pitch clock? About fucking time. Dicking around in baseball will never, ever be legislated by the participants. In fact? All manner of complete and utter nonsensical bullshit will be invented to justify why they do it when, frankly, they just don't want to change a time-honored habit. My dudes, people who rented porn at stores probably didn't like changing to the net either, but they figured it out, OK?

Then the shift. Good riddance. I mean good fucking fucking fucking fucking fucking riddance.

BUT IT'S STRATEGY!

Yes, quite, and if I were a manager? I'd shift the ever living fuck out of everyone if allowed to do so. They aren't the problem.

But I'm not a manager. I'm a fan. My interest isn't game theory. It's whether what I'm watching is remotely enjoyable to watch. The shift makes baseball boring as fuck.

So ban it. It's no different than the NFL liberalizing pass defense in 1978, or, the aforementioned illegal defense decision made by the NBA. If on-field strategy is making the product shit, then flush the shit.

Buh, buh, but, batters need to adjust!

For the guys out there, lemme run an experiment. Whatever hand you've jerked off with your whole life? Pretend your wife put a sort of chastity glove on it. Try it with your other hand. See how well you "adjust".

Sorry for the crude metaphor (not really), but batters have been trained to hit a certain way their whole lives. I can't believe there's people in our industry, who at least have some passing knowledge of how sports works and how difficult it is to play, suggest dumb-ass shit like, "Oh, they're lining up six fielders on one side to counter you. Fuck you! Hit the other way!" Too many people think it's as simple as betting on black instead of red. We know better. Fuck.

I'm all for these changes. My only regret is that Rob Manfred, the human embodiment of mood slime from Ghostbusters II, is the one who is carrying it through. You can't pick your agents for change, but I do not fear these changes. I embrace them.

Back to your regularly scheduled PBS program ...

 

These are all well-taken points. As rebuttal, I will only point out that the most change-resistant people in our society are probably baseball players.

 

Wait … you can’t go to your left?