Baseball does have to adapt. But this doesn't accomplish anything towards that necessary adaptation. How many games lasted 12 innings last year?
True, but soccer shootouts suck. Players score over 70% of the time. So much for the “beautiful game.” Hockey shootouts are also bad, but far less bad (more like 30%). And I actually like reducing of the # of players on the ice In OT.
Tom Tango on twitter proposed the "I cut, you deal" idea. One team picks the base/out scenario, other team decides if they are hitting or in the field. Hitting team scores, they win.
How about removing one defensive player per team each inning after the 12th? (up to 3 or 4).
It's only the games that go more than 12 that I'd like to eliminate in the regular season. Stands are emptied out. Third rate bullpen guys are usually in there, especially if the game was a slugfest. Pitching depth of both sides affected the next few games the way the game is played these days.
This is exactly true for...just about everyone?
I think that the "baseball is too slow" argument has legs but maybe too many. It's okay for games to be slow but it's not okay if they are consistently stalled in a short period of time. For example, a pitcher throwing to first 5 times or a manager changing pitchers 3 times in a half inning. Those events make even the best fans sigh. Extra innings though, who cares? How does extra baseball reduce revenue or interest in the game? It sounds like a stupid way to reduce the average game time but not have any impact whatsoever on fan enjoyment of the product.
Chicago? Miami?
Yes! The real improvements come from improving the pace of routine play.
Yes. They're attacking the length of games citing audience attention span issues, yet the NFL's average game length is pretty much the same as MLB and they've got just as much dead time during the broadcasts as baseball does. What the NFL does have is assured game action every 30-40 seconds. Their pace is steadier.
And 30-40 seconds between pitches is way more problematic because almost every NFL play gets an immediate replay. Whereas most pitches aren’t worth replaying.
Correct. I've been watching a bunch of classic games from the 60s and 70s during our little global shitshow. The way pitchers keep throwing pitches and batters stay in the box between pitches feels like the whole thing.
I'm sure the money from those ticket sales will be shared with the players, right?
Oh, nice, this answers my question in the other thread about what if teams lose a lot of guys to injuries and/or Covid:
I don’t know... I mean, is this really news? 40 players have already tested positive. Not sure what the cutoff point is, but there seems to be a good measure of ’calculated risk‘ built into the equation.
Not sure this is the best example of "this season ain't happening". The player in question was at home, isolated from the team, and is asymptomatic. Sounds like whoever it is will be cleared to join the team for training camp when it opens.
Not to single your post out, but I keep saying this in regards to all sports. My question is, what indications do we have that this is going to be over by 2021? The way this is being handled (or more accurately ignored) at the federal level, we could be dealing with players testing positive for this for years. It’s easy to say ok just punt and we’ll see if everything is better in 2021, but there’s a good chance that it won’t be. They need to start figuring out how they can safely play games and generate whatever income that they can now, or teams are going to start folding in 2022 or 2023 when we’re on the 3rd or 4th ineffective vaccine that the FDA thinks “might be the one!”.
By the time baseball regular season rolls around in 2021, if there's no vaccine on the horizon, the only realistic solution will be herd immunity with hopefully improved treatment protocols. Not a popular opinion, but also one that reflects the reality of the situation. But trying to get a season in 2020 was always going to be challenging, and the resurgence of cases in the south and west will make it more challenging.
Poll numbers indicate 2021 may usher in a change at the top of the federal government. Also, with each passing day, more best practice info emerges from other leagues like Bundesliga who are active and successfully dealing with it. It may not be over when pitchers and catchers report in February, but we should be a heck of lot smarter by then.
I agree that there are plenty of best practice info that can be gleaned from the numerous sports leagues that are up and running in other countries. I honestly have no concerns at all about protocols on the field for North American leagues. It's entirely the off-field stuff that is the issue. It's impossible to isolate the sports participants (players, coaches, officials, etc) from the rest of society for the length of the season, and it's the rest of society that poses all the dangers.
They're trying to keep the players relatively quarantined from the outside world anyways, right?
So would this work like waivers protocol or just first come, first serve? Like fantasy, after you pick someone up, you move to back of the line?
That article I linked is literally all I have seen about it, but presumably first come, first serve I'd think.
MLB seems to be having a tough enough time working out how the Blue Jays are going to be able to go back and forth as needed. Can't imagine they'd move another team over the border.
Not to belabor - as you note, we don't know much right now, so I'm just espousing - but it brings up a lot of questions. Is it only for COVID positive players that need to be quarantined? Can they use it if their 1B blows his knee out? What happens when a player returns? I'm just wondering if there's hazard to essentially using it as a taxi squad.
They are not even sure if MLB is going to be involved yet, it`s being negotiated. They are going to do it with or without MLB. So I would think it would be regarded as any Indy League.
They're all hopeful. Though with the trends in the virus spread, if any city could get away with it, it might be Boston. Certainly better odds than, say, Phoenix. I'd still bet on the league shutting back down before we get to opportunities for fans to enter stadiums.
Chase had a lot more experience with distancing though. Good luck trying that in Fenway grandstands
