I’m as much of a traditionalist as there can be in baseball. But I think we have to be open to some significant and potentially even radical rule changes to address these major issues in order save and advance the game.
C'mon, now. The game has literally never been more popular worldwide. This "save the game" nonsense simply comes from Cleveland fans frustrated by two weeks of baseball in April. Good lord. Wake me up in August when pitchers are on fumes and we see offenses raking like crazy. What is wrong with us? We can't stand a couple of weeks of adversity and immediately wholesale changes to the basic game need to take place? The game has always been a long, drawn-out sport with balances that need to be carefully watched, but not overreacted to. I've always said that it wasn't just the lowering of the mound that changed things in 1969, but the huge expansion which brought many more mediocre arms into the sport. Trust me, by the end of this year, we're going to see MANY mediocre arms trying to get out hitters who have finally warmed up. Anyone who watched that 13-12 Twins-A's game or that absurd 9-8 Rays-Royals game or the 16 runs the Cubs hung on the Mets, all on the same day, should start to realize what the future holds for this season, and it ain't pitchers dominating the hitters.
I just laugh when people point to the NBA and NFL as brilliant "keepers of the sport" because their sport is allegedly so popular. First, there is a sameness to those sports now that has made them entirely uninteresting compared to their previous iterations, all in the hope of attracting the adenaline junkies who consume and move on looking for their next hit. The NBA has completely abandoned any semblance of mid range game; if it's not at the rim or a three, it's a worthless possession. The game is launch or dunk, possession after possession. THAT'S not boring? No one cares about regular season basketball. No one. But there's also no one fretting about the future of the sport, like shifts cause people to do in baseball.
As for the NFL, jeez, that sport is so flawed because of its main premise--knock the guy carrying the ball into next Tuesday--that they've had to legislate safety in to the game to such a degree that it is an over-officiated, QB-obsessed mess of a sport. It's flag football on steroids; you can't touch a wide receiver or hit anyone or even have kickoff returns! There's no running game to speak of, no halfbacks or fullbacks or flankers, just five wide, play after play after play. And do you think that sport has a future among American families who want to see their sons stay healthy?
And don't get me even started on soccer, a sport which can't even generate a box score worth looking at.
There's no rule that says baseball has to be popular. There's no rule that says the sport has to make gobs of money or have a multitude of eyeballs watching it. The only people who fret about things like that are MLB poobahs and fans with short attention spans. Go to the Mississippi State-Mississippi series like a good friend of mine did over the weekend, where the stands were completely packed, barbeque pits lined the outfield fence, and fans were loving baseball. No one was sitting there wringing their hands over freakin' shifts.
Listen, I get it, I understand why people today don't like watching pitchers hit. But it's only because we've told them for years that they shouldn't bother to learn. I'm so grateful I got to see complete players like Bob Gibson and Earl Wilson and Don Drysdale hit, to see pitchers who had an edge on their opponents because they could do something with the bat, even if was an expertise with small skills like laying down a bunt. It was a separator and kept the game from having a sameness to it. We knew that when you got to the bottom of the order, decisions needed to be made, and maybe defenses would have to be ready to do something a little different. OK, you don't like that, I get it, but I did. I don't moan and groan about it, I accept the way the game is today, but I'll miss not seeing a Bartolo Colon miracle once in awhile, or watch Triston McKenzie line a single to right when Jake Bauers can't. That's just me. But please don't tell me my version of boring is worse than yours.
Because, frankly, I reject the idea that baseball HAS to be broadly popular. That just means to me it needs to be a homogenized mess, full of rules changes to appease the masses who don't care about the sport in the first place. It's funny, the most exciting game of the year so far was Lucas Giolito vs Shane Bieber that had everyone talking about how stupid it was to end a glorious game like that with the with the silly 10th inning rule. We think we know what a game needs, but we don't really. And it sure as hell ISN'T what MLB thinks it needs, because baseball is NOT the major leagues, it's much, much bigger than that, and if you can't see what's going on in other countries with the sport and how it is catching on because it's a great game, I can't help you.
