Hello everyone and welcome back to Ramble Sport! Today I'm following up on my last post, Fixing Major League Baseball, Part 1. You can read that, if you haven't already, by clicking Here. Before we get into Part 2, I have to say I was really inspired to get off my butt and write this by last weekends Dodgers v Padres series. In Part 1, most of my changes called for a realignment that would shift MLB's focus heavily to rivalries, a la college sports, with a reduced schedule to prevent burn out, like what happens right now with Yankees v Red Sox. Anyway, check out this video of Hunter Renfroe's walk off Grand Slam. Full house, fans from both teams, Padres avoid the sweep in a series with a rival 2 hours down the interstate that they should have swept themselves. Look at the crowd, the passion, the excitement, and imagine that over an entire season... Wow. Straight up chills watching that. Now, the first thing I want to fix in Part 2 is the 'Unwritten Rules.' You flip the bat or admire your HR, you get plunked. Act like you've been here before! How about you act like you've pitched before, eh? Take this video of the Royals v White Sox confrontation from last month. This is just dumb. Grown men arguing over crap like this is not just dumb, it's a bad look for the sport and society in general. But I won't get into cultural ethics here. Now, let's look at Korean Baseball and how they do and handle things like bat flips. I thought about starting the video at the bat flip part, but this whole thing demands to be watched by American Baseball fans. This is just way, way more fun looking. Anyway, these are grown men, playing a kids game for a living, and they seem to actually remember that and not take things so seriously. So, bye bye unwritten rules! You plunk a guy after a bat flip or admiring stare, or plunk a guy who plunked your guy, you're ejected, fined, and miss games. If you're a reliever, no next start for you, and no workouts either. Reliever? You miss 5 games and no work outs. Repeat offenders get 5 additional games or an additional start every time they repeat.
Now, next up is a fix that I think is happening within the next year or two based on this past off season and the MLBPA actually being willing to discuss it for this year: the universal DH. Dude, it's time. Beyond time. Nothing like seeing an NL team putting a run together in the early innings. Runners at second and third, 2 outs, a chance to score more...and there's the pitcher for a feeble strikeout. Be gone, batting pitcher. Be gone. One bit of feedback I got from a reader to Part 1 ties in neatly to this. He mentioned fewer games messes with the stats of the great hitters. 'What could he have done with more games?' A universal DH actually helps address this. 20 fewer games per season means 20 days in which you can't get injured, and can rest to reduce chance of injury during the other 142 games. In 7 years, you've actually rested the equivalent of an entire season, or 2 season over 14 years. Now, a universal DH in my alternate universe of a 32 team MLB means there are 16 new jobs for talented hitters of all ages. Now the Pirates have Melky Cabrera raking from the DH spot every day. What a dream that would be! Older players whose skills on the field are declining, but skills with a bat are staying consistent, have more homes. And with fewer games to reduce their career length through potential injury, they could actually potentially play more seasons, both because of less wear and tear and the addition of a DH to the National League. Next up, game length. Institute the Mercy Rule. In the World Baseball Classic, if you're up by 10 runs and the trailing team has completed 7 innings, it's game over. It makes too much sense to institute this guys. The odds of rallying from 10 down in baseball are so small that games this lopsided see stadiums empty, field players pitch, and are generally a waste of time. Stop it. Mercy Rule is now in effect. Relief Pitchers. I've got no problem with specialists. None. But this changing of 3 pitchers an inning is getting ridiculous. Either make relievers face a minimum of 2 batters per appearance, or stop letting them warm up on the mound. I mean really, warming up the mound? What the heck is the bullpen for? Same with starters. Let them go the bullpen between innings to stay loose if they want, but no more warming up the mound. Get on with it already! Lastly, some fun changes for fans that I think will help loosen things up and get more people to games. No more noon or afternoon games during the week. Fans have to work! Our PTO is precious. We can't just leave at 12:00 for a 12:45 first pitch. You're outta here! Big league teams work with local little leagues to have 'Free Little Leaguer Fridays' once a month. All the players from the local league can get in free if wearing their gear, coaches, parents and families 50% off. Special pricing for students. Have a valid, up to date student ID? Your ticket and parking are always 50% off because we want you at the game, eating our food, becoming a fan! Lastly, drop the price of concessions already! We all know how much hot dogs cost per unit. Stop treating me like I'm ignorant and charging me $3.00 when I could buy 2 to 3 PACKS for that price. If you're stuff was affordable, more people would buy it, which means you'd sell more, which means you'd make more money. It's really easy. Oh, and this has always been a fantasy of mine. For Spring Training, the World Series winner actually plays in Champions League style tournament against the winners of the other big baseball leagues, Korea, Japan, and Taiwan. This means in the Spring the Boston Red Sox would have been playing in a tournament against SK Wyverns of Korea, Sultanes De Monterrey of Mexico, and Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks of Japan. A tournament like this exposes American fans and teams to international baseball teams and players, and vice versa, helping the game to grow globally. Who knows what kind of quality players we might get to see? And that's it for Fixing Major League Baseball. Let me know what you think in the comments. Until next time!
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