Has baseball become boring?

[Guest 41Forever]

George Will has some interesting thoughts, and Keith and Gary were opining along similar lines a while ago. Too many strikeouts, too many home runs and too much shifting, he says.

The solution? Do nothing and let things work out on their own.

https://nypost.com/2018/07/15/mlb-may-be-broken-but-better-not-to-fix-it/

[Edgy MD]

Yes, it has become boring, and I agree that the market should answer, but I don't say "do nothing."

Let loose the artificial market restraints. End the draft. End the caps on bonuses to foreign players. End the the anti-trust exemption. End the equal shares in the merchandising pool. End the absurd and anti-American practice of territorial exclusivity. End affiliation. End exclusive rights to call yourself a major league franchise.

Go, free market, go!

[Ceetar]

Simply put? no.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Edgy MD wrote: Yes, it has become boring, and I agree that the market should answer, but I don't say "do nothing." Let loose the artificial market restraints. End the draft. End the caps on bonuses to foreign players. End the the anti-trust exemption. End the equal shares in the merchandising pool. End the absurd and anti-American practice of territorial exclusivity. End affiliation. End exclusive rights to call yourself a major league franchise. Go, free market, go!

I think I agree with all or most of that, but I'm not sure that it would make the game as it's played on the field any less boring.

And for the record, I don't think the game has become boring, but I do think that it's moved a notch or two towards boring on the "boring-to-interesting" scale.

[Centerfield]

Edgy MD wrote: End the absurd and anti-American practice of territorial exclusivity. End affiliation. End exclusive rights to call yourself a major league franchise. Go, free market, go!

How would this work? I build a stadium, order uniforms, and declare myself an MLB team?

[Benjamin Grimm]

Is there anything preventing an upstart league, like the USFL or the Federal League, from forming and calling itself a "major league"? I understand that there are practical matters that would make it hard to succeed, but I don't think there's any legal barrier to doing so. Wasn't that what the Continental League was all about in the early 1960s?

[Edgy MD]

Centerfield wrote: Edgy MD wrote: End the absurd and anti-American practice of territorial exclusivity. End affiliation. End exclusive rights to call yourself a major league franchise. Go, free market, go! How would this work? I build a stadium, order uniforms, and declare myself an MLB team?

Well, in my mind, you can do that already, but you would get frozen out of markets and broadcast opportunities by MLB, and certainly frozen out of opportunities to play other MLB teams.

The answer, though it's not popular, is to allow champions of lesser leagues to be promoted and last-place teams in greater leagues to be relegated. Competition would be fierce. Interest would be piqued in every hamlet across the nation. Players who play for peanuts now even though their talents and circumstances have left them just out side of the major league pool would suddenly have fierce competition for their services.

And teams who are on the verge of being relegated sure as hell won't shrug their shoulders and refuse to steal home when the opposition moves the thirdbaseman closer to second.

Competition! Baseball!

[Benjamin Grimm]

Yeah, the relegation idea doesn't appeal to me at all. I think that's how they'd lose me.

[Edgy MD]

You'll love it. I promise.

[Benjamin Grimm]

The first year that the Mets are in AAA, I'm gone. I'm sure of it.

Their grip on me is already loosening. I haven't seen a single pitch, live or in replay, in about two months.

[Edgy MD]

All the more reason you'll love it.

[metirish]

I read that IN a George Will voice .....anyway, I love watching teams that play "small ball" , are there any teams that do? the Mets certainly don't under this regime.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

The game will survive this era, I'm pretty sure.

I'm generally not in favor of looking at the game as played today and adding to it to make it more "exciting" but I am certain strategies will evolve. It takes time though.

Edgy's changes are oK with me but very unrealistic given what's at $take. At least until baseball gets shoved with a rival league, which has happened before and will happen again.

I am on record with 1 radical suggestion and that is to consider 7 inning games as an alternative to gimmicking up extra innings. Could solve a lot of other problems as well (length of games, wear and tear on pitchers primarily).

[Benjamin Grimm]

Edgy MD wrote: All the more reason you'll love it.

I don't think so. Triple-A Mets games won't have any meaning to me, and I won't watch them.

I guess you're saying that I'd be watching the 2018 games out of fear that the Mets would be relegated, and that may be true. But once they were dropped, I'm certain I'd be gone.

[Vic Sage]

we're going thru an adjustment period, as players and management are adjusting to what we're learning from analytics. The computer age has improved defensive positioning and hitters have not yet responded to it. They want a rule change to save them rather than "hitting them where they ain't", which has always been an important dictum in the game. So it'll suck for a while. But eventually GMs will catch on to the new "efficiency"... guys who can hit it the other way. We've already seen a decline in the value of 1-dimensional sluggers. A bunch of them were FAs over the winter and few of them got the kind of deals that HR/RBI counting stats used to command (except for the Mets, of course. Welcome back, Jay Bruce!)

So, as teams start going back to finding players who can actually get on base by putting balls in play, more hitters will start hitting that way, and the defensive shifts will become less prevalent. And once again we'll find baseball lineups with a balance of table setters and sluggers, which has always been the most reliable way of scoring consistently.

A rule change is an overreaction to this transitional period.

[Vic Sage]

Benjamin Grimm wrote: Edgy MD wrote: All the more reason you'll love it. I don't think so. Triple-A Mets games won't have any meaning to me, and I won't watch them. I guess you're saying that I'd be watching the 2018 games out of fear that the Mets would be relegated, and that may be true. But once they were dropped, I'm certain I'd be gone.

Don't worry about it Benjy, It can't happen here. Owners that have paid billions for franchises won't allow a system that will suddenly destroy their investments, while simultaneously exploding the prices of AAA teams beyond the means of many of the markets in which they play now.

[smg58]

Outlawing the shift would make as much sense as the NFL outlawing running backs by committee.

[Centerfield]

Vic Sage wrote: we're going thru an adjustment period, as players and management are adjusting to what we're learning from analytics. The computer age has improved defensive positioning and hitters have not yet responded to it. They want a rule change to save them rather than "hitting them where they ain't", which has always been an important dictum in the game. So it'll suck for a while. But eventually GMs will catch on to the new "efficiency"... guys who can hit it the other way. We've already seen a decline in the value of 1-dimensional sluggers. A bunch of them were FAs over the winter and few of them got the kind of deals that HR/RBI counting stats used to command (except for the Mets, of course. Welcome back, Jay Bruce!) So, as teams start going back to finding players who can actually get on base by putting balls in play, more hitters will start hitting that way, and the defensive shifts will become less prevalent. And once again we'll find baseball lineups with a balance of table setters and sluggers, which has always been the most reliable way of scoring consistently. A rule change is an overreaction to this transitional period.

I believe this will happen too. I'm shocked that it hasn't already.

I don't know how fans of other teams feel, but I feel like the Mets are actually doing the opposite. The book on Conforto was that he could hit to all fields. And when he first came up, he dazzled with his opposite field power.

It's only after he arrived at the big leagues that he started getting pull-happy. And I can't help but wonder if that is what is being taught on this club. Nimmo, Dom Smith...all these guys have the potential to hit to all fields. I can't understand for the life of me why they can't do so.

[Edgy MD]

Vic Sage wrote: Benjamin Grimm wrote: Edgy MD wrote: All the more reason you'll love it. I don't think so. Triple-A Mets games won't have any meaning to me, and I won't watch them. I guess you're saying that I'd be watching the 2018 games out of fear that the Mets would be relegated, and that may be true. But once they were dropped, I'm certain I'd be gone. Don't worry about it Benjy, It can't happen here. Owners that have paid billions for franchises won't allow a system that will suddenly destroy their investments, while simultaneously exploding the prices of AAA teams beyond the means of many of the markets in which they play now.

I wouldn't ever say "can't" but yeah, I agree that their interest are sorely aligned against this.

But I've discovered a new, radical seed growing in me, since sometime around the time that guy got booted kicking and screaming off the plane. It's a mantra that sticks with me, and it goes, "The corporation doesn't always have to win."

[ashie62]

It would feel less boring if the Mets were winning.

Hoops has become strong competition amongst people of color for fans.

More white people at a ballgame than maga rally.

[Lefty Specialist]

It's only boring if you're losing. The last two months of 2015 were the most exciting baseball I've ever watched, period.

[bmfc1]

It's not boring to this kid: http://www.chicagotribune.com/lifestyles/stevens/ct-life-stevens-sunday-baseball-schedule-collection-0716-story.html

[G-Fafif]

"Only boring people are bored."
--Betty Draper

[RealityChuck]

The fundamental fallacy behind the "baseball is boring" is the assumption that action is what makes a game interesting.

Baseball has never been about action. It's all about suspense. Each pitch raises hope. Will it be a ball? Will it be a strike? If the ball is hit, where is it going? If there are men on base, the suspense is even greater.

Too many strikeouts? No one complained when Tom Seaver struck out ten in a row.

[G-Fafif]

RealityChuck wrote: No one complained when Tom Seaver struck out ten in a row.

Well, maybe the Padres...

[Edgy MD]

I disagree that balls in play don't make baseball interesting. They involve more people, more skills, more decision, more risk, more physical and mental and emotional drama. They also involve more geometry! They demand that we include a more diverse and interesting set of people in the game.

As for Tom Seaver, what made his feat remarkable was it's rarity. It no longer is. The Red Sox struck out 11 in a row in 2016, and the feat didn't even lead the game stories the next day.

Dwight Gooden, who mythologized the letter K in baseball, struck out 7.8 batters per nine during his Mets tenure. This season, if he was a Met, that number would rank him here:

1) Jacob deGrom: 10.9
2) Noah Syndergaard: 10.2
3) Jeurys Familia: 9.5
4) Seth Lugo: 9.4
5) Paul Sewald: 9.2
6) Zack Wheeler: 8.9
7) Robert Gsellman: 8.3
8) Steven Matz: 8.0
9) Dwight Gooden: 7.8
10) Jason Vargas: 7.6

That's just among pitchers with 35 or more innings pitched. If we take everybody, he'd also be behind A.J. Ramos, Anthony Swarzak, Hansel Robles, Tim Peterson, Buddy Baumann, and Scott Copeland.

If the game is played exclusively at the extremes, we lose a ton of nuance of what used to be the real game in between.

I find it hard to dispute that fans are growing disconnected. Here, there, and everywhere.

[Guest d'Kong76]

Edgy MD wrote: I find it hard to dispute that fans are growing disconnected. Here, there, and everywhere.

I don't think anyone is disputing that. That doesn't make it boring.

I don't find baseball boring at all. I watch every Mets game and when I can't
I watch Mets Fast Forward or FF through a DVR of the game when I can. I have
a TV in my computer room and if there's a game on in the afternoon it's more
than likely it's on instead of one of the news/business channels. If I can't sleep,
I have a west coast game on many nights.

My biggest beef/frustration is professional baseball players can't or won't (??)
execute their way around the rampant use of the shift. It's doubly frustrating
when Joey Ballguy tries to still pull an outside pitch instead of slapping it the
other way or just deadening/bunting it to a large empty hole in the field. If
players would all do that for a week the shift would largely go away imo.

[Edgy MD]

I certainly agree.

Maybe that's what killed Rusty Staub.

[G-Fafif]

The shift does suck when it's deployed relentlessly and successfully against the Mets. On Saturday, when Cabrera poked a ground ball past where a third baseman might have been stationed, I said to my companion that the hair just went up on the arms of a million middle-aged men delighted to see the shift beaten.

[Ceetar]

d'Kong76 wrote: Edgy MD wrote: I find it hard to dispute that fans are growing disconnected. Here, there, and everywhere. I don't think anyone is disputing that. That doesn't make it boring.

Oh, I'm disputing that. That's very much in dispute.