The DH in the National League?

[Guest Mets Guy in Michigan]

http://www.si.com/mlb/2015/04/26/national-league-dh-washington-nationals-max-scherzer

Max Scherzer is the latest to raise the issue of the DH in the National League.

One one hand, as the differences between the leagues continue to melt away, it doesn't make sense to have this major rule difference.

But more importantly, why is it assumed -- and accepted -- that pitchers don't have the ability to hit? Why aren't pitchers working on their hitting as hard as players from the other positions? It certainly behooves a pitcher to hit decently. But there are DHs in college and the minors. Rather than create a position to excuse someone from hitting, wouldn't it be better to just have them work on their hitting? It's not like they're not great athletes and they have specialized skills -- but so does a shortstop, catcher and so on.

[TransMonk]

Max Scherzer is a baby.

Be a BASEBALL player, man! Do you not get paid enough to hit?

[Edgy MD]

Call me paranoid, but there seems to be a coordinated stealth campaign to soften the blow in preparation for a planned switch to DH-Ball. Craig Calcaterra just wrote an advocacy piece that amounted to "This isn't about Wainwright, but seriously, check out what happened to Wainwright."

Wainwright, of course, didn't hurt himself hitting, but jogging.

Be a BASEBALL player, man! Do you not get paid enough to hit?

This isn't a bad rallying point for a counter-campaign. You're a ballplayer. Show some professional pride.

Bartolo Colon is a disaster up there and you don't hear him whining.

[Guest d'Kong76]

There are a lot of people jumping on this bandwagon. For me, they
should get rid of the DH in the other league not look to bring it to the
real league.

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

Well, yeah. And people should be able to teleport. And livestock chickens should have, like, eight thighs and they should all be calorie free. I should be able to get drunk/sober/thin at will!

Of course, all of that is about as likely to happen as the abolition of the DH where it already exists.

[Guest d'Kong76]

You can't teleport??

[batmagadanleadoff]

LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr wrote: Well, yeah. And people should be able to teleport. And livestock chickens should have, like, eight thighs and they should all be calorie free. I should be able to get drunk/sober/thin at will!

Ironically, all those things will one day be possible.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Or maybe humans will have eight thighs and chickens will be able to teleport.

[Guest cooby]

I would like it. I have always liked it but I realize I am way in the minority (such as with the black jerseys)


On Edit: I would REALLY love to see interleague play go away, though.

[Frayed Knot]

Baseball players getting hurt while playing baseball is a lousy reason to insert rules that release them from playing certain aspects of baseball.
In this particular case, Wainwright's injury sounds like the same one as Ryan Howard's from a couple years back as was acquired in essentially the same way. Yet while Howard's injury was treated as just part of the risk of playing, there's a call to arms to alter the rules so as to ensure that even the possibility of that ever happening again to Wainwright and to anyone else who plays his position is quickly removed.


All that said, There's ZERO chance of it going away in the league it's already at. The Player's Union doesn't want to lose the job and the owners don't want existing contracts to older players to look worse than they already are. I fear the possibility of it becoming universal are much stronger than the reverse with a debate as to whether or not that makes it a better game never entering the discussion.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Here's my solution: Don't drop the DH suddenly, leaving owners stuck with contracts. Instead, say that the rule will expire in five years. Or eight years. Or ten. That leaves plenty of time to plan for the change. And to appease the union, expand the active roster from 25 players to 27. Or 28.

[Edgy MD]

And, as I try to discuss every time this issue comes around, is there really strong evidence that the DH works better for the players' interests?

[dgwphotography]

Unfortunately, true or not, that is the perception.

The DH makes the American League the equivalent of minor league baseball and beer league softball.

[Benjamin Grimm]

I think at most it helps 15 players each season. These would be guys who have full-time jobs, and earn the salary of a regular player, instead of the salary of a bench player. If the elimination of the DH was combined with the expansion of the roster to 27 players, that would create 60 new major leaguers, and 60 new union members.

[Ceetar]

I'm on board. I've given up hoping the pitcher's will actually taking hitting seriously. They don't. As amusing as Colon is to watch, he's hurting the Mets with the bat. (although small sample size this season he's actually helping) Pitchers openly joke about not being paid to hit.

They're not taking it seriously at any level. It gets worse and worse every year. It's so low right now that a truly innovative team would be training their pitchers to hit just because the adding value of all your pitchers even hitting .200 is significant.

Pitchers hitting is now like actually throwing the 4 balls for an intentional walk.

There is very little strategy difference even. Besides the bunting thing, which again, is because pitchers can't hit.

It's a couple of handfuls of decisions a year where it's truly a conundrum whether to give your pitcher another inning or pinch hit for him.

it makes the strategy tougher for the pitchers too. Instead of having holes to work around so you rarely have to get burned by the 8th or 9th guy, you legitimately have to pitch and figure out how to get guys out. There's no lull in the cycle.

[Benjamin Grimm]

I'd like them to delay this for another forty years or so. In 2055, I'll be 92 years old, and either dead or nearly dead. Either way, I won't have much baseball watching ahead of me, so they can do whatever they want.

National League games are far more interesting than American League games.

[ashie62]

I like the DH.

[ashie62]

Benjamin Grimm wrote: I'd like them to delay this for another forty years or so. In 2055, I'll be 92 years old, and either dead or nearly dead. Either way, I won't have much baseball watching ahead of me, so they can do whatever they want. National League games are far more interesting than American League games.

Depends on who you root for.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Ummm.... no.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

This Selig Era strategy of marketing the game by marketing the player led to all the crap about the Buster Posey Rules and I have no doubt that Wainwright will be the Tendon That Killed The Pitcher Hitting Once and For All.

I think it sucks but there's nobody out there who's going to stop this. What, you want snap poor Adam Wainwright's achilles?

[Guest themetfairy]

Eliminate the DH entirely. Make it real baseball again!

[Zvon]

Frayed Knot wrote: Baseball players getting hurt while playing baseball is a lousy reason to insert rules that release them from playing certain aspects of baseball.

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: This Selig Era strategy of marketing the game by marketing the player led to all the crap about the Buster Posey Rules and I have no doubt that Wainwright will be the Tendon That Killed The Pitcher Hitting Once and For All.

AllAdat^. Cept Wainwrights whining won't change it. It'll start a much louder debate.

[Edgy MD]

dgwphotography wrote: Unfortunately, true or not, that is the perception.

I tend to hope that perceptions have the potential to change following investigations into the facts, followed by cold and dispassionate revelation of the findings. The MLBPA, if no one else, has an abiding interest in being informed by data and not perception.

[Gwreck]

This is the first baseball rule change I can ever think of that could have a real, consequential diminishment of my love for the game (and would lead to spending far less of my money on it).

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

I'll ask again: Who is going to stop this?

The players? I'm certain would prefer the DH because it means more jobs and a perceived safer environment for pitchers.

The owners? I'm certain they would prefer more offense and wouldn't want to oppose the players on an issue they probably perceive as inconsequential in the big picture.

Managers? They'd also prefer more healthy pitchers, fewer second-guess decisions, and more home run hitters.

Commish? I'll bet the reason we're talking about it now is due to their at-best indifference and likely consensus-building effort toward enacting it everywhere.

Fans? While there's a lot like us who'd prefer more bench manuevering in a matter of taste, I'd guess we're badly outnumbered by dumber fans who only like offense and find the pitcher-hitting thing tedious.

Media? Seems like the "new breed" sees the DH as a relic of the game that interferes with the purity of matchups to analyze and are no friend to the old-school curmudgeons who'd argue for it to stay (I'm thinking the Bill Madden types who might be in favor of a DH for all we know, but whose general opinions index well with the burn-the-record-books old school type)

I suspect the non-DH is already dead, we just don't know it yet.

[Guest cooby]

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: Fans? While there's a lot like us who'd prefer more bench manuevering in a matter of taste, I'd guess we're badly outnumbered by dumber fans who only like offense and find the pitcher-hitting thing tedious. .

Dumb? Humph!
Anyway, yeah I do find pitcher hitting tedious, but mostly because they are so damn pathetic at it.

[Ceetar]

Considering I believe the only thing that has to happen (either for adding or removing) is simply the Commish to be all "Make it so" at the beginning of the season.

So seems rather inevitable, especially if offense continues to fall and be deemed a problem.

[Frayed Knot]

Ceetar wrote: Considering I believe the only thing that has to happen (either for adding or removing) is simply the Commish to be all "Make it so" at the beginning of the season.

He's a commissioner not a dictator and as such can neither make it happen unilaterally nor banish it.
This is an owners + players decision. The best Manfred, or his successor, can do is try to steer the argument.

[G-Fafif]

There's gotta be a Kevin Long for pitchers, a hitting coach whose sole brief would be to get these guys competent at this aspect of their job. One team does it and gains an edge and suddenly it's The New Market Efficiency and everybody will want in, including the pitchers who see hitting is possible for their breed.

As always, fuck the DH.

(Notice "Kevin Long" is framed here as a positive, at least through 19 games, probably the longest stretch of good vibes any hitting coach has generated here since we began noticing hitting coaches...which is usually only when things go wrong.)

[Frayed Knot]

Edgy MD wrote: And, as I try to discuss every time this issue comes around, is there really strong evidence that the DH works better for the players' interests?

I think it works well for a small cadre of high profile players [Papi, Pujols, Fielder, etc. - either permanently or in their near future] and the union tends to hear their voices louder than others and often to the exclusion of others as we saw with the steroid issue which was ignored for years for fear of offending the upper crust. The union's quite silent also on tobacco use even on the heels of Tony Gwynn's death.

But in the larger sense you're right. Even if the benefit thing ins't totally false argument it's at least one with a bunch of holes. The narrative usually goes that if there were no DH then baseball would have never known the likes of Edgar Martinez & David Ortiz. Sure we would have, they'd have been 1st basement; bad ones maybe, but of course they never had incentive to even try to get better so maybe not. And if their bad fielding DID diminish their overall careers then by definition it would have been to the benefit of the guy with the lesser offense but the more complete and balanced game. The DH does not now and never did CREATE a job, it merely alters the criteria for one of them.