Can we bring back steroids yet? Well, maybe that's not the best idea. But seriously, something has to be done. In general offense is down. Baseball has for a while become plagued with the 3 true outcomes: walk, strikeout, or a home run. It's part of what is making the game so boring to even long time fans. Well, that and dilly-dallying between pitches.
Who's the culprit? You have Major League Baseball's not so brilliant idea to remove the most exciting of the 3 true outcomes by deadening the baseball. That seems to have worked, although it may also be the new seams on the ball possibly improving pitcher's grip as strikeouts have increased to historic rates.
It could also be some teams are just taking a bad approach at the plate this year. Take my Brewers for example who are taking a ton of pitches only to rank near the top in strike outs, near the bottom in slugging and OBP, and in the middle of the road in walks. That may be a wider trend. The Brewers are a case-in-point to a
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| In over half their games this year, the Brewers or their opponents have scored 2 runs or less. |
And then, of course, there is the fact that some teams (my Brewers included) have looked noticeably worse on offense since the Astros/Red Sox sign stealing scandal broke and MLB made clear the severity of its enforcement to any team that is caught. Could it be that the bigger issue is that this was a more common issue than we outside the industry realize?
I'm not sure. The truth is it probably is a combination of these. But something has to happen. Should it be moving the mound back? It would probably have the desired effect of more contact and in-game action. But what will it do to breaking pitches? I imagine things might get a little Colorado Rockies really fast.
All I know is that after a Covid-shortened season, this was not the year to deaden the ball. All I know is baseball is back and boring as ever. And I love baseball. I love pitching duels. But when it becomes the norm it doesn't work. The excitement of a pitcher's duel is when it's out of the ordinary. That the game seems turned on its head and instead of being about a team stringing together hits it becomes about two guys on the mound. That's awesome. But that's not what baseball should always be. Because once high strikeouts and 1-0 games are no longer special, they become slow and lack energy. It's an uneventful game instead of a testament to two guys rising above the game.
I'm a baseball hungry fan, who felt starved last year like never before. Somebody start feeding me runs please.
But not artificial ones either. Yes I'm talking about the new runner on second extra inning rule. Anecdotally it doesn't seem to me to be helping speed up extra inning games. But it also feels like a genuine manipulation of the game itself. I hate-hate-hate the rule. Much like I hate-hate-hate 7-inning double headers (though I understand why we have them in the days of Covid, but please take them away next year). Seems pretty sucky that we'll never know if Madison Bungardner would've finished a no-no.
The point is it's hard to say what is killing the game faster: the way it's played or the rules that are meant to manipulate how it is currently being played. It means baseball has a real problem, and it might take more than a rule change to fix it.
But please, please, fix it soon!
