5/2 Cubs already beating the Reds

[Derwood]

Baseball games being too horsefeathering long is definitely a problem, but this isn't really a fix for that. But it's fine whatever...until they get a horsefeathering pitch clock, they won't actually fix horsefeathers.

 

They’re mostly too long to people who don’t actually like baseball. It’s like saying that soccer games are too low scoring; that’s part of the game.

 

The only REAL way to shorten games would be fewer commercial breaks, but that’s never going to happen

[Cubswin11]

Yeah the extra inning rule is really dumb. I’d rather they play with the old rule and then just have ties after 11-12 innings or something than this. I don’t really get the point, I don’t find it adding excitement and it doesn’t make games go quicker overall.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

The extra innings rule is solving a problem that does not exist, and solves it in the least useful way possible by enticing teams to play for 1 run with a “get him over, get him in” approach. It deserves our derision and scorn and nothing else.

[Bryants Disco Ball]

Yeah the extra inning rule is really dumb. I’d rather they play with the old rule and then just have ties after 11-12 innings or something than this. I don’t really get the point, I don’t find it adding excitement and it doesn’t make games go quicker overall.

 

I was going to say the same exact thing. You play the 10th and 11th and if still tied, you get a tie.

[Irrelevant Dude]

Yeah the extra inning rule is really dumb. I’d rather they play with the old rule and then just have ties after 11-12 innings or something than this. I don’t really get the point, I don’t find it adding excitement and it doesn’t make games go quicker overall.

 

I was going to say the same exact thing. You play the 10th and 11th and if still tied, you get a tie.

I hate the idea of a tie just as much, if not more, than putting a runner on second base. But why not compromise... if the game is still tied after the 12th, go ahead and put a runner on second base. Still not ideal, but it allows 3 extra innings for a "true" finish, while also all but eliminating the possibility of a 16-17 inning marathon.

[NOLA]

Yeah the extra inning rule is really dumb. I’d rather they play with the old rule and then just have ties after 11-12 innings or something than this. I don’t really get the point, I don’t find it adding excitement and it doesn’t make games go quicker overall.

 

I was going to say the same exact thing. You play the 10th and 11th and if still tied, you get a tie.

I hate the idea of a tie just as much, if not more, than putting a runner on second base. But why not compromise... if the game is still tied after the 12th, go ahead and put a runner on second base. Still not ideal, but it allows 3 extra innings for a "true" finish, while also all but eliminating the possibility of a 16-17 inning marathon.

I’ve long thought this was the right spot to land.

[Sammy Sofa]

Baseball games being too horsefeathering long is definitely a problem, but this isn't really a fix for that. But it's fine whatever...until they get a horsefeathering pitch clock, they won't actually fix horsefeathers.

 

They’re mostly too long to people who don’t actually like baseball. It’s like saying that soccer games are too low scoring; that’s part of the game.

 

The only REAL way to shorten games would be fewer commercial breaks, but that’s never going to happen

 

No, baseball games ARE significantly longer, and it's mostly due to delays caused by pitching bull horsefeathers. I remember seeing several breakdowns comparing games from within the last 10 years to games from the 90's and 80's, and the commercial time difference was minimal. The biggest difference, by far, in terms of something they could actually (and pretty easily) do something about was the time taken by pitchers between pitches and batters. It often added something like an extra 20 minutes or more per game.

 

Unleash the horsefeathering pitch clock.

[Derwood]

Baseball games being too horsefeathering long is definitely a problem, but this isn't really a fix for that. But it's fine whatever...until they get a horsefeathering pitch clock, they won't actually fix horsefeathers.

 

They’re mostly too long to people who don’t actually like baseball. It’s like saying that soccer games are too low scoring; that’s part of the game.

 

The only REAL way to shorten games would be fewer commercial breaks, but that’s never going to happen

 

No, baseball games ARE significantly longer, and it's mostly due to delays caused by pitching bull horsefeathers. I remember seeing several breakdowns comparing games from within the last 10 years to games from the 90's and 80's, and the commercial time difference was minimal. The biggest difference, by far, in terms of something they could actually (and pretty easily) do something about was the time taken by pitchers between pitches and batters. It often added something like an extra 20 minutes or more per game.

 

Unleash the horsefeathering pitch clock.

 

I’m down with a pitch clock. But announcers were bitching about slow pitching back in the 90’s

[Sammy Sofa]

 

They’re mostly too long to people who don’t actually like baseball. It’s like saying that soccer games are too low scoring; that’s part of the game.

 

The only REAL way to shorten games would be fewer commercial breaks, but that’s never going to happen

 

No, baseball games ARE significantly longer, and it's mostly due to delays caused by pitching bull horsefeathers. I remember seeing several breakdowns comparing games from within the last 10 years to games from the 90's and 80's, and the commercial time difference was minimal. The biggest difference, by far, in terms of something they could actually (and pretty easily) do something about was the time taken by pitchers between pitches and batters. It often added something like an extra 20 minutes or more per game.

 

Unleash the horsefeathering pitch clock.

 

I’m down with a pitch clock. But announcers were bitching about slow pitching back in the 90’s

 

And it's just gotten even slower since.

[Cubswin11]

Baseball games being too horsefeathering long is definitely a problem, but this isn't really a fix for that. But it's fine whatever...until they get a horsefeathering pitch clock, they won't actually fix horsefeathers.

 

They’re mostly too long to people who don’t actually like baseball. It’s like saying that soccer games are too low scoring; that’s part of the game.

 

The only REAL way to shorten games would be fewer commercial breaks, but that’s never going to happen

 

No, baseball games ARE significantly longer, and it's mostly due to delays caused by pitching bull horsefeathers. I remember seeing several breakdowns comparing games from within the last 10 years to games from the 90's and 80's, and the commercial time difference was minimal. The biggest difference, by far, in terms of something they could actually (and pretty easily) do something about was the time taken by pitchers between pitches and batters. It often added something like an extra 20 minutes or more per game.

 

Unleash the horsefeathering pitch clock.

There’s no doubt games have gotten longer and pitch clock would make them faster to some degree, but does that matter/affect anything like viewership or games being more watchable? Is there some large group of people out there if games, on average, go down 6-20 min are suddenly going to start watching games or attending them in meaningful numbers? I don’t know the answer and would interested to see what info they have that it would matter or not matter. NFL games are long as horsefeathers and there’s literally 30-40 seconds of downtime before any action, baseball inherently is going to have down time between action and no action. MLB game length doesn’t really matter to me.

 

A pitch clock could also bring injury risk in, potentially, obviously a study would have to be done. But forcing guys to throw when they aren’t ready or like in a 20+ inning within a set amount of time could have health/fatigue affects.

[mias_tisg]

The real solution to cutting time of games is to cut the commercial in between half innings. Get on the field and pitch after a few warmups. But we know Manfred will never look into cutting that.

[Bryants Disco Ball]

Yeah the extra inning rule is really dumb. I’d rather they play with the old rule and then just have ties after 11-12 innings or something than this. I don’t really get the point, I don’t find it adding excitement and it doesn’t make games go quicker overall.

 

I was going to say the same exact thing. You play the 10th and 11th and if still tied, you get a tie.

I hate the idea of a tie just as much, if not more, than putting a runner on second base. But why not compromise... if the game is still tied after the 12th, go ahead and put a runner on second base. Still not ideal, but it allows 3 extra innings for a "true" finish, while also all but eliminating the possibility of a 16-17 inning marathon.

 

That's a really solid idea.

[CubinNY]

baseball's problems have little to do with the product on the field and almost solely to do with the lack of marketing the game to kids (especially black kids), ticket prices, blackout restrictions, and cartoon villianish ownership of teams. The solutions to what ales baseball will never be looked at by the people in baseball

[Sammy Sofa]

 

They’re mostly too long to people who don’t actually like baseball. It’s like saying that soccer games are too low scoring; that’s part of the game.

 

The only REAL way to shorten games would be fewer commercial breaks, but that’s never going to happen

 

No, baseball games ARE significantly longer, and it's mostly due to delays caused by pitching bull horsefeathers. I remember seeing several breakdowns comparing games from within the last 10 years to games from the 90's and 80's, and the commercial time difference was minimal. The biggest difference, by far, in terms of something they could actually (and pretty easily) do something about was the time taken by pitchers between pitches and batters. It often added something like an extra 20 minutes or more per game.

 

Unleash the horsefeathering pitch clock.

There’s no doubt games have gotten longer and pitch clock would make them faster to some degree, but does that matter/affect anything like viewership or games being more watchable? Is there some large group of people out there if games, on average, go down 6-20 min are suddenly going to start watching games or attending them in meaningful numbers? I don’t know the answer and would interested to see what info they have that it would matter or not matter. NFL games are long as horsefeathers and there’s literally 30-40 seconds of downtime before any action, baseball inherently is going to have down time between action and no action. MLB game length doesn’t really matter to me.

 

A pitch clock could also bring injury risk in, potentially, obviously a study would have to be done. But forcing guys to throw when they aren’t ready or like in a 20+ inning within a set amount of time could have health/fatigue affects.

 

In regards to the last part....tough horsefeathers. If a pitch clock is the difference between a pitcher staying healthy or not, then he's just not cut out to be a professional pitcher.

 

As for the rest: it's just part of the larger problem of how baseball has had a long simmering problem of being terrible at attracting new fans, and just being a viable form of entertainment in the current landscape. If it was something someone was coming up with now it would be laughed out of every room, and rightly so. The games are too long and too slow, they eat up WAY too much programming time (which has lead to it being walled off via a TOTALLY SUSTAINABLE bubble of what essentially amounts to premium cable channels to watch the horsefeathering games; great model to hitch your wagon to, guys), there's way too horsefeathering many of them, the game itself has next to no bankable/recognizable faces or personalities, there's too many teams and too many of them are run like strip mall businesses that are willing to settle for cheap mediocrity in the hopes they stumble into penny-pinching competitive season or two each decade, and the action is too brief and goes through too many prolonged periods where it's dominated by pitching, which just exacerbates almost all of these issues to an unbearable degree.

 

Comparing it to football is a non-starter: I despise football, but acting like they're comparable in terms of watchability and player recognition is laughable. Football is infinitely easier to market, watch, follow, blah-blah-blah. I'd take baseball a million times over football, but the bottom line is that's almost actively designed at this point to not draw in new fans.

 

And I don't know what the answer is. Stuff like adding the DH or lowering the mound or shortening the season or expanding the playoffs or, IMO, all good ideas, but they're Band-Aids on a head wound. Baseball, as it stands, is not designed for long term sustainability (at its current level) with the way we (and especially younger audiences) consume media and sports.

[Irrelevant Dude]

I guess we're doing split 7-inning doubleheaders now. How stupid is that? I don't know if fans with tickets have any recourse, but I wouldn't want to make the trip to Wrigley for a single 7-inning game.

[Cubswin11]

I guess we're doing split 7-inning doubleheaders now. How stupid is that? I don't know if fans with tickets have any recourse, but I wouldn't want to make the trip to Wrigley for a single 7-inning game.

No idea how the tickets work but think they kept the 7-inning DH thing to help limit pitcher innings/fatigue off the shortened year.

[Irrelevant Dude]

I guess we're doing split 7-inning doubleheaders now. How stupid is that? I don't know if fans with tickets have any recourse, but I wouldn't want to make the trip to Wrigley for a single 7-inning game.

No idea how the tickets work but think they kept the 7-inning DH thing to help limit pitcher innings/fatigue off the shortened year.

 

But they have no problem making players sit around at the ballpark all day to get that extra gate.

[Cubswin11]

I guess we're doing split 7-inning doubleheaders now. How stupid is that? I don't know if fans with tickets have any recourse, but I wouldn't want to make the trip to Wrigley for a single 7-inning game.

No idea how the tickets work but think they kept the 7-inning DH thing to help limit pitcher innings/fatigue off the shortened year.

 

But they have no problem making players sit around at the ballpark all day to get that extra gate.

The game was a 6:30 start and they called it before 5. Don’t think any fans would’ve been inside yet (fans aren’t allowed in more than 1 hour before first pitch as far as I know, that was the rule in Milwaukee when I went a few weeks ago). And I’m sure a lot of guys would’ve been at the park anyways today to get some work/treatment/whatever in, game or no game.

[Irrelevant Dude]

No idea how the tickets work but think they kept the 7-inning DH thing to help limit pitcher innings/fatigue off the shortened year.

 

But they have no problem making players sit around at the ballpark all day to get that extra gate.

The game was a 6:30 start and they called it before 5. Don’t think any fans would’ve been inside yet. And I’m sure a lot of guys would’ve been at the park anyways today to get some work/treatment/whatever in, game or no game.

I was talking about the doubleheader. MLB is concerned about the players, but not concerned enough to play a traditional doubleheader to avoid having a long break in between games.

[Cubswin11]

 

But they have no problem making players sit around at the ballpark all day to get that extra gate.

The game was a 6:30 start and they called it before 5. Don’t think any fans would’ve been inside yet. And I’m sure a lot of guys would’ve been at the park anyways today to get some work/treatment/whatever in, game or no game.

I was talking about the doubleheader. MLB is concerned about the players, but not concerned enough to play a traditional doubleheader to avoid having a long break in between games.

I’m guessing it’s to honor the tickets for tomorrow nights game since that was time people knew and planned/bought tickets for? You really can’t guarantee that start time for people without building in the ~5 hour gap.

[UMFan83]

The 7 inning split doubleheader horsefeathers is a fraud. I can understand full price in situations when a game is called in the 6th but this is an avoidable situation. Either play two 9 inning games and charge full price, play a traditional doubleheader with 7 innings per game and charge full price (one gate), play a split doubleheader with 7 innings each and refund 2/9th of the cost of everyone’s tickets for both games.

[Andy]

I guess we're doing split 7-inning doubleheaders now. How stupid is that? I don't know if fans with tickets have any recourse, but I wouldn't want to make the trip to Wrigley for a single 7-inning game.

No idea how the tickets work but think they kept the 7-inning DH thing to help limit pitcher innings/fatigue off the shortened year.

That's the company line. I wonder what the company line will be next year when they're still here.

[squally1313]

Is the company really coming out much further ahead than they would for a 9 inning game? Maybe shave 45 minutes off everyone's minimum wage time sheet, but you lose out on concessions for those two innings where the margin is super high. Definitely understand the frustration as a fan in terms of what you're paying for, but don't think it's changing the math too much on the Ricketts end.

[Andy]

Is the company really coming out much further ahead than they would for a 9 inning game? Maybe shave 45 minutes off everyone's minimum wage time sheet, but you lose out on concessions for those two innings where the margin is super high. Definitely understand the frustration as a fan in terms of what you're paying for, but don't think it's changing the math too much on the Ricketts end.

I meant MLB as the company line. I'm sure the Ricketts would rather have the extra 4 innings of gameplay over these 2 games. But I'm pretty sure 7-inning doubleheaders will never go away now.