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Today’s Wall St. Journal has a headline that reads: Baseball Mired in a Mysterious Ratings Slump.  The gist of the article is that ratings are down this year and that last year’s World Series had low ratings.  The article posits that other sports leagues playoffs and a public tired of steroid scandals might be to blame.  As a big baseball fan (and someone that tried many moons ago to get into the business of baseball), I’ve done a lot of thinking about what’s wrong with America’s Pastime.

The biggest thing I hear when talking to fans and non-fans alike is that the game is boring.  It’s hard to disagree because at times I can’t take it and change the channel.  What’s boring isn’t the game but the time it takes to watch a game.  My beloved Yankees know how to drag out 9 innings like no other team, especially when playing the hated Red Sox.  Take the series against Boston back in April.  Here are the lengths:

• Friday night, 11 innings, 9 total runs, 4 hours 21 minutes
• Saturday, 9 innings, 27 total runs, 4 hours 21 minutes
• Sunday, 9 innings, 5 total runs, 3 hours 9 minutes

Two games are a little irregular.  One went extra innings, the other has a boatload of runs.  But, that’s going to happen and MLB has to figure out how to NOT make it happen.  Practically no one has the time or the patience to sit at home and watch over 4 hours of baseball.  It’s simply too much.

Compare that to football, basketball and hockey which all have the advantage of a fixed clock.  They know their games will last under 3 hours unless there’s overtime.  A 3-hour game is completely manageable AND those sports are much more action-packed.  There’s a lot more happening with up and down the court action in the NBA.  End to end runs up the ice are thrilling.  Football is violent and has action on every single play.  Part of baseball’s charm is that there is no clock.  But now that games have lengthened, that rather unique feature has become a hindrance in our world of channel surfing, ritalin and Twitter.

Here are my proposals for Major League Baseball.

• Pitcher/batter clock - It would be impossible and against all tradition to put a clock on the field but guys have to get on the mound or in the box and be ready to play.  Viewers get bored when a pitch comes in and then the batter steps out.  The pitcher walks around the mound.  The batter adjusts his helmet or gloves or whatever.  The pitcher takes his sweet time getting back on the rubber.  Then around 22 seconds later, the next pitch is on the way.  There’s 19 or 20 seconds in there where NOTHING is happening.  I don’t think MLB understands that.  There is NOTHING, NOTHING, NOTHING happening that would compel someone with 300 channels to stick around.  This doesn’t just happen once in a while, but rather it happens 5 times when someone goes to a 3-2 count and puts the ball in play on the last pitch.  It happens every inning, 3 times, top and bottom.  Every second is a step closer to the channel changing and a fan being lost.

  MLB needs to set a guideline, say 10 seconds between pitches, and enforce that.  How?  My suggestion would be a post-game review of the time per at bat.  Calculate how long on average every at bat lasted.  What were the reasons?  Who was ready, who wasn’t?  What were the guilty parties doing?  Compile the statistics per batter and per pitcher.  That information needs to be shared with the teams and the players.  Then, set penalties for violating the rules.  You might find that David Ortiz averages 15 seconds between pitches per at bat.  Fine him and the Red Sox.  CC Sabathia takes too long getting on the mound?  Fine him and the Yankees.  There have to be consequences to change the behaviors.

• Bring back the strike zone – The rule book definition of a strike and what is actually called differ.  Wikipedia says, “Historically, umpires often call pitches according to a contemporary understanding of the strike zone rather than the official rulebook definition.”.  That’s a problem.  A smaller strike zone means more pitches.  More pitches takes more time and that drags out games.  MLB has tried to address this but I haven’t seen anything definitive that tells me the problem is solved.  What I do see are pitches just above the belt not called strikes.  Umpires need to be rewarded for using the rulebook strike zone.  This simple change will do wonders for the length of games.
• Intentional Walks – How often does an intentional walk go awry in the majors?  Once in a lifetime is my answer.  I don’t remember anyone ever having an issue with this.  If that’s the case (and even if it’s just 1 in 1,ooo that something goes wrong), just put the guy on first without throwing the pitches.  It’ll only cut a few seconds but they are boring seconds that have zero excitement.  When did you last stay glued to the tube to see whether or not a professional pitcher could intentionally throw 4 straight balls?

The end goal has to consistently get games under 2 1/2 hours.  That’s the magic number.  Go back and watch old games and you’ll see how fast they move along.  Your attention doesn’t wander because the next play is happening quickly.  MLB needs to do this to keep and attract new fans.  If they do this, the game will sell itself and the way they market the overall sport will be less important.

Hard to believe but Ben’s teeball team got 6 outs in one inning yesterday. They play 8 batters each half inning. A typical stanza may have one out but often there are none.  That means at least 2 or 3 runs per inning. It’s a huge victory to get 2 outs. Well, yesterday with Ben playing first base, his team got the first 4 outs in the inning. Ground balls to the pitcher, second base, Ben at first and then the pitcher again. Each time the ball was fielded cleanly and then a good throw to first (except for Ben’s non-assisted grounder). One batter got on and made his way around to score the lone run of the inning.  Two more outs came with another grounder to the pitcher and one to Ben.  On the last pitcher’s throw to first, Ben caught it on a short hop.  It was as if he was Mark Texiera scooping a throw out of the dirt.

Daddy was one proud papa.

There aren’t many bigger Yankee fans out there than me.  I get sick to my stomach when they don’t play well and can get in a foul mood (no pun intended) when the Red Sox win.  But, you’ve got to be a HUGE fan to spend the rest of eternity in one of these bad boys…

If NBC was to lose Cris Collinsworth, their Olympics coverage would improve three fold.  He’s a doofy nerd.

A while back I wrote about everyone needing to find a niche.  Well, here’s another one from the Wall St. Journal in an article about Barry Zito’s recent pitching woes:

Andrea Mallis, a Berkeley, Calif.-based astrologist who specializes in baseball prognostications, says Mr. Zito’s charts show he was just entering a “Neptune cycle,” a period of sluggishness and confusion that lasts two to three years. (Ms. Mallis has never worked with Mr. Zito, a Taurus, but she did get his birth time and location from his mother at a game.)

I guess as long as you’re the best in your niche, anyone can make a living.

These two lines sum it up for me.

The Angels celebrated their success last season by raising their 2005 West division championship flag before the game.The Yankees, of course, will have no such recognition of their American League East title on Tuesday in the Bronx.

The goal is a World Series championship. Anything less is failure.

For some reason it was very difficult to get out of bed today. When I finally got into the shower, my head was still kind of cloudy with that first thing in the morning sleepiness. And then I got a very rude awakening. I heard the guy on the radio say something about Johnny Damon being a Yankee. This is the guy with the long hair that hit not 1, but 2 HUGE homeruns against us in Game 7 in 2004. Are you friggin’ serious?

I’m saying it now and I hope I’m wrong, but it is going to be very difficult for me to truly root for him. Wade Boggs was different. Roger Clemens was different. Those guys were classy and had my respect. This is Johnny Damon. I hate Johnny Damon. Learning to love him will be a tall order.