If you want to fix baseball, let’s start with the real problems

ST. PETERSBURG – The ball field, just like a century ago, is almost perfect.

The distance between the bases remains the same, and plays at first base are still bang-bang. The pitcher is precisely 60 feet, 6 inches from the plate, and curved balls still break painfully out of a batter’s reach.

In 1939, the average Major League Baseball team scored 4.82 in a game with 9.49 hits and 3.44 steps. In 2019, the average team scored 4.83 in a game with 8.65 hits and 3.27 steps. Eighty years have passed, and barely a bit of change.

More than anything, this is what sets baseball apart from other sports. Football is hardly the same game it was in the 1970s, let alone the 1930s. Basketball players generations ago wouldn’t recognize the NBA today.

And maybe that’s part of the baseball problem. It hasn’t changed as the world has changed around him. Or maybe – just maybe – the creators of baseball were right when they first envisioned the game in the 19th century.

So why is all of this remarkable this morning?

Because change is happening in baseball. The commissioner’s office has announced a slew of minor league experiences this season, and there is no claim that they are not being considered for future MLB seasons.

Minor league teams in Florida, for example, will use electronic hitting zones to assist the referees. In other leagues, bases will be extended by three inches and pitchers will be limited to two catch shots per batting in an attempt to increase base stealing. Infielders will no longer be allowed to roam in the grass of the outfield and, later, may be confined to their natural side of the field.

I’m not sure I would call these drastic changes, but they are significant. Certainly more than the three-hitter minimum rule for pitchers and the mound visitation restrictions introduced in recent years.

The question is whether these changes will address what is really suffering baseball.

While runs, hits, walks, stolen bases, errors, and other stats have remained relatively static over the years, the game has changed dramatically in three ways.

No. 1 home runs are double what they were in 1950. No. 2 strikeouts have fundamentally tripled since 1930. No. 3, and by far most important, baseball is sort of past from a two to three hour match. game of an hour or more.

And I don’t see how defensive changes, selections, bigger bases or robot umpires solve these issues.

“This game has lived as long as it has lived because it is exciting and fans love it,” said Taylor Walls, Rays minor league infielder. “Small tweaks outside of the game to make the game faster, faster, more interesting – which I agree with. But in terms of trying to control… what’s between the lines… maybe it’s going a little too far.

Another experience that is developing in the minor leagues this season is absolutely worth pursuing. In a Class A league on the West Coast, timers in the outfield and between shelters will be used to track the time needed between throws, between innings and during pitch changes.

If you’ve ever watched post-season game videos from the 1970s, the first thing you notice is how quickly the pitchers worked. There is no walking around the mound, no endless hitting streaks, no hitters coming out of every court to adjust their batting gloves. If it takes timers in minors to get players used to a faster pace, so be it. And if it takes a fifth referee to watch the stopwatches, that’s fine too.

“The fans should tell us if we have a rhythm problem. If they think we do, then we do, ”said Rays manager Kevin Cash. “I know they do a lot of polls, surveys, ask a lot of questions, and if that’s the answer they get, then as an industry we should start trying to find ways to ‘make changes, because it’s (the fans). “

If the clocks help solve the rhythm problem, that leaves only the question of the preponderance of home runs and strikeouts. And, while the MLB is loath to admit to having used juicy balls in the past, that problem can likely be fixed with an adjustment to cushion baseball slightly. If more flying balls hit the warning lane instead of the second row of bleachers, hitters will eventually adjust their swing path.

There is nothing wrong with MLB executives being open to the idea of ​​innovation and change. In fact, they should spend a little more time looking at what the NBA and NFL have done with revenue sharing to rid the game of its gross economic disparities.

But fundamentally change a 90 foot basepath to a handful of inches by introducing larger bases? Penalize an intelligent manager by dictating to him where he can position his infielders?

Well let me be the old man screaming to get off my lawn (outside).

John Romano can be reached at [email protected]. Follow @romano_tbtimes.