Rob Manfred meets Justin Verlander of the Astros and declares that the MLB did not deliberately extract the baseballs

Commissioner Rob Manfred was invited on Tuesday to respond to comments by American starter Justin Verlander, accusing Major League Baseball of deliberately hitting baseballs to produce offensive production. Not surprisingly, Manfred reaffirmed that the MLB had neither changed nor encouraged the modification of the bullets.

Because this is not new, it probably will not satisfy those who believe that the baseballs in 2019 have been deliberately mixed – Verlander chuckled in the smothering of Tuesday night's All-Star game when he was informed of Manfred's comments, but allowed it if what Manfred said was true This gives the parties at least a basis for working together to reduce the current surge. The most interesting part of Manfred's statement came after the denial, when he explained that the owners – according to any theory of respectable conspiracy, would be those who hide behind the sorting of bullets – are in fact not in favor of more than circuits. By ESPN:

"Baseball has done nothing, no directive has been made for a baseball change," Manfred told reporters on Tuesday. "The logic is that baseball wants more circuits at home. If you attend the owners' meetings and listen to people on how the game is played, it's not a feeling among the owners I work for. "

If this is true, this is an aesthetic concern shared by the homeowners and not commercial. As Manfred will point out later in the report, fans, like dingers, and the increase in popularity of baseball have been one of Manfred's main projects as MLB Commissioner, while avoiding death. slow market of free agencies. His setting of the pace of play, for example, stems entirely from his studied opinion that a faster and shorter match will be more popular with casual supporters, and he personally and unilaterally adopted an imminent rule change behind the justification that 39, it ultimately results. in favor of the popularity of the sport. It's a little difficult to accept that owners are running out of attacks if they have, for example, data showing that these circuits make baseball more attractive to fans. And even:

"It's easy to get carried away with" you have too many circuits, "said Manfred on Monday." Let's not forget that our fan data suggests to fans like at home. worst thing in the world. "

Manfred is clearly trying to do it both ways, protecting against the perception that he and the baseball owners are motivated to increase the totals of the throws while dampening the growing sense that the MLB needs to identify and s & rsquo; Attack at the source of the recent surge of setbacks. production. Maybe Manfred's preferences can be discussed between the lines: if baseball is currently powerless to do anything about all these problems, this could be one of those problems.