One of the big stories going into the 2015 season is the MLB’s new pace of play rules. Pace of play in the MLB has become a major issue. According to a 2014 study, game length has increased every year since since 2010, averaging over three hours for the past few seasons. There are several main changes that are being made for this season but it remains to be seen if these will make a significant difference in the pace of the games.
- The first change covers relievers entering games. For local TV games relievers will have 2 minutes and 25 seconds to reach the mound warm up, the time for the commercial breaks. For national TV games they will have 2 minutes and 45 seconds.
- The other big one is the batter’s box rule. Batters are required to keep one foot in the box in between pitches with the exception of certain situations.
- Although, the pitch clock is not adopted at the MLB level, it will be used in the minors this season with a 20 second pitch clock between pitches
Relievers have become a major part of the game, in 1990 about two relievers were used per game and that number has risen to close to three per team in 2013. Additionally, the rise of specialists like LOOGYs have caused for more and more pitching changes per game. The commercial break rule will likely have a slight impact on the game but I do not see it making an major contributions to speeding up the pace of play. I think that one way the game could be sped up regarding pitching changes will be to require pitchers to face a minimum number of batters, for example three. What this accomplishes is that it will no longer allow teams to play the mix and match game having pitchers only face one batter. Less pitching changes will result in fewer commercial breaks, which will in turn reduce average game time. This rule may have its flaws and detractors may argue that it takes strategy out of the game, it will require relievers to be more skilled, as they will likely have to be adept at getting out hitters from both sides of the plate. The minimum of three batters will only be necessary if a pitcher is removed mid-inning as if a pitcher faces one hitter and records the third out of the inning, then a change can be made between innings. This will force many pitching changes to be made between innings utilizing the commercial breaks that already exist instead of causing new ones.
The other two rules could have an impact as both have to do with time between pitches. In 2013, the average time between pitches was 22.6 seconds according to Fangraphs. This number is significantly above the 20 second pitch clock Minor League Baseball is testing this season. Those extra two and half seconds over between 250 and 300 pitches per game comes out to over ten minutes of extra game time that can be removed. However, until the MLB actually adopts the pitch clock I do not see any significant changes. College Baseball has a similar batter’s box rule to the one MLB is stressing this season. However, umpires in the college game do not often make a point to enforce the rule. Often times hitters step completely out of the box without any word from the umpire. If the MLB umpires follow this trend then the new rule will have zero effect on the game. Although, if the MLB makes examples of some key players, like they claim they will, with suspensions for repeatedly breaking the rule then there could be some significant progress made.
In the game of baseball scoring is down and game length is increasing, and while for some passionate baseball fans that is a positive sign, many casual fans are losing interest in the game. These steps are the first in likely many new commissioner Rob Manfred will take to raise baseball viewership but in my opinion these initial changes will not be enough.
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