In the thread Survey on Baseball Players and Gay Attitudes it was encouraging that more baseball players would be supportive of a baseball player coming out. But I was also interested in what the players thought which changes should be made. The results of the survey are here, scroll to question 10. I was interested in what other Outsporters thought.

[ July 14, 2004, 09:33 AM: Message edited by: pat125 ]

Pat, in your poll you've got "Keep DH (in NL only)." You mean, AL, no?

Oops, that's right. And unfortunately, I can't correct it, unless one of the moderators can help me.

If I had the power to change one rule, I would eliminate the DH. It's such a cop out and takes so much strategy away from the game. That's why the National League is so much more entertaining in my book.

[ July 14, 2004, 09:48 AM: Message edited by: Gaga4Gaby ]

I think the DH should be in both leagues. I can't believe that after 30 years there is still this ridiculous dichotomy in both leagues. It is a waste of pitcher's talents to have them hit. And I'm not intrigued by the cutesy strategies NL managers employ involving pinch hitting for pitchers. But I'm surprised that most players seem to favor eliminating the DH.

I think the length of the season is fine. Yes, there are 162 games, but I like the baseball season, and it is still shorter than the basketball and hockey seasons.

I am a fan of interleague play, but I think the format should be changed. First each league should have 15 teams with 5 in each division. This would force there to be at least one interleague game going all the time, which I have no problem with. But I would also make the schedule fair, so that one team doesn't have to play a good team 6 times, while another has to play a bad team 6 times. Something similar to what the NFL does would be fair. But if the NL still chooses to not have the DH, then it should be up to the team whether or not they want to use a DH, even if the game is in an NL park. Same goes for the World Series.

Wow, I"m not the only one who dislikes Interleague Play.

I'm torn between eliminating the DH, and eliminating inter-league play. I went with the former, because if both leagues played by the same rules, inter-league play could work, but not in its current format. The way it works now, inter-league play is simply not fair.

Even though my Yankees have always had a winning record against the National League, I absolutely hate--hate--hate interleague play. American League teams should play American League teams. National League should play National League. The Mets series means nothing to me. Sure it's fun to joke around with my friends that are Mets fans. But, in reality, I am much more interested in beating Boston or Oakland or Anaheim or even Toronto or Detroit. They are American League teams and since I am an advocate of the Designated Hitter, I see no reason to adjust this until the 3 to 4 World Series games that are held in the National League ballpark.

I like the Wild Card, but I think it should be adjusted so that a Wild Card team is not put on the same plane as a team that wins a division. I think the top two teams that do not win a division should have to play a best-of-three qualifying series for the right to play the division winners. Let me give an example...
Last year the top two teams that did not win their divisions in the AL and NL were Boston and Seattle, and Florida and Houston, respectively. Boston and Seattle should have had to play each other (and the same goes for Florida and Houston) for the right to play a true divisional winner. Why should Florida, who did not win its division last year, get the same treatment that the Chicago Cubs, who did win its division get? Why should Boston, who did not win its division, get the same treatment that Minnesota, who did win its division get. There should be some kind of advantage to winning your division. Right now, the Wild Card winner is simply treated as any of the other teams that won its division (albeit without home field advantage). But, while home field advantage is always nice, it really does not have as much of an effect on a game as, say basketball, football, hockey or soccer.

I also think that a special pitching award should be given, not to the closer or a starter, but to someone that is able to "hold" a game in the middle to late innings. The "hold" should count as an official statistic. This would help guys like Tom Gordon of the Yankees, B.J. Ryan of the Orioles, and Francisco Rodriguez (who is back to this role after the return of Troy Percival) of the Angels get some well-deserved recognition for holding a game.

Anyway, I have tons of thoughts about how I would tweak baseball, and kudos to the very intelligent and handsome man that started this thread. wink

[ July 14, 2004, 11:25 AM: Message edited by: Cattledog ]

My two biggies are getting rid of inter-league play and, as much as I love Edgar, getting rid of the DH in the American League. I also wouldn't mind the M's switching over to the National League. .

I voted for keeping the DH in the AL, but not in the NL. I liked it when there was some difference between the two leagues.

I also voted for elimination of inter-league play. It was a fun experiment, but the thrill is gone.

.... and the Love Boat theme starts to play!

Anyway Cattledog, I think we finally found something that we agree on. NO MORE INTERLEAGUE PLAY! Sorry didn't mean to shout. As some people are aware, while I do enjoy watching the Mets beat the Yanks, I'd rather it be in October, not July.

I more of a purist when it comes to baseball, and fully realize that the game today is all about getting fans into the seats. More power, more long balls, excitement, gimmicks, whatever.

I would also like see the pitching mound go back to its original height (it was higher than today), or bring back the "deadball era". Not only would the pitching be better, (a 3.48 ERA is NOT stellar IMO) but you would see a lot more strategy, baserunning, hit and run plays, defensive excellence, etc that you do in the "short ball" side of the game. Given how athletic the players are today, I'd like to see them prove that they can play the game as it was originally created.

[ July 15, 2004, 05:56 AM: Message edited by: BPT336 ]

What has always bugged me the most is days off during the playoffs. The teams that make the playoffs are the ones that have had the pitching depth to respond to the challenge of playing 162 games. Suddenly in the playoffs that depth doesn't necessarily count for much- two strong to dominant starters and your chances of winning a series are pretty good (Arizona). I'm not really in favor of having the games played at neutral sites, but I think they owe it to the integrity of the game to limit days off as much as possible. The fact that the playoffs are drawn out, to me, is an argument for playing a lot fewer games, which I don't want to see happen. Thankfully, because history means so much to this game they probably won't do that- then again, it didn't stop them when it came to the DH.

I really hate the wild-card format for the playoffs. It just seems to drag it out so. Baseball playoffs are like a movie that needs to be edited a bit more. Or the wild card games are like deleted scenes on a DVD - stuff that might be fun to watch but in the scheme of things just distract from the real action. That's just me, I don't know.

I think the wild card needs to stay. With 6 divisions there's usually going to be at least one team that's better than one of the winners. The divisions and WC give more people (and players) hope for their team! I suppose you have fewer teams that pack it in early and maybe have better quality games during the season than you might otherwise have.

I've always thought it rather strange that 30 MLB teams play far more games than any other major sport (NHL, NBA, NFL) and yet after all that, considerably fewer teams qualify for the playoffs than the other sports (8/30 in MLB, vs 16/30 in NHL and 12/32 in NFL). So I'd like to see at least two more wild-card teams, which I think Cattledog was suggesting in his example above (Seattle and Houston from last year). To compensate for the extra playoff games, the regualar season could be reduced to 150 games so we would still have the World Series in mid-October. Also, I like Pat's idea of 15 teams in each league, and one interleague series going on at all times, rather than having blocks of all-interleague games. As for the DH, both leagues should use it.

Why is that strange? It seems logical to me. The longer season allows you to sort out the best teams more accurately, so there's no need to allow inferior teams to play for the championships. MLB is the only sport in which the regular season matters.

I agree. In the NBA, 16 of 28 teams go to the post season and last season 2 teams with losing records made the playoffs!

Plus, going from 8 to 16 playoff teams will only extend the playoffs and the season is long enough as it is.

Actually, I didn't say there should necessarily be 16 playoff teams in MLB. It's just that 8 out of 30 teams (26.6%) seems like a rather low figure when compared to other sports. Somewhere in between these extremes (eg 12) seems about right. I doubt if any MLB team with a sub-.500 record would qualify under that scenario. Also, by reducing the length of the regular season, as I had mentioned, the playoffs could start earlier and be finished around the same time as they are now.

Maybe because Boston was a better team than Minnesota last year. Duh.
Because of how divisions are grouped, some teams will nearly always breeze into the playoffs, while others will have to annually contend with opponents who can spend 10x their payroll.

As for what rule I would change about baseball, while not technically a rule, I would change how wins and losses are assigned to pitchers. I watched a Cubs pitcher recently pitch like 8 innings of a shutout. His reliever gave up a run to allow a tied game, with the closer finishing off for the win. How is it fair that a guy who worked his butt off and gave up no runs gets a "no decision" for his efforts? This, while a closer gets the win for throwing probably 15 pitches tops.

Whether or not Boston was better than Minnesota had nothing to do with Boston getting the same treatment as Minnesota in the playoffs. I'm with Cattledog on this one. Having two wildcards play in a best of three should help. The only thing though is the team with the best record should then play the wildcard winner. As it stands now, the best team only plays the wildcard if they are not in their division. The issue of payroll seems irrelevant to the wildcard issue.

I am surprised about the results so far. I thought most would favor getting rid of interleague play, despite my being in favor of keeping it, but in a fairer modified form. And I thought more people would be in favor of having the DH in both leagues. Unless I'm mistaken, isn't the NL the only professional league that doesn't have a DH, and isn't the DH also used in college? If so, it seems silly to me that the NL would be the only such league to not have the DH. With all due respect to the "excitement" of the strategies involved, after watching a double switch or two, the novelty gets old fast.

[ July 15, 2004, 10:07 AM: Message edited by: pat125 ]

The three rules that I would immediately change are eliminating the DH (it takes SO MUCH strategy out of the game that the A.L. managers might as well be sleeping in the clubhouse after they fill out the lineup card), doing away with interleague play (although I realize this will NEVER happen due to the increased attendance/revenue that these "rivalry games" generate) and, as was surprisingly included in the players survey, get rid of that atrocious body armor that Barry Bonds, among others, are permitted to wear at the plate.

While I admit to being a "baseball purist" (for a while I thought Bob Costas and I were the last ones left ) I am actually in favor of the wild card -- AS LONG AS no more than the current four teams from each league are allowed to make the playoffs.

As for shortening the regular season, that is absolute blasphemy! eek! ....no sport relies more on tradition, history and statistics than our national pasttime (for a multitude of reasons including the ability to compare players of today with their predecessors from past eras and generations) and to make a change that would alter the quantitative performance of the athletes and dramatically affect their ability to surpass "unbreakable" records (steroids and performance enhancing drugs, notwithstanding) goes against the very foundation of the game and eliminates one of the MANY unique characteristics that make the sport so great.

~Joe

[ July 15, 2004, 10:17 AM: Message edited by: gamecock ]

My only problem with the wild card has to do with unbalanced scheduling. If you're in a strong division, you play a tougher schedule, so the wild card doesn't necessarily select the best 2nd place team.

I'm less wedded to the 162-game season. After all, it's only been around since 1962. It was 154 games from 1904-1961, so 154 is really the most traditional number.

Not to be nit-picky, JC, but the 162 game schedule actually went into effect in 1961, not '62....hence the infamous asterisk* that was attached to Roger Maris' single-season home run record for so many years (it's always easy for me to remember because he hit 61 in '61 ), which apparently became even more controversial due to the fact that he failed to surpass Ruth prior to game #155 along with the fact that Maris did it in the VERY FIRST season after the schedule was lengthened.

~Joe

[ July 15, 2004, 10:48 AM: Message edited by: gamecock ]

To be even more nit-picky , I believe the AL went to 162 games in 1961 and the NL went to 162 games in 1962, since the NL expanded to 10 teams one year after the AL did.

[ July 15, 2004, 10:57 AM: Message edited by: pat125 ]

As someone who does not sympathize with that smarmy, Bob Costa-esque, over-romanticized belief that baseball is "special" and "different" from other sports, I'm inclined to:
(a) kill the AL and NL, force everyone into regional divisions a la the NHL and NBA.
( kill the DH.
© put the same number of teams in each division. Duh?!?
(d) chop the season down to 148 games, expand the playoffs.

I don't know if Senator Kerry has registered his vote in this poll, but I heard him say tonight at the Red Sox-Yankees game that he is in favour of eliminating the DH.