Baseball has a problem and it’s about time

Why baseball games take so damn long…

Wednesday night the Tampa Bay Rays beat the LA Dodgers 6-4 in Game 2 of the World Series, but I didn’t find that out until Thursday morning because I gave up on the game somewhere around the sixth inning.

Here’s why.

The game took three hours and 40 minutes to play and had more strikeouts (22) than hits (15). Throw in the eight walks and there were 30 plate appearances where a ball was not put in play. The teams also went a combined 1-for-15 with runners in scoring position and there was a grand total of one stolen base.

I’m a pretty big baseball fan so any time you can get me to stop watching a World Series game because it’s going too slow and there’s not enough action, baseball has a problem.

It’s not the first time I’ve written about this, but just in case you came to the party late, we’ll go back to where the problem started.

The influence of analytics

Long story only somewhat shorter: it’s now called analytics, but used to be called sabermetrics – using statistics to analyze baseball – and it had been around for decades, but got a big boost when Moneyball was published in 2003.

Pretty much every baseball fan in America thinks his or her favorite team is run by idiots, so those fans wanted to know if their dumb teams were copying what the really smart Oakland A’s were doing as described in Moneyball and why their team hadn’t hired Brad Pitt to be the general manager.

Nobody wanted to look like a bunch of dopes, so teams started hiring guys to crunch the numbers and forming analytics departments to advise them on how to play the game more intelligently. And pretty much all those number-crunchers said the same thing: stolen bases, sacrifice bunts and hit and runs were dumb – walks and home runs were good.

Since everybody was getting pretty much the same advice, pretty much every team started playing baseball the same way and teams started looking for guys who were patient at the plate and when they finally got around to swinging the bat, would try to hit a home run.

But as you might have heard, it usually takes at least four pitches to walk. Also, hitters were ignoring pitches that couldn’t be hit for a home run, so plate appearances got longer and longer with fewer and fewer balls being put in play.

The game slowed down.

You can’t blame Moneyball for everything that happened afterwards, but when it was published in 2003, nine-inning games averaged two hours and 46 minutes. In the 2020 regular season, nine-inning games took longer than ever; an average of three hours and seven minutes.

And it’s even worse in the postseason.

To be fair (and I don’t plan on making that a habit) commercial breaks are almost a minute longer during the postseason and you can’t blame the numbers guys for that, but the 14 League Championship games averaged 3 hours and 38 minutes which increased the postseason average to 3 hours and 31 minutes for nine-inning games.

So if you want to watch a postseason game in 2020, it’ll take about 45 minutes longer than watching a regular season game in 2003.

Progress.

The problem with trying to work walks

Everybody in baseball is looking for patterns and when they find one, try to take advantage of it and let’s take patience at the plate as an example.

This season the New York Mets had the highest team batting average in baseball; .272.

But if pitchers think batters are going to be passive and watch the first pitch go by, they tend to pour fastballs down the middle to get ahead in the count. Fastballs down the middle are good pitches to hit and if you pass up the chance to swing at one, you might not get another.

When the Mets put the first pitch in play, they hit .394.

When the Mets didn’t put the first pitch in play and the first pitch was a strike, after that they hit .223.

There is no one-size-fits-all philosophy in baseball; everything depends on the situation. Taking a first pitch can be smart when there’s nobody on and you’re down by four; taking a first pitch can be dumb when there’s a runner in scoring position and the game is tied.

The problem with trying to hit home runs

This season for the third time in a row, there were more strikeouts than hits and strikeouts take at least three pitches and aren’t all that entertaining unless you enjoy watching someone glare at the pitcher while he carries his bat back to the dugout. Although, I gotta admit watching someone try to beat a water cooler to death with a Louisville Slugger has its moments.

Anyway…

If you try to hit home runs you’re gonna strikeout and there’s a reason for that; some guys have opposite field power, but most guys don’t and just in case you don’t know, here’s what that means.

When a right-handed hitter is at the plate, right field is the opposite field and when a left-handed hitter is at the plate, left field is the opposite field which is kinda confusing, but I didn’t come up with that so blame someone else.

Moving on.

It’s easier to hit a home run when you hit it over the part of the fence closest to home plate and those tend to be the corners. So most right-handed hitters want to hit a ball over the left-field fence and that means swinging sooner and catching the ball out in front of the plate.

But catching the ball out in front of the plate means starting your swing sooner and when a hitter does that it’s easy to get fooled. A pitch that looked like a fastball down the middle turns into a slider down and away and the hitter looks like a dope when he comes out of his shoes hacking at a pitch a foot outside.

Nevertheless…

Baseball is so in love with home runs they’ll put up with a guy who strikes out a lot as long as he hits enough homers, so guys are swinging for the fences even when a single will do, which helps explains that 1-for-15 with runners in scoring position that made Game 2 of the Series so exciting.

Pitchers per game

These days, if a manager wants to keep his job he better pay lip service to analytics and play the game the way he’s been told to.

And the numbers guys like favorable “matchups” – bringing in a pitcher who has a good history against a particular hitter – so there are more pitchers being used per game than ever and we have to wait while all those guys warm up.

Second problem with that:

A pitcher might have favorable overall numbers against a hitter, but nobody – including the pitcher – knows what kind of stuff he’ll have that night. Use enough pitchers and you might find one that doesn’t have it. Following the numbers while ignoring everything else can lose you a ballgame.

But if that happens a manager can cover his ass by saying he did what the numbers (and the number guys) told him to do. Winning is nice, but job security is more even more important.

In conclusion

Baseball knows it has a problem; games are getting longer and longer and fewer and fewer people are showing up to watch. Paid attendance has gone down every year since 2012.

They’re trying to shorten games with goofy stuff like pitch clocks, limiting mound visits, forcing relievers to face more hitters and allowing intentional walks without throwing four pitches, but that’s just nibbling around the edges.

Baseball games won’t get significantly shorter until they change the way they’re played and right now the length of games indicates the problem is getting worse, not better.

Nevertheless…

Despite the geniuses who have tried to reinvent the game, baseball is still the greatest sport ever invented and I plan on watching Game 3 of the World Series tonight.

Or at least the first six innings and if that takes three hours, I’ll go to bed and check the box score in the morning.