MLB’s Proposed Pitching Rule Could Ruin Baseball

Ryan Jones, Assistant Sports Editor

The strategy behind baseball and how a game is managed can be just as important as the physical game itself. With the MLB’s newly proposed rule, a large part of this strategy will be lost with the changing times.

The rule, which was agreed upon in principle by the MLB and its’ Players’ Association this offseason, states that a pitcher must face a minimum of three batters before his manager can relieve him of his duties for another pitcher. The only exceptions to this rule come when a pitcher records the last out of an inning or is injured while facing a batter, in which case a new pitcher may be brought in no matter the batter count.

The pace at which games are being played at is an issue the MLB understandably wants to fix. This is the wrong way to go about trying to fix it. Yes, constant calls to the bullpen can drag out a game longer than it should go, but this is not a nightly occurrence over a 162-game season, and its value when used holds much more weight than the time it takes away to do it.

Major moments in the history of baseball outweigh a few extra minutes to a legendary game. Under the imposed rule, the Arizona Diamondbacks’ 2001 World Series victory over the juggernaut New York Yankees is nearly impossible.

The Diamondbacks, then managed by Bob Brenly, were the David, taking on the Goliath that was the Bronx Bombers. In game seven of the October Classic, the teams sat tied at one heading into the bottom of the eighth, but the D-Backs’ starter, Curt Shilling, was gassed. He hadn’t thrown an obscenely high pitch count, actually less than his Yankee counterpart Roger Clemens, but was about to face a dangerous part of the Yankee’s lineup, headlined by Derek Jeter.

Schilling didn’t have an ideal start to the eighth, allowing a solo home run to put New York up one heading into the potentially final frame. Brenly was ready to relieve his starter, but the ace up his sleeve, starter Randy Johnson, was not warmed up in time to come in. Needing to get Schilling out of the game, Brenly threw in Miguel Batista, a right-handed reliever, to take on the daunting task of pitching to the likewise right-handed Jeter.

Batista forced a ground out and was taken out after facing one batter to set up Johnson. The game would be the third of the series that Johnson pitched in, carrying Arizona to three wins along the way and securing their first ever championship.

Johnson went on to split the series MVP with Schilling but had the new rule been around back then, none of this would be possible. Johnson would not come in for another two batters, another two bats that Batista was much less equipped to pitch against. Batista could have easily given up the game, and in larger scale, the series, to these batters had Johnson not come in to replace him.

While I don’t believe there’s anything wrong with the length of games today, which was down five minutes last season to the year prior, it makes sense that the league would want to speed the game up. However, this move will not impact the length of games, it will only impact the quality of them.