Changes in Baseball Are Coming!

Dee Gorden reportedly traded to the Mariners.

Add MLB baseball to Portland and Las Vegas (I would like that) and realign teams both at division level and league level. Reduce games played from 162 to 154. Reduce travel miles. Complete the WS in October. Put teams located in western half of US in the NL and eastern half teams in AL.

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Definitely electronically called strikes and DH in both leagues. Reduce time between innings and pitcher substitutions. Max number of pitchers in a game limited to 4 . Stop reviewing plays where a player might have come off the bag for a half a second.

While the Stanton/Ohtani saga continues, the Chicago Cubs signed Tyler Chatwood to be their #4 at 3 years $38M. I think this will turn out to be very good for the Cubs. Chatwood improves the team over John Lackey. Since returning from his second TJ surgery, his metrics away from Coors are significantly better than they were at Coors. For the last two years – Home – 6.07 ERA and 21 HRs; Away – 2.57 ERA and 14 HR’s. With the Cubs, the most he will have to pitch in Colorado will be one game per regular season. The Cubs could look ahead and move the rotation around so he may not have to pitch the 1 game. Chatwood turns 28 next week.

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They still need to replace Arrieta, but with Lester (35), Hendricks (28), Quintana (29), and Chatwood (28), that could be a formidable #1 – #4 if they do not do anything else. They will find a #5, but they still have very little else to fall back on. They do not have anyone in their farm that is ready to make the jump. They always have Montgomery to fall back on.

Chris Camello is reporting that the Dodgers are in discussion with the Marlins about Staton.

I would think Mexico City and Montreal would be the two cities MLB would like to see awarded franchises.

The expansion Las Vegas Knights (hockey) are averaging 17,833 per game in attendance, 99% of capacity. They are supported by the corporate community (casinos) who buy luxury suites for their high rollers and VIPs. The AT&T Arena was privately funded by MGM resorts and sits on their property. It will also work perfectly for basketball.

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The new Raiders Stadium had $750 out of $1.9 B publicly funded but it comes from the room tax fund that also paid for the LVCC (Convention Center) expansion and even a freeway improvement project getting cars into and out of the strip corridor off I-15 Fwy from the south (LA) UNLV football will also share the stadium and it will get a major bowl game each year. It is being built on land behind Mandalay Bay owned by MGM that has Fwy offramps on both sides.

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A new domed stadium for baseball would need to be built, similar to Chase Field in Phoenix. The advantage baseball has is the 81 regular season home games per year instead of 8 for pro football and 6 for college; 41 for the NBA and 38 for hockey. The funding formula used for the Raiders would work for a baseball stadium, casinos are on board, which means the state is on board (gaming taxes, property taxes and sales taxes from resorts account for more than 50% of the state’s budget) I believe it is just a matter of time before Las Vegas has every major sport like Phoenix does. Phoenix is a much bigger market at #5 but does not have the advantage of tourist visits and corporate sponsorship that Las Vegas enjoys or the huge room tax fund. The facilities are also being built close to the strip corridor benefiting both local and tourist access.

An interesting impact on expansion will be by the pushback against publicly funded stadia.

1. Fix September rules

2. One foot in batters box

3 no pitch clock-fine repeat offenders

4. Goodbye to God Bless America

5. Less commercials between innings once game goes to extra inning. Sponsors have gotten their money’s worth.

6. AUTOMTED STRIKE ZONE!!!!!

Expansion will increase offense like it always has in the past.

Screw the DH! I could make 5 or 6 suggestions that would help pace of play without screwing with the game. Their proposals will do nothing to increase viewership of baseball just diminish how much real baseball fans enjoy the game. I’m all for Montreal getting the Expos back.

Now, to the real subject. Chris Camello tweeted out that the Dodgers were pushing hard for Stanton now. Trade not imminent but due to how complicated a deal would be due to contracts and players but the Dodgers are in. Camello broke JT’s and Kenley’s signings almost down to the $ about 24 hrs before the talking heads like Rosenthal.

No to the DH!

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I can’t see baseball limiting the number of pitchers who pitch in an inning but can see baseball requiring that a pitcher who has been announced must pitch to at least one batter and that a hitter who has been announced must hit.

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With the expanded use of bullpens, I can see the rosters expanding.

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I can also see a limit on visits to the mound by a catcher or other player.

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Oakland has never really supported the A’s. I can see San Jose (maybe baseball forces the issue), Portland, Las Vegas. I live in the Sacramento area – we have an SMSA population of about 2.5 million, but I don’t think that Sac can support an MLB team.

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As to expansion, there are too many “small market teams” who have trouble scraping together payroll – really Miami wants a payroll of $90 MM? That’s a wealthy city. Who needs another small town team that will have trouble competing?

Population is a tricky thing, Las Vegas is ranked 28th above but that is not including the cities of North Las Vegas and Henderson which are contiguous. Clark County’s metro population is 2.17 million. The city also averages over 3 million tourist visits per month: what better city to take a road trip to see your team? San Diego is ranked at 8th and has always struggled with attendance. San Jose is ranked ahead of both SF and Oakland, maybe that is a good destination for the A’s.

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Purists hate the DH but younger fans love it, who wants to see pitchers hit? It has increased offense, prolonged careers and lets starters pitch deeper. My main problem is different rules for each league and since it’s staying it should be the same in both leagues. I am also not a fan of the double switch.

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Any restriction on relief pitchers should be batters faced, not outs. What if a guy can’t get anyone out and can’t be pulled? Have them face at least 2 or maybe 3 batters. Nothing is worse or takes longer than seeing 3 or more pitching changes in 1 inning.

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I am all for a pitch clock but also a batter clock. I am really tired of batters backing out and going through their rituals. Time to limit mound visits by catchers too, it was out of control by the Cubs and Astros in the post season. I have been to minor league games and it works well and improves the flow of the game.

1. I agree that the DH is coming to the NL. I am generally a baseball purist, but I am also a realist and understand that the DH is not going away. I also agree that both leagues need to play under the same rules. I cannot see it happening before a new CBA, but who knows for sure.

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2. The MLB Union will be pushing for expanded rosters, and will probably make this a key negotiation point in the next CBA. This is where the owners are going to have to be negotiating amongst themselves as the large market teams would have no problem with expansion, but the small market teams do not want another 2 players even at MLB minimum salaries. If you make the change, make it two players. Most teams would love to have a 3rd catcher at the end of the bench, and an additional pitcher for the games ever expanding use of specialists.

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3. The only pitching visit limitation I can see in the foreseeable future is to limit the number of trips from the catcher to the mound. The number of trips McCann made to the mound in the WS was ridiculous. With the ever increasing use of pitching specialists, I cannot see the owners agreeing to make no mid inning pitching changes. And with the expected roster expansions in the pitching ranks, this will become even less likely. I can see a limit to the number of warmup pitches to 5 for incoming pitchers.

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4. At an estimated 2.8 million, Toronto would slide into the number three slot behind Los Angeles. Pittsburgh is right at the St. Paul population, and Cincinnati is even less. Since Cincinnati has supported a professional baseball team since 1869, I think they have proven they will support a MLB team. St. Louis and Pittsburgh both have long standing support (from 1870’s).

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Tampa has to move. They cannot support a ML team. I do not know why they keep fighting it. Tampa/St. Pete, Clearwater, and Bradenton are within a stone’s throw and they have successful Single A franchises which is what the population will support. The Florida State League is a good league and has good organizations. They are also the home to multiple spring training teams. Tampa/St. Pete has always been a Yankee town so it is hard for the Rays to gain a foothold.

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Oakland plays in a horrible stadium surrounded by nothingness. They had a new site set up near Laney College in the East Bay where they hoped to open a 35,000 seat stadium in 2023. Unfortunately this plan, which was early in the design stages, was just shot down by the Peralta Community College District after strong opposition from the faculty and student body. There is no Plan B. There were rumors moving to San Jose (SF Giants said no), and to Fremont which has a ton of environmental issues and just was not a plausible location. IMO the only successful location anywhere in Oakland would be Jack London Square, on the Oakland waterfront with lots of restaurants, hotels, and SF Ferry. Any other choice outside of reincarnating Charles Finley, Oakland will continue to flounder.

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I would not mind seeing the A’s come to Sacramento. I do not know if Sacramento would support a MLB team, but they have supported the River Cats, and very much supported them when they were the A’s AAA affiliate. But Sacramento is very much a Giants town, so an exodus from Northern California seems to be their best option. Their AAA team is now in Nashville, so maybe that is an option.

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Other locations that will be considered are:

Mexico City (MLB will want this to work)

Montreal (They want this to work as well)

San Antonio

Charlotte

Las Vegas

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I will leave the capability of Indianapolis to Mark and Hawkeye. I do not know the Midwest very well.

While I am on a roll— Mark, the population chart that you included in your post distorts the actual situation. It only takes into account the population of the city itself and ignores the surrounding municipalities. For example: compare SF and Indy which are listed as having almost the same population, both in the 800,000 range. Actually, the Giants have a much larger population to draw from than does Indy. Some of those cities have a large metro population and others do not, so to get an accurate picture of the ability to support a baseball team they would have to list the population of the greater metro areas instead of the population of the city itself.

I have long felt that they should change the way they determine wins and losses for pitchers. Whoever gives up the loosing run should get the loss. For example: a starting pitcher gives up two runs and is taken out in the 7th trailing 2-0. The relief pitcher gives up 3 in the top of the 8th, making it 5-0. The home team scores 4 in the bottom of the 8th, but they lose 5-4. The loss should go to the relief pitcher who gave up the 3 runs in one inning rather than the starting pitcher who gave up 2 runs in 7 innings.

A certain way to speed up and shorten the game. Not that I want that, but here’s a suggestion.

When a runner comes into the game to pitch run, he doesn’t get to run down to second base to warm up. When a fielding change is made for defensive purposes, he doesn’t get a few fly balls or grounders hit to him before the game resumes. When a pitch hitter comes up, he doesn’t get a few pitches thrown to him to warm up. So, why does a relief pitcher get a certain amount of pitches to warm up, especially since he already did so in the bullpen?

Make the warm up mound in the bullpen exactly the same as the one on the field. When the relief pitcher comes he ‘s ready to go and maybe gets one warm up pitch. Because of so many pitching changes and the fact that they are trying to speed up the game and make them shorter, this would certainly do both. Much more than the automatic walk.

Just my idea. I love the game the way it is and hope the DH never happens in the National League.

Is a team in Mexico now a dead issue???

In between post op meds, I’ve been catching on the last couple weeks of M.T. & A.C.’s posts and all I can say is great work.

Woulda, coulda, shouda with be our mantra till ST…

I agree with changes have to be made for instance pitchers starting pitchers goes 8 innings in a 0-0 tie a relief pitcher comes in the team scores one run the reliever gets the win the picture received nothing only Innings pitched. It should be the starting pitcher gets the win the relief pitcher gets the save what do you think about this