MLB and MLBPA Agree to Significant Rule Changes
MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred and MLBPA Executive Director Tony Clark via Clutchpoints
Major League Baseball has been deemed as a “deadlock” by the MLB and the MLBPA in their most recent meeting. It’s not looking like baseball will return anytime soon and their most recent meeting was even looked at as going backwards by MLB. However, we got some major news out of the newest CBA meeting. MLB and MLBPA have agreed to implement a pitch clock, ban shifts, and making the bases larger in the 2023 season. This screams nothing but offense. The idea many get from these new rule changes is to make the game more exciting and to quicken up the game. Taking a look into these significant rule changes, we will see everything we need to know about them.
1. Pitch Clock
MLB is seeking the pitch clock to be 14 and 19 seconds. Meaning the pitcher will have 14 seconds to deliver a pitch with the bases empty and 19 seconds with runners on base. The desire of a pitch clock is due to increasing game times. This seems like another one of MLB’s tactics to keep the viewer at home or at the game more involved and not get so bored at how long the game is taking.
Pitch clocks have been used and experimented with in the minor leagues. Games in low-A has seen their games reduce from 3 hours and 2 minutes to 2 hours and 41 minutes. There has been mixed feelings and results of the pitch clock but MLB and the MLBPA obviously feel implementing a pitch clock with ultimately speed up games at the major league level.
2. Banning of the Shift
This rule change seems to be the most controversial out of them all. This rule has people either extremely happy or upset. Some believe players should have the skill set not to hit into the shift and others feel it’s not fair to the players who have a tendency to hit the ball a certain way.
Yankees OF, Joey Gallo, had some thoughts on the shift himself.
“At some point, you have to fix the game a little bit”
Gallo is not a fan of the shift and is quite happy it will be gone very soon. Gallo, who struggled after his trade to New York (AL), is now looked at as a player who will benefit significantly to this new rule change. Other notable players who will benefit is Phillies OF, Bryce Harper and Red Sox 3B, Rafael Devers.
By banning the shift, this new rule also screams offense. By banning the shift, we will see batting averages go up, more base hits, and bringing the game back to the fundamentals. This all goes into MLB’s plan to make the game more exciting.
3. Bigger Bases
Bigger bases have been an experiment in the minor leagues for quite some time now. The size of bases will be going from 15-inches to 18-inches. By having bigger bases, it is a lot more forgiving to players who can focus on baserunning. These new bases will now cause players to not miss the bag, as much, if they choose to try and stretch a single into a double. This also goes for stealing a base as well. Often times, runners are speeding into 2nd base from 1st, then find themselves going too quick to be able to stop resulting in overextending out of the base line. This rule being implemented will result in baseball fans witnessing more stolen bases and more exciting play as players will be testing their luck on base hits. The most important reason for implementing bigger bases is fewer collisions and injuries to the players. We see this problem far too many times when players are sliding into the base, they either injure themselves or the defender due to the size of the base not giving enough room for the runner.
The bottom line with these new rule changes is to speed up the game. As we all know, baseball is not the most attractive sport to people. MLB and the MLBPA haven’t agreed on much during this horrific time for the sport, but it’s nice to see them finally agree on trying to attract more fans by making the game have more exciting moments. These rule changes are not set in stone quite yet due to MLB and MLBPA still going through negotiations and could blow up at the next meeting, but these are the rules baseball fans should be preparing themselves to see quite soon. With the MLB lockout looking like it will carry on for the foreseeable future, we should expect more major and minor rule changes coming our way.