Time will tell but I think the NHL model of putting aĺl the players and staff in a pair of bubbles (Edmonton and Toronto) rather than travelling from city to city is more likely to succeed.
Time will tell but I think the NHL model of putting aĺl the players and staff in a pair of bubbles (Edmonton and Toronto) rather than travelling from city to city is more likely to succeed.
As I said, time will tell, hopefully the NHL experience will be better. Hope so as I miss hockey and the Canucks, although not necessarily a contender to go all the way, are an exciting young team to watch. As to the NBA experience all I can say is WOW, left the bubble to go to a funeral and went to a strip club, what was he thinking?
Stand for something, or you'll fall for anything.
I know baseball is a religion to some and change is not always welcome but I am all for speeding the game up a bit. The pitchers need a time clock behind the ump. Give that guy "X" seconds to get rid of the ball or give the batter a ball. It is not much fun watching a man chew on his mitt.
That rule already exists pretty much just as you describe it. Pitcher has 12 seconds if there is no one on base after which the ump calls "ball". How well it is enforced can't say but the rule is there. Sometimes think the batter stepping out of the box is more of a game delayer, don't know if there are any rules to address this.
https://www.sportscasting.com/is-the...er%20enforced.
I have been umpiring since the 70’s. It is at the discretion of the umpire.
Once the pitcher addresses the batter, the batter must be granted time to be able stop the action of the pitcher. If the ump chooses to, he can deny the call for time and the pitcher can continue his delivery, with the pitch being called a ball or strike as the case may be, If the batter does not enter the batter’s box when directed to, the umpire can call a strike.
Comments made here are my own and, according to my children, do not reflect the opinions of any other person... anywhere, anytime.
Jim Leyland (3x MLB Manager of the Year) agrees with you.
https://www.freep.com/story/sports/m...ow/5387570002/
"Don't worry. They couldn't possibly hit us from that dist...."
I also did some umpiring in my youth but that's over 50 years ago and it was young kids, in fact the park I umpired at was the only one playing baseball at that age group, every other park in the city played Tee Ball at that age. As an umpire I also used discretion, if a pitch was hittable it was a strike, some of the kids were so small a MLB pitcher would have trouble hitting the strike zone. Wonder how MLB would look if umpire were allowed to apply the same criteria?
A lot of people argue the easiest way to speed up professional baseball games is to call the strike zone the way it is written in the rules. Right now anything above a couple of inches above the belt is a ball. If they called the high strike consistently, you would see batters swinging at the first pitch they could hit.
Comments made here are my own and, according to my children, do not reflect the opinions of any other person... anywhere, anytime.
Hearing these multimillionaire athletes complain that playing with no fans in the stands is terrible and hard to get motivated makes me think of most high school sports. Except for football and basketball most sporting events have no fans in the stands except relatives and boyfriend/girlfriends. Ever been too a high school track meet? Or a badminton match. Those are real athletes who do it for the sport not the glory from fans. That is pretty much true of ALL girls teams.
Bil lD
With Covid problems, thread title may have to be changed to "Four Days of Major League Baseball." Sure was a short season.