As mentioned in my previous post, it seems Major League baseball players are a lot more fragile these days than they were in times of yore. This despite superior conditioning, trainers, specialized coaches, weight rooms, nutritional supplements, and the like.
These days any starting pitcher can only go every 5 days. It used to be every 4. Go back far enough, and it wasn't unheard of for the same pitcher to toss both ends of a doubleheader.
Doubleheaders themselves are rare these days. When they happen, there's typically a 3-4 hour break between games. What are the players doing during that time? Taking a nap? Playing cards? Checking out their twitter followers?
There's no reason for this. Give the umpires a chance to get off their feet and a well-deserved potty break. Let the players change into clean uniforms. The grounds-crew can resweep and rehose the infield to keep that pesky dust down and swap out the bases for spiffy new white ones.
In the meantime, the fans have been there for hours, are chock full of draft beer, nasty hot dogs, and the damn kids want another ice cream -- as soon as mom or dad gets back from taking them to the, by now, not-so-sanitary restrooms to relieve their precious little bladders -- again. They don't care if the pampered millionaires are a little sweaty, because they're stinking it up by then themselves. Play the nation anthem again, and let's go for Game 2. PLAY BALL!! It shouldn't take more than half an hour between games -- max. And it didn't used to. But now all the participants are divas, and the poor dears must have their proper rest lest they, heaven forbid, overexert themselves. One word. BS. They used to play the same game all day long when they were kids but, now that they're, ahem, "mature", they have the stamina of a teenaged boy in his first go-around after the prom?
And now a commercial break. Some furniture company is advertising a 96 month interest-free payment plan on their bedsets. Time out. 96 months? That's 8 years! Typically, a new car loan lasts somewhere between 3 and 5 years. And how much do they cost? 30 grand? 50 grand for a deluxe ride? So we can pay off back-to-back consecutive brand new car loans in the same time it takes to pay off such a single bedset?
Question. How much are those mattresses and box springs anyway?
Way back in the 1960s a pudgy Detroit Tiger first baseman named Norman Cash hit a few home runs over the rightfield roof at the old Tiger Stadium. They were estimated to have travelled somewhere between 525-550 feet. In the early 70s Reggie Jackson clobbered one at the same stadium that crashed into the bank of lights high above the right-centerfield roof. It would be interesting if the geeks that can simulate such things would go back and estimate how far that ball would have gone if not being stopped by some of Edison's finest glassware. 550? 575? Mickey Mantle is generally credited with having hit the longest home run ever -- some 585 feet. A colossal blast.
But that begs the question. How come nobody can even come remotely close to such marks these days? The pitchers still bring it in the 90 MPH range, the hitters have custom made bats, and aren't the balls themselves supposed to be "juiced" over what they were in the old days?
Currently, if some player whacks one 450 feet, the breathless announcers will rant and rave and call it a "moon shot". But they lose sight of baseball history. In the old old Yankee Stadium, it was 465 from home plate to the left-centerfield fence. That same 450 foot fly ball would either be caught for a long out or hit the wall on one hop for maybe a double. It wouldn't even be a home run, let alone talking heads going berserk-worthy. The above-mentioned Tiger Stadium measured 440 feet to dead center field, but only a paltry 325 down the right field line and 340 down the left. So depending on which direction a batter hit a ball, a modest 360 could either be a home run or an easy out. For that matter, the old Tiger Stadium had their flagpole INSIDE the park in left-centerfield. That was always fairly stupid. We've heard of outfielders crashing into walls trying to make catches -- but a flagpole?
A final rant. Call me old school or anything else that comes to mind (trust me -- I've been called worse), but I've never liked the designated hitter rule in the American League. Yeah, I get it. Most pitchers can't hit a lick anyway, and it's supposed to add more excitment to the game. But most of the DHs are there because that's ALL they can do. They can't competently field a defensive position and are typically molasses slow on the basepathes. They exist only because they can hit. Truly one-dimensional players.
So basically, they'll come up to bat 4 or 5 times a game, and occasionally have to chug their way around the bases. While their team is on defense, they have a seat in the dugout.
So why -- tell me WHY -- do THESE guys need a game off every week or so to rest up?
Compared to the old days -- how pitiful is that?
No comments:
Post a Comment