18 Minutes of Baseball

"Baseball is 90% mental, and the other half is physical."  

--Yogi Berra (Baseball Hall of Famer)

Besides the offseason, strikes, and lockouts, how much inaction is there in Major League Baseball?

Before attempting to answer that question, let's look at the state of today's National Pastime.

The delayed Opening Day was on Thursday, 7 April 2022. The first game of the MLB season was a matchup between the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees, played at Yankee Stadium. The Bronx Bombers won 6 - 5.

The last game of the 2022 MLB regular season will be played on Sunday, 2 October. With the expansion of the playoffs, MLB eliminated the tie-breaking 163rd game teams typically played on Monday. The postseason will begin on 4 October, concluding the entire season after the final out of the World Series.

The 2022 MLB All-Star Game will be played on Tuesday, 19 July, at Dodger Stadium.

There are 162 games of baseball this season, barring any unforeseen developments. Less than 100 games are remaining. 1

Money ball

How does baseball make money? The 30 MLB teams have a 26-man roster (expanded during the playoffs) with an average payroll of $148 million. So everyone is paid, win or lose.

The owners have new contracts with TBS, ESPN, plus local outlets. Beginning this year, they will take in about $100 million each before selling a single ticket, according to Blake Williams, Managing Editor, Roundup News. 

Is it time for a 7th-inning stretch?

(C) Post-Gazette

Starting young

My earliest recollection of professional baseball is a magical one. My dad's favorite team, the Pittsburgh Pirates, was playing the New York Yankees in the 1960 World Series. The seventh and deciding game of the series was at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. 

We were with friends on the playground at Calvin Britain Grammar School in Benton Harbor, Michigan, listening to the game on a transistor radio.

In the bottom of the ninth inning, on 13 October at precisely 3:36 p.m., on a pitch thrown by Yankee reliever Ralph Terry, Pirates shortstop Bill Mazeroski hit the most dramatic home run in World Series history. 

Final score--World Champion Pittsburgh Pirates 10, New York Yankees 9.

There was bedlam that afternoon as 36,683 Pittsburgh fans drowned out play-by-play announcer Mel Allen. But, I knew that dad, from the City of Bridges, would be a happy man in his own quiet way.

Slow to change

The Associated Press reported the average time of a nine-inning game set a record once again despite Major League Baseball's efforts to improve the pace. The commissioner's office said the average was 3 hours, 10 minutes, and 7 seconds for the 2021 regular season. That was up from 3:07:46 for the pandemic-shortened 2020 season and 3:05:35 in 2019.

Starting with the 2018 season, MLB imposed stricter limits on mound visits by managers, coaches, and players; however, there were some exceptions. Commercial breaks are shorter. And pitchers may throw as many warmup pitches as they want before the commercial break ends but are no longer guaranteed eight warmup pitches.

Even with rules designed to trim playing time, opposed mainly by the players' union, the games are taking longer. Those 25 258 fans (on average) who turn out to root for the home team are patient to a fault. But for how much longer? 

Why are major league games getting longer?  

Grant Brisbee, who writes on baseball for SB Nation, decided to look into that question. So Brisbee stopwatched two games, one from 1984 and one from 2014. Some things were the same. The changes were in the inaction pitches--balls, strikes, or missed swinging strikes that didn't result at the end of an at-bat or the advancement of a runner. 

What was different was the time those inaction pitches took up. In the 1984 game, inaction pitches accounted for 32 minutes and 47 seconds. In the 2014 game, they accounted for 57 minutes and 41 seconds. A nearly 80 percent increase.

Frisbee said, "Pitchers don't get rid of the ball like they used to, and hitters aren't expecting them to get rid of it like they used to." As a result, a couple of minutes to each inning adds close to a half-hour to the game.

Slowpitch

In any given year, just under 70 million people will attend a major league baseball game. 

What do they see? Very little.

This brings us back to our original question about inaction. 

According to a non-scientific stopwatch study conducted by baseball statistician Steve Moyer, published in The Wall Street Journal in 2013, there are 17 minutes 58 seconds of action and 2 hours 39 minutes and 58 seconds of inaction. (A similar study found just 11 minutes of action in NFL football games.) 2

Action:

-Balls in play or runners advancing: five minutes, 47 seconds.

-Other actions (such as pitches, foul balls, and pickoffs): 12 minutes, 11 seconds.

Inaction:

-Time between batters: 33 minutes, 39 seconds.

-Time between pitches: one hour, 14 minutes, 49 seconds.

Only 7 Teams Have a Cost Index Under $200 

The MLB Fan Cost Index calculates the average price for four people to see a game at any given ballpark. It includes the cost of four tickets, parking, four hot dogs, four drinks, two programs, and two of the stadium's least expensive hats. 

Across all 30 teams, a family of four can take in a game for less than $200 at only seven stadiums. Among 30 MLB teams, the average ticket now costs $65.

Let's call this baseball inflation--paying more and getting less.

More challenges ahead

There's a lot of talk in professional sports, but money talks the loudest. 

Here's a short list of dollar-driven critical issues facing professional baseball:

1. Aging fans who put up with high costs because they can. What about younger families who want to attend games but can't?  

2. Starting playoff and World Series games later to placate networks (who pay the bills) but short-change younger fans who often have school the following day. Little League participation rates continue to decline (as do all youth sports). Where is the inspiration to play ball?    

3. MLB exclusive deals with pay-walled and soon-to-be pay-walled streaming partners. Keeping loyal fans from watching their favorite teams at certain times of the day seems counterintuitive. 

4. Robo umpires to eliminate human error--as if using technology would be error-free.

What we've learned in our study is that the antidote to inaction is not action--it's the right action at any given moment.  

Extra innings

Perhaps Major League Baseball commissioner Rob Manfred and billionaire team owners could benefit from the wisdom offered in a movie, The Sandlot--

"Man, this is baseball. You gotta stop thinking and just have fun." 

No doubt Yogi Berra would agree.

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© Bredholt & Co.

 

1 SportsNaut.com

2 The number of stopwatched games is low due to the task's difficulty. Politifact judges this study to be mostly true. 

 

What a Game!

"You'll like baseball. It's a civilized pastime."

--From the Broadway musical, "Ragtime." 

Fifty years ago this month, the Detroit Tigers won the 1968 World Series 4 games to 3 over the exceptionally talented St. Louis Cardinals (Curt Flood, Mike Shannon, Orlando Cepeda).  

Detroit (Al Kaline, Denny McLain, Jim Northrup) was down 3 games to 1, and Tigers fans, including me, thought there was little chance the Motor City team could win a seemingly insurmountable three straight. Especially with Game 7 being played under the Arch in St. Louis against future Hall of Fame pitcher Bob Gibson.  

Detroit pitcher Mickey Lolich won three complete-game victories and was named World Series MVP. The improbable comeback was primarily due to Lolich's left arm--and Willie Horton's perfect throw in Game 5 to catcher Bill Freehan who tagged out Lou Brock as Brock decided to stand up and not slide into home plate. 

A baseball era ended Thursday, October 10th at 3:07 p.m., Central Time, with the final out at Busch Memorial Stadium. The Tigers won 4-1 before a sellout crowd of 54,692.

There are several historical observations about the '68 World Series in which the Tigers were managed by Mayo-Smith and the Cardinals by another future Hall of Famer, Red Schoendienst. Most notably, that was the last World Series where American and National League champions would enter a Fall Classic without going through a playoff process. In succeeding years, TV money, seven-figure contracts, best of five and best of seven series, plus team expansions, would launch baseball into a totally different era.  

That was then       

If the business model of professional baseball was about to change significantly, so was the nature and development of its future talent.  

Five decades later, what is the status of baseball pipelines such as Little League, high schools, college, farm systems, and minor leagues?  

"They can't play catch," says Jack Thompson, a 40-year high school baseball coach from California who spoke with The New York Times. So while Thompson says young players can scorch line drives, hit 400-foot homers, and hurl blazing fastballs, these future major leaguers must be taught how to play catch.  

The story clarifies that the new "holy grail" is a college athletic scholarship. However, in pursuit of that goal, "the fundamentals are falling by the wayside in favor of flashier skills like big-league-style hitting and pitching," according to sportswriter Bill Pennington.  

The report adds that private coaching, specialized camps, and travel teams all have the same objective--to place youth players in college recruiting showcases.  

As a result of these new values, Pennington concludes, "a generation of top ballplayers has, in most cases, spent little time learning how to accurately throw across the diamond; catch a fly ball; field a ground ball and turn a double play; run the bases effectively; make a tag at a base, or, God forbid, bunt."

Where are the parents?

On a Southwest flight from Kansas City to Chicago with a sports consultant specializing in identifying young talent for major colleges and professional sports, I learned that the parent is often the driving force for these changes in player development and recruiting.  

My seatmate said that even the advent of newly designed uniforms by traditional football programs (Notre Dame; University of Miami; Iowa State; Arizona State; Army and Navy; Texas A & M) is an enticement to high school athletes and their families to come and be part of something new.  

Well-rounded players

Let's take this idea of specialization and move it into the marketplace.

What are employers looking for? 

They want employees who are talented but can also work as a team. Who knows how to play catch and maybe hit an occasional home run. They're after personalities more fully developed in all aspects of life. Those who are composed and balanced in their dealings with colleagues and customers.  

There's no going back in time, and the past was never as good as we remember it to be. Nonetheless, hard work, proficiency, and maturity are traits as desirable in people today as they were fifty years ago. 

For inspiration, look at the Detroit Tigers and St. Louis Cardinals, whose 1968 rosters were filled with players of that kind.  

Strategist.com

(C) Bredholt & Co.

  

Who's on First?

"Oh, somewhere in this favored land the sun is shining bright;

The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light,

And somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children shout;

But there is no joy in Mudville — mighty Casey has struck out."

-- Ernest Thayer, Casey at the Bat

 

By the time you read this post, the regular 162-game Major League Baseball season will have ended with divisional playoffs getting underway. The playoffs will be followed by the World Series between the American League and National League champions. 

The Kansas City Royals will play the Oakland A's in an American League wildcard slot (Update:  Royals beat the A's 9-8 in 12 innings). The Pittsburgh Pirates and San Francisco Giants pair off in the National League wildcard game (Update: Giants 8-0 over the Pirates).

Play-ins, begun in 2012, add excitement for the fans and revenue for the teams from broadcast and cable rights. After all, professional sports is a business, first, and a game, second. 

Depending on how fast teams are eliminated from the playoffs, with best-of-five and best-of-seven series, plus weather and travel, a six-month baseball season can extend through a  potentially chilly October, at least for the final two teams.

College of baseball knowledge

Here's a pop quiz to test your current knowledge of the game.

What do the following Major League Baseball teams have in common? (Team payroll for 2014 season according to Associated Press) 

American League

• East:  Boston Red Sox ($162.8 million)
• Central:  Minnesota Twins ($85.7 million)
• West:  Texas Rangers ($136.0 million)

 National League

• East:  Philadelphia Phillies ($180.0 million)
• Central:  Chicago Cubs ($89.0 million)
• West:  Arizona Diamondbacks ($112.6 million)

In 2014 each team on both lists finished dead last in their respective divisions. Together the six teams won 418 games while losing 554.  

The combined payroll of the six cellar dwellers was $766 million. A losing season doesn't come cheap in the major leagues. 

Lessons from the game

What can organizations learn from "America's pastime?"

1. Winning is harder than it looks. As bad as it is for those on the bottom, winning teams struggled to get over the .500 mark. Just half of 30 teams played .500 ball or better during the season. The Los Angeles Angels (AL) had the highest winning percentage in baseball at .609. The Angels won 95 games, 20 more than in 2013, with the sixth highest payroll in baseball, $155.6 million. The Baltimore Orioles (AL) and Washington Nationals (NL) finished at .590, the second highest percentage.  LA, Baltimore, and Washington lost a combined total of 195 games.   
2. It’s possible to wear the same uniform and not be on the same team. There's still a lot of room for individual achievement in baseball, especially in a free-market and social media world. Some players show up and do their job--but never build good working relationships with other members of the team. It doesn't take long to figure out who's a team player, or not. Improving trust and cooperation makes a difference in team performance.
3. Bad luck can be overcome--sort of. There's a chance of getting hurt playing just about any sport, including baseball. Just ask the catchers. Or second basemen. Players get sick, injured, jet-lagged, care for loved ones, and become tired and discouraged. Hitting streaks come and go. Every team faces problems during a long season. What's the difference between winning and losing teams? Often it's the right leaders creating healthy environments which allow players to rest and heal, then get back in the game. 
4. It costs to get the right talent in place. The American League Division winners--Baltimore Orioles, Detroit Tigers, Los Angeles Angels--and National League Division winners-- Washington Nationals, St. Louis Cardinals, and Los Angeles Dodgers--are among the top 15 payrolls in baseball. Even then there's no guarantee of peak performance. Just ask the Cincinnati Reds front office which spent $112.3 million on salaries for a next-to-last place finish in the NL Central. Keeping the right talent mix together for extended periods isn't easy with baseball's free agency and outsized salaries in the larger TV markets.     
5. There's always next year. Just look at the Boston Red Sox. World Champions in 2013. Last place in the American League East in 2014. Is it possible for the Red Sox to come back and win another World Series? After an 86-year drought, Fenway Park saw World Series championships in 2004, 2007, and 2013. Which reminds us, where would any team be without their fans? That's why in baseball hope springs eternal, even with Casey at the bat.

World Series ® is a registered trademark of Major League Baseball.

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© Bredholt & Co