Geez. Yesterday on MLB Network Brian Kenny and his three guests briefly addressed a proposal so monumental that they did not think it could be implemented in 2017, that it would take another year. And what was this? Eliminating the need for the pitcher to throw four pitches to "intentionally walk" a batter.
I couldn't believe it. I had to check my sun dial to confirm that it is 2016. What kind of idiot would still use that as an example of why games are slow? There is interminable jerking around between all pitches. That's what is killing baseball. This dead time is augmented by the absurd meetings, primarily to speak to the pitcher.
By far the pitches with the least dead time between them are the ones to issue an intentional walk. I'm not opposed to simply waiving the batter to first base as it's been in softball for decades. My point is that there are so few intentional walks and that each takes so little time, who in his/her right mind would even think of that as a problem?
In 2015 there were 183,628 plate appearances and 951 intentional walks. That's half of one percent. And the entire event takes about 20 seconds, maybe 30 seconds. There were 4,848 games. What the heck?
And Brian Kenny did not utter a syllable in disagreement.
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