Imbalance between offense and defense contributes to violence.

It's pretty obvious but still it eludes most. The defense ALWAYS has the offense outnumbered. Duh.

That's one reason that fights spread beyond the near participants. At best the offense is outnumbered 9 to 4. So ... out come members of the team on offense to even things up. Now the defense is outnumbered. So ... out come their teammates. For good measure what self respecting bullpen teammates would remain outside the fracas? Here they come, streaming across the outfield from two locations. It looks quite spectacular to spectators, which just gets them all the more involved and agitated, which increases the violent impulses of the players.

Somewhere the sun is shining.
Somewhere children shout.
But the Major Baseball League (MBL) still hasn't figured this out.