Once a Pitcher Is Removed From the Game Can They Go Back in and Pitch Again

Well, my journey to the clock side is now complete. Seven or so years ago, I offset wrote nigh the thought of pitch clocks in baseball game … and, looking back, I was basically insulted by the very thought. Information technology was an instinct, a bit of the baseball traditionalism pouring out. I doubtable I'm not the only person whose first reaction to new ideas in baseball game is like the reaction of a Mama Carry to her cub being threatened.*

*I can merely imagine how protective Ryne Sandberg's Mama Comport was of him.

Hither'due south what I wrote:

Baseball game — information technology's an escape from clocks. Baseball is a vacation from clocks. In baseball, in that location is none of that time anxiety, none of the feeling that every second matters, none of that clock-watching. There's a certain quiet, a certain calm in the rhythms of baseball. I don't desire some stupid clock ticking behind a bullpen, people in the stands counting downwards, pitchers throwing at the terminal possible second. Baseball game is at its all-time when you can melt into the game. Sure information technology'south a cliché, but when but right, baseball game does feel timeless. Who brings a timepiece to a timeless game?

I look back at that and … yeah, I'grand kind of embarrassed. What a bunch of semi-poetic nonsense. I was fully aware that games were moving at too slow a pace, and I had no idea what bear upon clocks might actually take, only right away, in the well-nigh human knee-wiggle, old-man-yells-at-cloud manner, I jumped headfirst into "No! Baseball game is the game without a clock! This will ruin the leisurely rhythm of the game! Find another solution!"

The only thing I will say on my ain behalf is that a few months afterwards I actually saw the clock in action at a Toledo Mud Hens game … and I was an immediate convert. I believe I've written nigh my least favorite announcer tick (especially in football), and that'due south when the announcer says something similar, "that'southward a coverage sack, in that location was nobody open up," and then replay shows that there were receivers running wide open all over the field, and the journalist DOUBLES DOWN on the original statement as if we're as well dumb to run into what'southward happening in front end of our eyes.

Immediately later the Mud Hens game, I wrote how wrong I had been.

It turned out that the digital clock -- which rolled somewhat unnoticed behind the batter -- was absolutely fantastic. It did non distract from the game the fashion I had thought information technology might. Instead, information technology kept the game flowing. It kept the action rolling. Afterwards years of watching baseball players stretch out the game the way George stretched out James Spader's sweater on Seinfeld, this was listen-blowing. The pitcher pitched. The hitter swung. The fielder caught. The pitcher pitched again. The game propelled itself. Aye, There was still the nice, relaxed footstep of baseball that I worried might be lost, just within that piece of cake pace was a steady drumbeat of action. It was, I must admit, glorious.

Once again, that was 7 years agone. Over those seven years, MLB games accept gotten about x minutes longer on average, which is pretty deplorable because the pace in 2015 was already Molina-like. There are rules in MLB that give umpires the quote-unquote "authority" to move the game along. Dominion 507c, for example, states: "When the bases are unoccupied, the bullpen shall deliver the brawl to the concoction within 12 seconds after he receives the brawl. Each fourth dimension the bullpen delays the game by violating this rule, the umpire shall call 'Ball.'" There are other such rules on the books as well.

But for any reason — perchance because umpires don't experience authorized to invoke those rules, perhaps because umpires accept likewise much else to worry about, perhaps considering the players would defection — the games accept just kept getting longer and slower, seemingly without much resistance.

But something interesting — and, again, distressing — was happening in the minor leagues. Fifty-fifty with a pitch clock, the game started getting longer again. In 2021, modest league games averaged about 3 hours. As J.J. Cooper wrote for Baseball America: "Pitch clocks have been a part of multiple levels of the minor leagues for a number of years. Only enforcement has been somewhat lax, and players have regularly figured out workarounds to take more fourth dimension."

Information technology'southward time to embrace the pitch clock. (Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Portland Press Herald via Getty Images)

Well, on Sabbatum, Baseball game struck back. On Saturday, a new pitch clock with harsh new penalties was instituted across the minor leagues. This clock was shorter (14 seconds with nobody on, 18 seconds with runners on base) and the brunt of getting that pitch off was placed on BOTH the pitcher and the hitter.

The penalty for a pitcher not beating the clock was a ball.

But, at the aforementioned time, the penalty for a batter stepping out of the box and non being ready to hit in time was a strike.

This admittedly created a flake of mayhem, as new rules volition. In Worcester, for instance, Carmine Sox bullpen Darwinzon Hernandez struck out the side on eight pitches considering two strikes were automatically chosen on tardy Lehigh Valley batters (the final strike of the inning was really an automatic strike). This, of form, is not ideal. Nosotros'll become back to this in a minute.

But first, we need to requite the headline: The average game time for the 50 nine-inning games in the minor leagues was two:38. Yeah, that'southward correct, 2:38 — that was the AVERAGE time of game. That was roughly 25 minutes less than the boilerplate time of game for the first week of the small leagues before the clock was put in.

Only eight of those 50 games lasted iii hours, while seven were finished in less than 2:20.

This was just a stunning reversal. Obviously, this was just one dark, and fifty-fifty more obviously, minor league baseball is not Major League Baseball game. But do you lot call up the terminal time Major League Baseball game games averaged two:38 or less? You do not call back this if you are twoscore years former or younger, considering information technology was 1984.

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And think, the thing that the pitch clock does is cut downward the expressionless time betwixt pitches. In that location might be other unknown benefits and/or consequences with the pitch clock, we don't know those notwithstanding, but nosotros do know that the games with the clock accept the exact same amount of action as those games without it. There are still 27 outs, three strikes is a strikeout, four assurance is a walk, etc.

This was the revelation that hit me watching that Mud Hens game way dorsum when — all the choice clock did was get everybody to play the game a bit faster.

Now, there are manifestly a few caveats. As mentioned, it'due south just one twenty-four hours'southward worth of games. I did a random scan of games since Saturday, though, and information technology seems like the tendency is very, very real. Here are a few Monday games that I happened to click on:

• International League: Syracuse at Columbus, 2:29

• International League: Rochester at Buffalo, ii:17

• Pacific Declension League: Circular Rock at Sugar Country, ii:47

• Pacific Coast League: Tacoma at Albuquerque, 2:49 (this was a 12-eleven game)

• Eastern League: Portland at Harrisburg, 2:17

• Eastern League: Altoona at Richmond, two:45

• Southern League: Birmingham at Chattanooga, ii:xx

• Texas League: Wichita at Northwestern Arkansas, 2:37

• Midwest League: South Bend at Fort Wayne, 2:36

• Northwest League: Spokane at Eugene, ii:21

• South Atlantic League: Greenville at Asheville, 2:26 (this was a 10-ix game)

I hateful, those times are kind of mind-blowing in 2022.

Second caveat, the rule is new and the punishments are astringent, and then yous can await things to slide once everybody gets used to it. Umpires surely will not sentinel the clock every bit closely. Pitchers and batters will probable figure out new ways around the clock.

3rd caveat, this is the minor leagues. People aren't really paying attending. It's one matter to call out a Lehigh Valley batter on an automated strike, just information technology will be a very different thing if that batter is Shohei Ohtani or Vladimir Guerrero Jr. Information technology's one matter to dock a pitcher in Altoona a ball for non pitching fast plenty, information technology's another if the game is at Yankee Stadium and the pitcher is Gerrit Cole.

I'm certain there are other caveats likewise … Just this pitch clock matter is obviously working. I call back we all can complaining the fact that baseball needs a pitch clock to get u.s.a. a comfortable but crisp pace, simply we are here: 30-plus years of bear witness suggests that the umpires and players will not speed up the game without one.

The pitch clock'due south time is now.

And as for the penalties, yes, they're harsh, and there volition undoubtedly be an inflexible and not particularly pleasant transition menstruation when everybody volition complain that baseball is being wrecked.

Merely I predict that — assuming MLB doesn't lose its nerve — everyone will get used to the clock. Batters will naturally empathise that they have to be gear up, and automated strike calls will go away. Pitchers will naturally understand that they tin can't merely stare the batter downward for 20 seconds, and automatic ball calls volition go abroad. I don't think MLB games will average ii:38, just even if they could knock it down to 2:50, that would be an enormous, game-altering difference.

Yes, I'thousand preaching with the zeal of the converted. I want the pitch clock. And I want information technology yesterday.

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Source: https://joeposnanski.substack.com/p/bring-on-the-pitch-clock