Baseball and the Tie Game: A Logical Match
September 29, 2016, marked a cool and damp evening in Pittsburgh. PNC Park was sparsely populated for game No. 159 of the regular season, the final Pirates’ home game of the campaign.
The hosts had little to play for, having been eliminated from postseason contention, failing to make the playoffs after three consecutive trips to the postseason. The visiting Cubs had already secured a playoff spot and the best record in the NL.
I sensed many, including those in the press box, were ready for the season to end. Then the rains came. The tarp was deployed. Western Pa. was soaked by more than an inch of rain.
In the sixth inning of a 1-1 tie, the umpires decided they had see enough regular-season baseball in Pittsburgh in 2016. They sent everyone home with baseball’s first tie game since 2005. I was there as a witness, recounting the events for what turned out to be the last game story I wrote as a beat reporter for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.
I am revisiting this history today because of the Jeff Passan’s report from Wednesday that revealed the league’s plans to experiment with some radical extra-inning practices at the lower-levels of the minor leagues this season — notably, beginning extra innings with a runner on second base. The goal is to avoid ridiculously long games that tax everyone, most notably young arms. And the experiment could eventually lead to implementation at the major-league level.
Predictably, the news was met with snark as you can observe through Twitter comments..
If you care for my opinion, I am not a proponent of overtime or extra-innings play deviating from how the game is played and structured during regulation. As entertaining as the college-football overtime can be, the punting game is eliminated along with deep vertical passing. It’s not the same game that’s played in regulation. (Although, as the Atlanta Falcons can attest, the college game has the benefit of allowing both teams to possess the football.)
So, like many, I do not care for the idea of artificially placing a man on second to began an inning to hasten the end of a game. However, I do appreciate the willingness of Joe Torre and company to take a creative approach in addressing what they view to be a problem. Said Torre to Yahoo!:
“Let’s see what it looks like,” said Joe Torre, the longtime major league manager who’s now MLB’s Chief Baseball Officer and a strong proponent of the testing. “It’s not fun to watch when you go through your whole pitching staff and wind up bringing a utility infielder in to pitch. As much as it’s nice to talk about being at an 18-inning game, it takes time.”
In an era when bullpens are more specialized, when we’re more concerned about wear and tear on elbows and arms, considering a change to the extra-innings format is rational and logical.
What good does wearing down a pitching staff do for the individuals involved or the teams? (Particularly the losing team.) And while it might be fun to boast about sitting through an 18-inning game, recent personal experience as a beat reporter suggests that most fans don’t stick around. (And beer sales end after the seventh inning, right?) It’s more enjoyable to flip to the 16th inning of the game from your sofa and watch the curiosity that is a position player being summoned to pitch due to a depleted bench and bullpen. Someone like Travis Snider coming in to strike out Joey Votto.
(OK, OK, that wasn’t an extra-inning game, but it was a game played after the Pirates had gone to extra innings in two of their previous four games… and it’s Travis Snider striking out Joey Votto.)
So many, it seems, did not care for the proposal reported by Yahoo! Well, here’s another proposal many will likely find repugnant but that carries some logic: why not have more games end in ties? Instead of having ties in baseball once a decade, why not a handful of times per year? Beyond tradition, beyond the prospect of occasionally failing to name a winner and loser for the day, what are the drawbacks?
After, say, 12 innings are played and teams are still even, declaring a game a tie seems like a reasonable option. Because there are so many games played, a regular-season baseball game is the least scarce commodity among its pro sports contemporaries. MLB plays twice as many games as the NHL, which has long embraced ties and now rewards overtime losses. College football long had ties and the NFL has its occasional tie game, despite the relative scarcity of games played. With European soccer becoming more mainstream in the U.S., perhaps the idea of a game ending in a tie is not so antithetical to the American spirit as it once was.
The idea of crying or tie games in baseball seems abhorrent to many, I’m sure. But if you were drawing up baseball from scratch today, I don’t think the creators would include the potential for an infinite number of innings in a game.
The game has changed so much. Pitchers are expensive and fragile, bullpens more specialized. I don’t believe any manager loves exhausting his staff in a 13-plus-inning affair and how it can affect a club the next day or next series. Few fans are willing to sit through the entirety of such a game. And by the 10th inning, every sports writer just wants to go home or back to his or her hotel room.
I’ve seen an MLB game declared a tie, and I have to tell you: it wasn’t so bad. And ending a game with no winner might be preferable to artificially trying to hasten the process of creating one.
A Cleveland native, FanGraphs writer Travis Sawchik is the author of the New York Times bestselling book, Big Data Baseball. He also contributes to The Athletic Cleveland, and has written for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, among other outlets. Follow him on Twitter @Travis_Sawchik.
I’m on board for ties. The sport is played for entertainment purposes….I doubt you’ll get much agreement though.
No, baseball is a competition. People played baseball before there were crowds and stadiums and television. Ties defeat the purpose of a competition.
So are all the other sports that can end in ties, I guess?
Football/soccer says hello from the rest of the world. It’s a competition over 162 games not a one off cup. The best team wins through even with individual ties.
I’d be for ties after 12 completed innings, but looking over the standings and seeing 1/4 games back would just be maddening.
Do the math. There would be no 1/4 games back. 80-70-1 would be the same as 80-70.
Great idea, totally for it.
Travis, you’re the best. My Fangraphs experience is infinitely more rewarding now that you’re on board!
Love your idea. While I happen to enjoy the lengthy games (I can never get enough baseball!), I wouldn’t mind the game being called at 12 innings for precisely the reasons you mentioned. Artificially changing the game by placing a batter at 2nd is way worse than just ending the game.
“Artificially changing the game by placing a batter at 2nd is way worse than just ending the game.”
Exactly.
Jerry Meals is against this.
This has my full support. Makes all of the sense.
I disagree. Baseball is a past time, not a clocked game. If a game has to go 18 innings, let it go 18 innings. I enjoy seeing Wilson Valdez pitching every so often. Injuries can happen in a 9 inning game too, I like we’re searching for a solution where there is no problem.
Well, I”m not exactly FOR declaring games a tie after 12 innings, but it’s a heckuva lot better than the idea of artificially placing a runner at 2b.
Just say “NO” to choosing the lesser of two evils!
I say do like they do PK’s in soccer, only make it a HR derby if the game is tied beyond 10 innings.
This is more or less what they did in the NHL by going to shootouts after a short overtime in the regular season. It has been (generally and correctly) derided as an obnoxious skills competition that shouldn’t determine outcomes of games that matter.
That being said, they also recently changed overtime to include 3 skaters instead of 5, and that’s been mostly awesome. I think forcing teams to play with only 4 position players (plus the pitcher and catcher of course) past the 9th inning is a terrible idea, but it is pretty fun to think about. Not only would holes suddenly open up all over the field, but you would be dropping your three worst hitters from the lineup. Come to think of it, I’d much rather watch this than starting with a man on second.
^ Must be an Orioles fan…
i’ll say this, if they keep going past 9 innings, they gotta stop cutting off beer sales in inning 8……
You’ve clearly never been to Toronto…
Oh they definitely cut off after 7. I found out the hard way that this was something that happened.
I’m also on board for this. Or why not have a home run derby to decide the game after 14? Just joking, but I’d prefer that to a runner on second I think.
I figure they should go with something as natural to the regular flow of the game like soccer has. First basemen throwing at bowling pins positioned at shortstop, whoever knocks over the most wins.
I’ll have to disagree. The Every-One-Else-Is-Doing-It argument doesn’t do it for me. Baseball already has a stigma of being “the boring sport”. Throwing ties into the mix only supports that uninformed argument.
Also, you don’t mention playoff games. I’m assuming you wouldn’t advocate for playoff ties, correct? Or would you continue with the soccer/hockey pattern and settle a playoff tie with a short HR derby?
That puts AL teams at quite the advantage, with the DH and all. There were 300 more HR’s in the AL than NL. You’d be all but forcing different roster construction.
And, LOL, who’s pitching to them?!
The other team, obviously.
Wait. Then they would just be playing baseball. Why don’t they just play baseball to decide who wins?
One of their teammates, just as in the ASG.
Playoff games would have to keep going. And that’s the same in the NHL where they still go on forever. It’s only in tournaments where they will settle playoff/elimination games using a shootout.
Yeah, in a playoff game there’s far less worry that the fans have all left or that you’re changing things for the next series.
You can rearrange the roster at the end of each series, you get more days off, and the series are longer so it’s more likely that you’ll be playing the same opponent a few more times anyway; and hopefully few fans leave early at an extra innings playoff game.
Playoffs you just keep going.
You amaze me once again, Travis. In my 65+ years as a sports fan, I have never shared the prevalent aversion to a tie. I am extreme in that I would even have loved the World Series last year to end in a tie after Game 7’s 9th inning. Both teams played great and deserved to share the title.
In baseball’s regular season the teams are punished for tying by having to, as you pointed out, wear out their players and be at a disadvantage against their next opponent.
If you want to protect pitchers, don’t allow them to participate after the 12th inning. Sure, I prefer your tie idea to runners on second, but I prefer hitters pitching as opposed to ties.
Position players can get injured that way too. http://www.sportsnet.ca/baseball/mlb/blue-jays-notebook-injured-goins-no-regrets-mound-appearance/
I just don’t see the need for such a drastic change. There were 188 extra inning games last year, and 124 of those were done after 11. Only 33 games went longer than 12 innings. If we want to call those 33 games a tie, that’s fine (personally, I am still the fan who would prefer an infinitely long game). But starting with a man on second is ridiculous and shortsighted.
There may have only been 33 games that would have been artificially ended, but every game played is affected in some way by the possibility that it might go deep into extras. Managers have to be more conservative with their players and pass up strategic opportunities. That last bench player might be the best matchup to score the winning run in the top of the 9th, but he’s the backup catcher and we don’t want the starting catcher having to catch 5 more innings.
That “only” 33 games went longer than 12 innings is a better argument for the tie, to me. Games that long are detriments to both teams playing, and beneficial to teams that will play the two participating teams in the next series. That’s bad schedule design, and the 33 times that a team got to benefit from a game they weren’t playing in is worse than the benefit of the long game that’s effectively a coin flip.
How many ties would we have had over, say, the last 10 years if your rule had been on the books? I’m open to the idea.
I’ve never really understood why regular season games in any sport go to extra innings, overtime, what-have-you.
Imagine how entertaining/unique it would be if it only happened in the postseason…
It seems like the Japanese rule of declaring games ties after the 12th inning is worth considering. They also have a time limit which I would not support. The strategies and impact of a 12 inning limit could be easily studied this way. I FAR prefer this move as opposed to the gimmicky addition of an automatic runner moving to second base in extra innings.
Excellent idea, and I think 12 is the right number. Teams would get at least one time through the lineup before calling it a draw. I presume playoff games would still have the potential to go 20, 30 innings, but no need to prolong regular season games.
Putting a runner on 2nd base is what they do in women’s softball, since scoring is so low. I hate that idea. Another thing is that it would drastically alter pitching stats for relievers pitching in extra innings. Charging them an earned run for somebody they didn’t put on base isn’t equitable.
The Kansas plan in college football also has this type of negative effect. Teams that score 20 points in regulation sometimes go three overtimes, and so the final score is 41-34 or something, and they get inflated touchdown totals.
Likewise, penalty kicks in soccer are ridiculous. Why not just flip a coin if they’re invoking so much randomness into the equation? Or why not fix the rules so there are more 3-2 matches and fewer 1-1 matches? Widen the goal by four feet on each side or reduce the number of players on a side.
If they think baseball games are too long, they can blame things like extended commercial breaks, the glut of relief pitchers that face only one or two batters, batters going deeper into counts than in earlier generations, and silly replay review. Modern baseball has created many of its own problems, but instead of addressing the causes, they’re treating the symptoms.
“Another thing is that it would drastically alter pitching stats for relievers pitching in extra innings. Charging them an earned run for somebody they didn’t put on base isn’t equitable.”
When an RP allows an inherited runner to score [and there is no error], they aren’t charged with an ER, so not sure why this would be different.
In the current rules, whoever put the runner on base is charge with the ER, so I imagine if this runner scores, it would not go as an ER for anyone in particular.
It would still inflate runs scored for a player that did not fully earn his way around the bases.
Pinch runners don’t fully earn their way around, either. It would inflate team scoring slightly, but we have analytics to correct for that.
In a typical MLB season 20,000 some-odd runs are scored. How many of these runners are going to actually score? Dozens? A couple of hundred?
We’re talking about an extra 1% percent tops.
That would seem odd too, because all first runs scored in an extra inning would be unearned. And then sticking the pitcher with the loss when he possibly didn’t allow any baserunners would be bizarre, eh?
(1) it is almost always going to be a reliever– how much weight do you put on RP w/L records?
(2) From the verbiage of the rulebook:
“The losing pitcher is the pitcher who allows the go-ahead run to reach base for a lead that the winning team never relinquishes.”
If that runner is the one in question, then by the current rules, no one would get the loss, so presumably a new rule would be added to handle it [or another part of the rules could be modified]:
“If a relief pitcher, who would normally be in line for a win, makes a ‘brief appearance’ and is deemed ineffective, the official scorer can grant the win to the succeeding relief pitcher.”
They could add something that allows the official scorer to assign the loss to another pitcher if he feels that the one in question didn’t pitch poorly to deserve the loss…?
While those are possible workarounds, I guess the part I don’t like the most is that it instantly puts the pitcher at a disadvantage, a la penalty kicks rendering the goalie almost useless. Ultimately, it upsets the competitive balance. It’s not fundamentally different than making the pitcher use an “extra inning mound” that’s 70 feet from home plate, or giving the batter two extra strikes.
For soccer, an obvious way to avoid ties would be to give the win to the team with most shots on goal, or most time spent in opponent’s half of the field. Not only would that avoid the PK shootout, but it would reduce the type of all-defense, no- offense strategy that weaker teams sometimes use intentionally to tie a stronger opponent that they know they can’t outscore during regulation.
I now this isn’t FootballGraphs, but penalty kicks are not ridiculous. Shooting is an essential part of football association, and penalty kicks reward good shooters and goalkeepers, as a normal football match usually does. There is no equivalent in baseball, american football or even hockey (you need to dribble the goalie).
I think a tie game after 12 innings is not bad. It’d be less than 2% of the total games on a season, according to the math of Captain Tenneal.
Strike throwing competition? First guy to throw a ball 😉
What skill that a goalie possesses, other than guessing “do I dive left, or do I dive right?” is at play here? The goalie is almost completely emasculated. Now, if they started the ball twice as far away, allowed the kicker to dribble and the goalie to come out to contend, then that would be much fairer, and it would be a hundred times as exciting.
Travis, your work is generally good, but this is a very tone-deaf article. The multiple references to the feelings of the media are a good “tell.” They should be way down the list of stakeholders in prioritizing changing the ending of games.
We are a payoff/outcome/winner and loser society. CFB and NHL moved away from ties because few are going to pay high ticket prices (in this country) to see a 0-0 or 3-3 tie.
Being from a consumer marketing background, I am guessing MLB’s internal metrics must be showing a lot of future red flags. IMO, the game needs a radical overhaul to remain relevant long-term, but a tie is not giving the consumer what they want.
Unfortunately, I agree with much of what Scott says here.
What I can’t do, though, is put myself in the shoes of a casual baseball fan. I don’t really know how much a casual fan cares about a winner and loser. I’m sure they’ll say they want a winner and loser (and too many will blurt out about participation trophies and wussification). But many of those will leave before the conclusion of an extra inning game. I’d also bet there are many casual fans who, the day after, might not even remember who won the game.
Looking at Tango’s Run Expectancy Charts (http://www.tangotiger.net/re24.html), a runner on second with nobody out scores a run just over 60% of the time with an average of 1.1 runs scoring. Somebody mathier than me, can figure out how often we’d expect the game to continue to another inning (both teams scoring a run, or neither team scoring a run) and just how many extra innings this would save. It seems like it wouldn’t be unfrequent that both teams would score a single run and the game would continue.
I am equally un-mathy, and had the same inkling about RE and both teams scoring.
If (and I’m not advocating for this), but if we’re adding runners I feel like putting a guy on first makes the most sense, based on my math-challenged understanding.
Depending on how the runner at 2nd is chosen, I think the run expectancy could be higher. If the offense gets to choose, they’re not putting Victor Martinez on 2nd, they’re putting Jerome Dyson or Billy Hamilton, I.E., a fast guy that could score without a hit or guaranteed to score on a single.
If it’s just the next batter in the lineup at the end of the 9th, can they pinch run a fast guy?
It would certainly see an increase in a roster spot for a fast, pinch running type..& an increase in value & maybe usage for a Andrew Miller type wipe out reliever that could possibly strike out the side & strand the runner at 2nd.
I was at the Jays 19 inning game this year. It was probably less than 1/4 of the stadium that stuck it out that long, most leaving after about the 12th. And if you’re leaving after the 12th inning anyways, I don’t think calling a game a tie really will matter or impact you.
That being said, it was a mix of fun/awful/annoying to stick it out for 19 innings, only to see your team lose because your second position player of the day gave up a homerun. So had they ended that game after 12 innings, I would have gotten 2 hours of my life back, and probably been fine with it.
Saludos, soy lector de Fangraphs (sé leer en ingles). No estoy de acuerdo con esta loca regla que se experimentará. Con esto se forzaría a tener un ganador, algo que no puedo comprender.
Hola, soy el jugador Fangraphs (iitam inglés). No comparto para obtener estas reglas loco. Además, él fuerza para ser un ganador, algo que no entiendo.
I would support a tie game outcome after 12 innings but with one wrinkle
if after the bottom of the 12th the home team Manager notifies the Crew Chief that they will accept a tie, the game is over after 12 innings
if the home team sends out a pitcher for the 13th, then the teams play the 13th and the home team can again exercise its option to accept a tie if after the 13th the score is still tied
this goes on until there is either a winner or the home team accepts a tie
as long as the home team starts an inning the teams are obligated to play it
I like it… kind of along the lines of resigning in chess.
there you go
Interesting idea, but do you really want a game that ends with the entire crowd booing?
This isn’t even a break with tradition. Baseball used to have lots of ties before stadiums had lights.
I’ve favored the idea of ties for a few years now, although not ardently. ATM, my vote would got to playing 12 innings, so basically one more guaranteed time through the order for each team before calling it.
One question is whether two ties would count the same as one win and one loss in determining the standings.
I love long extra inning games. My favorite in-person game memory involves a relief pitcher making his debut not on the mound, but at the plate, and winning the game with a walk off single in the 14th in a game between two very bad Reds/Nats teams in like 03 or 04 or something. It was a delight.
Frankly, the game of baseball is perfect as is to me. It doesn’t need to be shorter or faster paced; extra innings are a welcome anomaly as often as they occur; pitching changes and the DH and whatever else people complain about are a-ok by me. I love baseball, as constructed.
Call me a cranky old man if you will, but baseball doesn’t need changing at all. It’s the perfect game, as it stands, without meddling with it.
Putting a runner on second to start the inning is a dumb idea. I would prefer ties. I would prefer more if we did not change anything.
The reason why we currently have an issue with extra innings is teams seem to be obsessed at carrying as many 1 inning relievers as they possibly can and then use them for 1-2 outs each. (This also is one of the reasons games go on for so long.) This can work if you can gather a whole lot of good relievers or if the starting pitchers eat a lot of innings, but for most teams it is far from an optimal strategy. They would be better off finding a couple of so-so long relievers to eat innings which solves the problem with the extra inning games. They would also be better off if they used their good relievers for more than 1 inning at time when the situation warrants.
This is merely baseball refusing to address the fact that their bullpen management is poorly thought out.
How does placing a runner on 2nd at the top of the inning work? Is it the next man up in the batting order. What if that is Yoenis Cespedes? We taking the bat our of his hands. What if he is a home run short of hitting for the cycle? What if the next man up is Bartolo Colon pitching long relief. You want him to run? No, so you burn a player and if he doesn’t score you burn another pitcher next inning.
If the next hitter is Bartolo Colon, he bunts.
Iresponded above to another post & will copy/paste here:
“If the offense gets to choose, they’re not putting Victor Martinez on 2nd, they’re putting Jerome Dyson or Billy Hamilton, I.E., a fast guy that could score without a hit or guaranteed to score on a single.
If it’s just the next batter in the lineup at the end of the 9th, can they pinch run a fast guy?
It would certainly see an increase in a roster spot for a fast, pinch running type..& an increase in value & maybe usage for a Andrew Miller type wipe out reliever that could possibly strike out the side & strand the runner at 2nd.”
To further your question, what if the next hitter up is Miguel Cabrera or David Ortiz..a team’s best hitter, who happens to be very slow. Take the bat out of his hands? Yank him out of the game? What do you do if the pitcher is up next in NL games & possibly burn another pitcher, like you said? Lots of tactical questions.
My preferred solution to this relative non-problem is for things to remain exactly as they are; there is an important beauty to the potential infinitudes in baseball. I talk to a lot of young fans, and the realization that an at bat, inning, or game could potentially go on FOREVER is a poignant epiphany.
The idea of tying games after twelve, or giving the home team the option of calling it a tie after the completion of twelve, is my second-favorite option because in a way, it both updates the game and restores an older tradition, when ties were more common. There have been hundreds of tied baseball games, back in the good old days when players had trains to catch.
Starting with a runner on second is not the most repulsive idea you could come up with, but it’s awfully close.
Why does everyone in search of problems nobody is complaining about? Is there some groundswell of fan outrage at the 18-inning games each team has something like once every three years? I mean, yes, ties would be preferable to the starting-runners-on-second … but then a punch in the nose is better than a bullet to the brain. Why are we even having this conversation?
I guess it boils down to
1) The owners want to do things about game times and whatnot
2) All of the serious solutions (i.e. actually reducing time between pitches) involve standing up to the players and/or umps who want the status quo
3) The owners only want to do that if it’s about getting more money, so
4) We owners and the leagues floating asinine crap as a backdoor way of getting at the real issues.
I like something like coopatroopa’s idea but a little less extreme.
The goal should be to make it more likely for teams to score but to alter the game as little as possible (i.e. nothing like soccer, where the shootout is essentially a completely different sport).
What if after the 11th or 12th, if the game is still tied, each team loses one defensive player each inning? The bonus is that it adds a strategic element in the defensive positioning.
And in the rare cases where a game makes it to the 15th or 16th inning and teams are playing “The King and his Court” style, that would be incredibly fun to watch!
I am a purist and think the game is fine, but since we’re entertaining ideas, this one sounds fun. It pains me to say this, but ending in a tie is worse than even the unfair NFL-type overtime rules. Ties are not fun. Pretty much any gimmicky alternative would be more entertaining and worth watching.
How exactly are NFL overtime rules unfair? It’s a continuation of the regular game, and a team has less than a 40% chance of scoring a touchdown on a given drive that begins with a kickoff.
Good piece, Travis. I definitely prefer the idea to the runner on second to start the inning. I think I still prefer the current approach though. I’ve never heard anyone say “I can’t stand games that go more than 13 innings” when talking about game length; I think the focus should be on speeding up the 9 innings, not these various nonsense proposals that Manfred puts forward.
I’m surprised and disappointed that the FG crowd would not consider using an obvious tie-breaker: give the win to the team that accumulated the most RAA or RAR during the nine innings. In fact, it would be fairer if all games were decided in this way, but of course that’s not going to happen. But why not do it for the relatively small number of tie games? It would be a teaching moment for the fans, who could fairly easily learn the run value of different offensive events. And it would set up some interesting situations, e.g., a team tied in the bottom of the ninth could come from behind to win without scoring.
RAA… Runners Almost Advancing? RAR Runs Are a Rarity? Baseball is about coming home. Who does it the most wins.
That would alter the strategy too much, turning it into essentially a gimmick.
Ties are an interesting idea, less gimmicky than starting with a runner on second, certainly. However, I’d rather the focus be on speeding up the game during regulation.
For example, when relievers come into the game, only allow warm up pitches on the field mound for the first reliever in an inning – make any other relievers that pitch in the same inning completely warm up in the bullpen. Allow the first manager/coach visit to the mound in an inning without having to take the pitcher out, but all other visits from non-players would require a pitching change. Install a pitching clock as they’ve experimented with in the minors. Still allow the catcher and other defensive players to visit the mound, but require the pitcher to throw his next pitch within the twenty second limit (or whatever the clock time is). Those changes would actually speed up the game, and not feel as gimmicky as starting a runner on second in extras.
I agree in principle to take care of the things that are actually making the game take longer. However, one minor disagreement: a time clock on the pitcher is a recipe for disaster. I’d like to hear a description about how different scenarios would play out. For example, if it’s a 20-second clock, then if the pitcher wants to go through the signals again, he’s out of luck? Or if he gets to 18 seconds and the runner on first takes a big lead, he doesn’t have any more time to glance over at the runner? Runners could basically get a running start at 19 seconds and steal second easily. And would it be a replay booth official (in New York?) watching the clock? So how often in a game would they have to buzz down and say “Nullify that last pitch–he went over”? Total nightmare.
If the problem we’re trying to solve is wear on pitchers’ arms, the teams should be managing this on their own. Extra Innings are not predictable but they are not unexpected either, so they should set up their roster to absorb it. Better teams will be better at it. That’s the point, right?
Also, the new 10-day DL might help, especially if they can use it for something vague like “fatigue.”
Ties don’t really bother me in general, but changing the rules of baseball does. With few exceptions, baseball is played until someone wins.
With the runner-on-second plan, I assume the team gets to choose which player to put on 2nd? So would Billy Hamilton suddenly become the most valuable player in baseball?
Last year teams had an average of 12 extra inning games. I think Hamilton on 2B with 0 outs is almost guaranteed to score, compared to the league average 60%. That’s got to be worth several wins. I think that consequence is unintended and bad.
If the run value of a man on second, no outs, is 0.6, and Hamilton’s value is at a maximum, 1.0, then he is worth 0.4 runs in this situation, or about 5 runs in 12 such games. That is about half a WAR.
It’s a high leverage situation. A run in a tie game in the bottom of the twelfth is NOT worth only 0.1 wins.
WAR treats all runs as created equally because generally you don’t get to choose when to score a run, but if Hamilton is a sure run, and a team gets to choose who to put on second, then Hamilton’s runs are not randomly distributed, and the assumption that all runs are equal is also incorrect.
Hamilton in the proposed situation is worth .2 wins more than an average player, because he wins all the time, and the home team otherwise wins .8 of the time (.6 they win in the current half inning, the rest of the time it’s still a coin toss).
This is an example of a solution in search of a problem. I just hope saner people prevail so baseball doesn’t turn into a four-hour soccer match.
Some of my best baseball memories are of deep extra innings. Watching my Yankees play 16 against the Indians deep into the night at my cousin’s wedding. Chase Headley arriving in the dugout for his debut mid-game only to hit a walk-off in the 14th. Plans to go hiking at the end of a Mets-Cards day game derailed by it’s inability to end, as they played 18 innings: two full games.
I also think teams are getting the strategy wrong, and should always put in the next day’s starter. Pitching 2 good innings in sudden death extras is as valuable as starting the next game well, and if you have to call up a spot starter, that’s nowhere near the downgrade that you get when you put a position player in with the game on the line. There’s a tendency to approach the 15th inning differently from the tenth, but they’re both sudden death; a win is still on the line. I say let the spectacle of long extra-innings games live on, and the teams that put in a position player deserve their fates.
there you go.
I’m OK with allowing games to end in a tie, but if it does, it should impact the record somehow, either as a half-win/half-loss, or as a point whereas a win is two or three points.
Interesting that FG’s 2016 standings don’t show the tie. The Cubs’ record is presented as 103-58, which is inaccurate.
Pretty sure there’s an MLB rule that ties don’t count in the standings. No one has suggested the Cubs record is 103-58-1 (well, aside from you).
But this does raise in interesting point. If ties become a regular thing where each team has 1-3 per year, we have to figure out how they impact standings. If the Nationals are 93-69 and the Mets are 92-68 with two ties, do the Mets win the division or is that a tie?
“It’s not fun to watch when you go through your whole pitching staff and wind up bringing a utility infielder in to pitch”
Is he insane? That’s almost about the most fun I have the entire baseball season!
This is a solution to a problem that doesn’t exist.
Major league baseball games are too long but it’s 9-inning games that are the problem not the occasional game that goes many extra innings. While long games are fun to watch on TV, at the stadium somewhere between the 12th and 14th inning they go from “cool, extra innings” to “OMG, will this ever end?”. I’d be fine with ties (or suspended games) after 12 innings and/or 4 hours but I don’t think anything is wrong with the way it is.
For minor league baseball, while people root for the home team (and occasionally the visiting team), I don’t think fans generally cares who wins on a given night. Putting a runner on 2nd to try to determine A winner rather than the “deserving” winner seems fine. I’d be OK with this in Spring Training, WBC, even college baseball regular season. But I think as you move to playoffs and MLB and the games count, it’s a gimmicky way to determine a winner.
For years I have called for this. I think 16 inning or more games are ridiculous. There is no reason to play 2 games (18 innings) to get the winner for one in baseball. Especially considering the way pitchers are used in todays game. It’s not like basketball where you can sit, rest, and get back in the game. Once you are out you are out. I see nothing wrong with a few ties during the season.
If the length of a game your at bothers you, for goodness sake leave early. In the end, this entire issue is designed to give Flo and Progressive more time to talk to you. As to a writers discomfort in the pressbox, who in the heck cares how flat his tush gets. Gee, what’s the baseball equivalent of commercial timeouts that have plagued football. For christ sake, your talking about a net saving of 15 minutes in a game on average. Gather some perspective.
I’m for leaving things alone, but I had an idea that is a variant of the NFL/college tiebreaker. Starting in the 11th inning the visitors start with a runner on third. If they don’t score the home team gets the same opportunity in the bottom of the inning. This pattern repeats in each odd inning until somebody wins. I know it screws up a bunch of metrics, but so will any tiebreaker system if one is put in place. There would be no tiebreaker in the playoffs. I just don’t like the idea of ties in baseball.
Counterpoint: http://i.imgur.com/8zzrPyI.gif
Brought to you by extra innings.
In all seriousness, I love when baseball gets wacky. Baseball has unique ability to get weird. Only in extras do you get Scott Proctor hitting with the winning run on third, falling down going to first, and making it because Julio Lugo inexplicably went even though there was only 1 out.
I also love the up and down tension of you are looking at your due up and theirs, your pitcher and theirs. The thrill as an away team of surviving the heart of their lineup in the home half of the inning.
I have no problem with ties generally and don’t think it is antithetical to baseball or anything. I just enjoy a tight game being extended.
Also, I like managers being punished for stupid overmanagement of bullpens. The fan of the game in me loves seeing a manager (even my team’s when it was Fredi) have to send out the 7th pen arm for 3 innings because he wasted a top reliever getting their #8 man with 2 out & none on with our P spot due up in the next half inning.
I kind of wonder if having a limit actually has the unintended effect of causing greater overuse knowing that when the starter goes 6, you just need 7-8 guys to last 6 innings max. I’d rather watch 3 more innings than 3 more mid-inning pitcher changes. Though that is admittedly a false-dichotomy, I do believe the limit leads to even more Fredi-style Managin’™.
I believe if they(MLB and Players Assoc.) want to address the length of games it should be across the board. So, if a game is called early due to weather or rioting fans (when trump attends) the game should be continued at a later date to it’s full nine.
Seriously. The length of the season needs to be addressed. Baseball is not meant to be played in November… limit the regular season to 150 games.
I would much rather see the game end in a tie than do something like start each inning with a runner on 2nd base. That said, I’d propose that it be capped at 4 extra innings rather than 3. There just has to be some consequences for having a LOOGY on your roster.