THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

To answer your second question, I definitely would campaign against automatic concession rules.  Giving a manager the option of conceding seems fine.  They will be strongly disincentivized against using it due to potential fan and media backlash.  I see the rule being used once or twice per team a season when a game is particularly out of hand and the team already has issues with injuries/overworked relievers.  A manager would need to have a really strong position to justify using the concession.

I suppose you can make it optional.  I wouldn’t be against making it automatic, say, at the end of any inning starting at the end of the 5th inning, if the inning plus score difference is more than 18, make it an automatic concession.

You know, did we talk about this already?  This rule I made up sounds strangely familiar.

In baseball those last three innings of a “blow out” game have an effect on the next days games (more in some cases than others).  I am thinking in terms of pitcher usage and availability.  In curling or chess, my guess it does not.

In fact, I would think it would provide a benefit to the losing team in a curling or chess match to stick with it until the end.  Practicing against better competition and learning from mistakes should benefit the losing team.
vr, Xei

If baseball managers had the option to concede, I think they would use it quite often to keep from overworking their pitching staff.  I also think there would be considerable media controversy over a manager’s underuse or (probably more likely) overuse of conceding.

Imagine if a team wins its division, or gets mathematically eliminated from competition, and just concedes all of its remaining games.

I’m agin’ it in baseball, because one of my absolute favorite things about baseball is that you have to get 27 outs to win, there’s no running out the clock or such.

Of course I just realized that is not true because of rain shortened games.  Ban rain outs!

I’m fer it in most sports because I like sportsmanship.

Not sure about this. If I’m playing the Cardinals in five days, I wouldn’t want the current opponent to concede a game in which Chris Carpenter pitched six innings just because the score was 12-0. It would not be among the first 10 rule changes I’d like to see.

In order to protect against willy-nilly concessions, you first have to meet the concession threshhold, which could be say score + inning greater than 15 or 18 after 5 innings.  You can force the automatic concession if you like of the 18 threshhold. 

Of course, now you have the possibility that the manager will get a bad fielding team out there to force the threshhold.

You can make it that you can’t concede two games in a row, or more than say six in a season.

I hate the idea of this being permitted, because I much prefer the “it ain’t over til it’s over” philosophy.  Are we going to rewrite Yogi Berra?

Quite apart from any possible merits of the idea, it’s pretty unlikely to happen.

We’re focusing on the wrong use of the word “concessions” here.  Send the fans home early and they don’t spend their money on beer, hot dogs and pennants for a full 9 innings.  Watch how long it takes some clubs to declare a rain-out and you’ll appreciate how big a deal this is…

Furthermore, for teams that don’t routinely sell out, if you plant a seed in some fans’ minds that they may not get to see 9 innings of baseball, a significant fraction of them may decide it’s not worth it to knock off work early, pay $$ to park and buy tickets, and fight through traffic to go to the park.  Teams don’t want fans thinking “Better to watch it on my $800 42” plasma HDTV that I funded by forgoing two trips to the park"…

It’s not surprising that the cited examples, curling and chess, seldom have anyone paying to watch, or if they do, it is for such an extraordinary tournament or event where, if you annoy them by ending early, you have hardly any likelihood of being damaged by doing so, i.e. no one’s going to boycott the next Olympics because this Olympiad’s curling ended early.  Or if Garry Kasparov tips over his king in some championship chess match, no one’s thinking “well, no way am I buying a ticket next week”, because there is no next week…

I’m on board with this concept.  I’d never want to see it as automatic, and don’t think it rules like 2 games in a row or 6 per season would even be necessary.  I don’t think managers would be that eager to concede games.

One rule I’d consider is the game must go at least 5 innings.  Even if a manager wanted to concede a game where he was down 14-1 in the second, some consideration must be given to the fans who paid for that game.

Though I guess you could make it a rule that fans at a conceded game get a rain check - that would be another disincentive in case anyone thinks managers would overdo this.

I don’t mind watching blowouts.  I’d be disappointed if I sat down to watch a game and it ended after 6.  I’d feel a bit ripped off.

Other than that, I like the rule.  I don’t like any rule that forces a player, coach or manager to act against the best interests of his team.  And it’s obviously in the team’s interest to quit after 6 if it’s down 16-0.

Aren’t teams allowed to forfeit now?  What is the difference between conceding and forfeiting?  It’s bad PR, and they might get fined, but what’s to stop a manager from ordering his players to not take the field anymore after they are down 15 runs?  Or to order the pitcher to not throw a pitch, etc.  I don’t see why it’s not, strictly speaking, allowed for a team to give up. 

That said, there is something appealing about blowouts in baseball, much moreso than any other sport.  The games turn back into little league games where you’re never sure what will happen or who will play where and you’re more interested in a young fan catching a foul ball than scoring another run, and we all get to go out for ice cream when it’s over.

I doubt managers would be conceding too often.  I think their concession would be more about an overworked bullpen than anything else.  As a Cubs fan, there were times last year I just wanted the Cubs to get off the field.  Alfonso Soriano’s knee was a wreck, Ramirez had just returned from his dislocated shoulder and Derrek Lee was one slide away from landing on the DL with neck spasms.  I didn’t want any game being played longer than necessary. 

I agree that fans would have a problem with this rule, but it would be a short-term problem.  Our kids are going to remember baseball as always having the concession rule so in one generation whatever anger results from this will be gone.

I think we’d see managers use these blowout games very much the same way they currently do, which is to get underworked relievers into the game.  I just think it would be nice to have an option for the team getting blown out to just say, “It’s over.”

I like Tango’s idea about how to define the blowout game. 

I don’t see baseball ever making this a rule.  I just like the idea.

Curling has a maximum you can score per end, as there are only eight rocks thrown.  I’m no “Curlimetritian” but, from what I’ve seen, it is quite rare to score four in an end, and pretty good to get three.  Usually, you get two or one.

Say, after the 7th end, the other team has last rock, and you are down by five.  There’s really no point to keep playing because the other team will just keep peeling off your rock every time to limit your scoring, if any, to just one point.

In baseball, you can score an infinite amount of runs with only one out in your pocket.  Even if you are down by 50, you still have a chance. 

In chess, if you are down to just your king, there is no point to keep moving it around the board when your opponent has two bishops, a rook and a knight left.  Might as well concede.

If a team ever conceded in baseball because they were down, they should get no respect.  They are still “in the game”.  In other sports, it might already be over.

According to the win expectancy calculator on walkoffbalk.com, there have been 2134 games from 1976-2006 in which the visiting team was leading in the 7th inning by 7 runs.  The calculator only goes to 7 runs.  The visiting team won the game 10 times.  That’s less than 1%.  It would be even lower as the score increases.

That should say, “the home team won the game 10 times.” Sorry.

Though such a rule might make sense from the team’s point of view, I think that baseball would take a big hit on the public relations front if it instituted such a rule. Say a fan brought his kids from a couple of hundred miles away and that this is the only game of the season that they’re going to get to see live. (This is a common occurence with the Braves here in Atlanta.) They just might want to see a whole game, no matter how much of a blowout it is, because of the fact that they don’t get a chance to get to the ballpark all that much. The adults might lose interest when the game became lopsided, but what about the kids? They might still think there’s a chance to get a foul ball or something like that, or perhaps they would just like to see as much live baseball as they could.

Yeah I agree kind of like what chucko says.

I’m a mets fan.  I no longer live in NY tho and have to travel hours to go to games sometimes.  I’d be pretty mad to spend money on a ticket and all the travel only to find out the game was 6 innings.  I don’t like it.

Another thing to consider about Curling is that these tournaments, there are multiple games going on at the same time.  So even if u had people paying money (and Im guessing curling isnt anywhere the admission it is to go to ballgames) they could always watch one of the other matches.  Seems like the standard curling tournament is a round robin with 10 teams.....4 games going on at the same time and 2 teams on bye.  I know its like that for the winter games and usa national championship

On a side note, I been completely hooked on that game lol.  I can’t stop watching.  Wish they show more on TV. I think they do in Canada.

If I’m paying $100 to bring my family to the park I better see the whole game.  A 5 yr old doesn’t care if the score is 14-1.  He just wants to see the game played.  Fans can always leave early if they don’t want to watch the game.  Managers can always put in the bad rule 5 long relief pitcher if he is worried about tiring out the pen. 

I don’t really see the pros outweighing the cons from a fan’s perspective.  The risk of playing more innings might make conceding the better choice if you want to maximize the number of wins a year your team gets.  I’d argue we should be trying to maximizing fan enjoyment though.  Usually this is the same as maximizing wins however there are exceptions such as this.

#8 That’s exactly why I think an optional rule would be fine (with something like a 15 run threshold).  Managers should be averse to using the rule even when they qualify.  No home team would ever concede.

Another poster was right, no matter the merits this rule has a snow balls chance in hell of being put into the books.

Great point all-around guys.  Thanks for giving me a better perspective than my myopic view.

Two thoughts as to why concession makes more sense in curling than in baseball:

(1) At a major curling tournament, multiple games are taking place simultaneously.  Thus, from a spectator standpoint, even if the game you care about the most ends early due to a concession, there will be other games for you to watch.  In baseball, by contrast, an early concession would materially reduce the amount of entertainment you’re getting for your dollar.

(2) Data from curling suggests that once a team is 6 or more points behind, the chance they’ll come back is well below 1%.  As such, the concessions are viewed as an act of sportsmanship.  The same is true in bridge, another sport where concessions at the three-quarter point of day-long matches (or the five-sixths points of two-day matches) are common.

http://curlwithmath.blogspot.com/2008/11/statistics-for-womens-curling-and-what.html

#13. Depends on the level of your opponent for the chess analogy.  Even down to a King, if your opponent makes a bad blunder you can get a stalemate.  I’ve seen it happen plenty of times at the scholastic level.  But point taken.
vr, Xei

I agree with all the people saying this is a bad idea, for all the reasons they gave.

That said, if concessions are allowed, I’d prefer a limit instead of a trigger.  Each team gets eight concessions/ forfeitures per season.  How they use them now becomes something fans get to debate.  Fans are still guaranteed 154 nine inning games of baseball each year.  With only eight concessions allowed, its harder to game the system.

I could see teams that have had two rain delays in games against each other agreeing to each use one of their concessions, to avoid having to make up the rain delay.

Looking at old (pre-1920) box scores and game accounts, I’ve seen several examples of games being “called by mutual agreement” in the late innings of blowouts.  I’m not sure if there was a rule change or if the practice just fell into disuse.