THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

What’s wrong with tradition? I am all for the DH, but sometimes, tradition is more than just an arbitrary way of doing things.

I didn’t say I was against tradition. 

Just because “A” leads to “B” doesn’t mean that “B” leads to “A”.

In this particular case, tradition is bad.

The argument for the pitcher hitting is that everyone else has to hit, so why not the pitcher?

A better argument FOR the DH is that, the pitcher has to pitch, so why not everyone else?  If there’s a “designated pitcher,” why not have a “designated hitter?”

If I’m not mistaken, there are only two fielding positions that have specific requirements: Catcher, who is allowed to stand in foul territory (and probably has other priviledges), and Pitcher.  Why don’t all players have to rotate through C and P like through the batting order?

Again, if you have a DC and DP, why not a DH?

I read the arguments and agreed with them, and still don’t care for the DH. I think it’s a clumsy rule that was designed to solve a problem that should have been solved differently.

Still, there’s no real reason you couldn’t have entirely separate offensive and defensive lineups, with players allowed to appear in both. If you pinch-hit for a two-way player, he could stay in the defensive lineup, which would just be a list of nine. A player replaced on defense (usually the pitcher) could still play offense as long as he hadn’t already.

That would bother me less than the DH does. It wouldn’t really change the game. It’d make the box score a challenge, though.

Great way to look at it Phil.  Never thought of it in those terms.  You are right that there are only 3 functional roles: guy on the mound, guy behind the plate, and 7 other guys who can play wherever they want to.

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The argument against a football-type arrangement is that it is not appealing to have 9 bashers on offense and 9 clones of Adam Everett and Gary Pettis on fielding.  The game rules of football lends itself to having a 180-lb player playing next to a 300-lb player.  If you make baseball this football-style, it won’t look like that at all.

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Going back to Phil’s point: I think you could improve on the DH rule by forcing the DH to rotate onto the field (basically, alternating with the 1B or LF or whatnot).  This would prevent the career-DH type, like Hafner and Ortiz, and force them to field at least 4 innings every game.

As it is, they are like the “special teams” players in football.

Or simply going with an 8-man hitting unit instead.  Clearly, the tradition of “9” (innings, fielders, lineup) is an integral part of the game.  This is a case where tradition makes sense.

As a practical matter, there would have to be lots of overlap even with separate offensive and defensive lineups since most teams carry 14 position players, and two of them are catchers, and the manager would want to have a few options on the bench.

The strategy would be interesting. A manager might start the pitcher batting 9th and then plug in a DH when the pitcher’s turn to hit came up, because the pitcher would still be part of the defense. Or, if the pitcher’s slot came up in a non-crucial or bunt situation, the manager might let him hit to save the roster.

You could start your hitting catcher on offense and your fielding catcher on defense, but then your hitting catcher couldn’t pinch-hit because he wouldn’t be allowed to change his position in the batting order.

I don’t know—it’s just an idea that popped into my head.

One way to eliminate the career DH type of player would be to remove the pitcher from the line-up. Just have the eight non-pitchers bat.

I don’t like the DH, but how’s this for a compromise:

Each team can pinch-hit for the pitcher ONCE per nine-inning game without removing the pitcher from the game. 

It would add an interesting strategic choice, if nothing else.

That’s not bad.  But, why limit it to once?

Today’s benches are short already.  You can give the team the option to pinch hit for him as many times as they want (without making the pitcher leave the game).

Pitcher comes to bat 4 times, that’s 4 different pinch hitters.  Plus the starting 8, gives you already 12 games used up.  Basically, it depletes your bench.

Now, the manager has to value how much is his bench worth: should he let the pitcher bat with 2 outs and no men on in the 3rd inning, or use a PH (and deplete his bench)?

I can rally around that.

If you don’t like the full-time DH, how about:

RULE: The DH has to be a player who played in the field at least 7 innings the previous game.

This will lead to two rotating DHs, each fielding half the time.  If you still don’t like that, how about:

RULE: The DH has to be a player who played in the field at least 7 innings in one of the past three games, and did not DH in the last three games.

Now you have four rotating DHs, each 25% DH and 75% fielding.

Or adjust to taste, for how many you want.

There would be rules about the first game of the season, and what to do if nobody in the lineup qualifies, but these technicalities are easy.

That’s pretty good, actually. I’d have no problem with that at all. You wouldn’t have to limit the application to pitchers, either. I wish they had thought of that instead of the DH rule.

I watch mostly AL games because of where I live and I have only one problem with the DH: Headhunters who throw at batters because the pitchers know they won’t be the ones retaliated against. That can be fixed with some of the earlier suggestions on this site about giving two bases for a walk, etc., as well as more aggressive umpiring.

In terms of strategy, I think it’s ridiculous in this age of baseball where we have one inning specialized closers, as well as a variety of other specialized positions, to make pitchers hit. I prefer the NL’s running game over the AL’s HRs, but that’s a personal preference, not a reason to get rid of the DH (see Angels of wherever in SoCal).

As a fan of both cricket and baseball, one area of contrast is that in cricket matches they never allowed substitutes to enter the game (save for fielding replacements for injured/incapacitated players).  This leads to having, typically, five batsmen, four bowlers, a wicketkeeper-batsman and an ‘all-rounder’ who is (typically) mediocre as both batting and bowling in the XI man lineup.

I assume that if you forebade substitutions in baseball you’d get a couple of things: a lot of fielders would learn to pitch a bit, and a lot of pitchers would learn to field a position (again) and take BP more seriously.  How many pitchers would you play in your lineup on a daily basis?

That being said (mostly irrelevantly), I dislike the DH rule: there are nine people playing the game, let them play.  If you want to allow substitutions, fine, but people that are playing should play.

I forget where I read this proposal (I’m pretty sure I didn’t think of it myself), but I believe that the DH should be allowed to bat for any player in the lineup, and different players throughout the game.  The restriction would be that 8 lineup slots would have to come up before he could be used again.

This proposal would add a lot of strategic choices.  Suppose that David Ortiz was on the Giants, with their putrid lineup, and the Giants have the bases loaded with 2 outs in the 1st inning with the #7 hitter at the plate.  Do you use Ortiz now, to hit for Ray Durham or Brian Bocock or whoever, in this crucial situation?  If you do, then you have to let the pitcher bat when he comes up (or use a PH, of course), and Ortiz is not eligible to bat again until the 7th slot comes up.

This would lead to some interesting choices.  Do you “waste” the DH when the #9 slot comes out with 2 outs and no one on?  Do you hold back using him in the eighth inning in the hope that there is a huge situation in the ninth inning in which to use him? 

This all assumes that you have a big hitter who just cannot play the field.  In normal circumstances, you would always use him to bat for the pitcher.  But some managers might choose to gamble and get greedy, and I think it would be an interesting wrinkle to throw into the game, without distorting the offense/defense balance to the extent that some other “enhanced DH” proposals might do.

At the very least, the DH rule should be liberalized to allow the DH to be used on any hitter in the lineup, not just the pitcher.  This would make no difference at the ML level, but it would allow you to let Micah Owings bat and use the DH for Adam Everett, if an extreme situation like that was ever present on your roster.

I did a double-take the first time I was at a collegiate game in which the pitcher hit for himself, because their rule is a little different in that the pitcher can remain in the game as the DH himself, even once he is done pitching.  He can also inherit the DH spot after he is done pitching.  Our coach believes that our P/CF has his pitching suffer when he has to worry about hitting during the game, and so will start the game with a DH but leave in sometimes to hit after he is done on the mound.

I like the suggestions in 9, 10 and 14.

Phil’s comment in #3 suggests a more conservative variation of the ideas in #14: what if the DH could hit either for the pitcher or the catcher? Would some teams develop defense-only catchers for Owing/Ausmus type batteries?

Lots of good points here, but I am hard-pressed to come up with a more ridiculously antiquated rule in all of sports than pitchers hitting in the NL. I find National League baseball painful to watch a lot of the time, and most of that has to do with just how annoying it is to have innings ruined by pitchers batting. Does anybody really like this? I think people just like old things. We don’t force the quarterback to play linebacker. Why force a pitcher to play offense? Because that’s how it used to be? That argument just doesn’t make sense. Nothing about a pitcher batting makes for a better game. It’s not more strategic to double switch: any half-brained manager knows how to do it, and all it means is that a starter is out of the game for a bench player (which, of course, makes for worse baseball).

The only change I’d make to the rule is to force the NL teams to do it (or the AL teams should ALWAYS be able to use it, regardless of home park). And, I suppose, a manager can opt to not use it if he has Dontrelle Willis or Micah Owings on his team.

Pitchers hitting is almost always bad baseball. I don’t like watching bad baseball.

I like Patriot’s “floating DH” idea in #14.

I also like the “one and done DH” as per #9.

I have this other crazy idea.

We can have this player called a DH who hits for the pitcher like is currently done in the AL.

My biggest problem with having all designated fielders is that you would have impromptu pitching changes constantly. A pitcher is very capable of playing, say, first or third base I’d assume, and you’d be able to swap them out on the mound for different batters’ handedness, and otherwise slow the game down a lot.

The current DH is simple and it works. More complexity will just slow the game down more, and be intent on producing the same general result as the permanent DH.

Sal, “more complexity” will not just slow the game down more.  The alternatives presented here prove as much.  No need to bolster the case for the current DH setup by making a claim that is wrong on its face.

Everyone here is conscious of the face that we don’t want to do ANYTHING that will add wasted time to the game.

When I was in high school, you could DH for anyone.  Worked well for us as one of our best hitters was also one of our best pitchers and a first baseman.  I didn’t realize that MLB doesn’t allow it for anyone but the pitcher until this thread led me to look at the rules.

Even though I grew up watching mostly American League ball, I still much prefer the NL and dislike the DH.  The AL, to me, is less enjoyable to watch because of lack of decisions (not the double-switch, but do you let the pitcher who is due up hit just in order to get another inning out of him, how long do you stay with this pitcher when you know if you bring in a reliever you are going to pinch hit for him next inning, etc.) I personally prefer watching small ball, speed, pressing the defense, and manager’s trying to “out strategize” each other more than walks and lumbering sluggers, and I think the NL has more of that without the DH.  That’s just my enjoyment of the game, not when I look at maximizing output.  If the NL adopted the DH, I am sure I would watch many fewer games, and certainly wouldn’t get the Extra Innings package so I could see more games.

With the deep bullpens teams have now, and the way starters go all out on virtually every pitch, it’s just a matter of time until all NL managers realize that taking the pitcher out, even an inning early, is a good thing.

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The advantage of the “one and done DH” is that this forces the manager to decide if he wants to have a deeper bench, like 15, and go with 10 pitchers, or will he put himself at risk by going with 14 nonpitchers.  Imagine, you’ve got you starting 8, the 4 one-and-done-DH to hit for your pitcher, the backup catcher… that’s 13 guys right there every game.  That leaves you with one emergency guy if someone gets hurt, if you have only 14 nonpitchers.

So, the strategy will be to decide if you want 14 or 15 nonpitchers, meaning 10 or 11 pitchers.  If you go to 10, then you will have fewer relief changes.

The other strategy is that if you are carrying only 14 nonpitchers, then perhaps one time per game, you WILL let the pitcher bat (say 2 outs, no one on), simply because you do not want to waste a hitter in a situation that might be low-leverage.

All of a sudden Micah Owings (or whoever the good hitting pitchers are) will get an additional value.  Imagine, in a one-and-done-DH league, the value of the pitcher’s hitting increases!

And none of that changes how much time it takes to play baseball.

tangotiger,

Sorry to be unclear. It’s not the complexity, it’s my belief that more mid-inning swaps would lead to longer delays in the game, and longer games on the whole. My (untested) assumption is that the bulk of player changes come between innings and with pitcher changes. Since both inning changes and pitcher changes take longer than telling the umpire who’s going where, the batter change isn’t the source of the delay.

What concerns me is that, for instance, in the 2nd inning, there is a man on base, 2 outs, pitcher’s on deck. You won’t swap for the pitcher in a current ball game (at least I assume you wouldn’t) because it’s the 2nd inning. If you’re the visiting team, your pitcher has only throw a single inning so far. However, in a ‘swap for a pinch hitter while keeping the pitcher in’ league, you’re going to have a delay as that’s relayed to the umpire, the pinch hitter takes a few extra swings out of the box, and the game becomes marginally longer.

If this happens 3 times a game for each team, it would add up.

But my real concern was with the idea of offensive and defensive specialists, specifically because there would be multiple pitchers on the field (I’d assume) so that you could have a lefty and righty pitcher swap off according to batter, and toss in a knuckleballer or Japanese relief pitcher with odd motion in to throw things off. The problem is that shifting around would take time.

The complexity has little to do with my objection (though I realize I phrased it poorly and said the opposite). The increase in changes and switches which have to be logged and agreed to will increase game times, which I don’t think is positive for the most part.

I don’t think anyone here wants the NFL-style of players.  That’s a definite minority.

The best alternatives on the table are:
1. floating DH: he comes to bat at most once per 9 times up… so he can come in the second inning with Adam Everett up with guys on base, thereby foregoing the opportunity to bat for the pitcher that time through the order; so there’s strategy as to when to use the DH, and times will occur that the pitcher may bat

2. one-and-done DH: he comes to bat once, then he’s out of the game, and a NEW player comes in to bat the second time, and so on; this will deplete your bench, and maybe cause a team to go to 10 pitchers, and definitely not 12 or 13

These two options here do nothing at all to slow the game down.

Hopefully, now we’re on the same page.