A note to Rob Manfred: Strikeouts are deadly, deadly dull.
Not all of them, of course. I’ll admit a few exceptions. A bases-loaded whiff in the top of the ninth is always exciting, no matter which team you’re rooting for. But the vast majority of today’s strikeouts — the flailing swings-and-misses that have become so dreadfully common — are decidedly snoozeworthy.
And a few other things, Mr. Commissioner. There isn’t enough solid hitting today (see above). There isn’t enough running. There are way too many pitching changes.
And one final point: Three-and-a-half-hour games are too long. If we’re going to be honest, three-hour games are usually too long.
These problems have existed for years, of course, though you and the other Lords of Baseball have typically chosen to ignore them. But statistics for the first quarter of the current season indicate that the situation has become worse than ever.
Potential remedies are already being debated online and in print — and there’s no doubt that changes of some sort are urgently needed — yet you and the rest of baseball’s brain trust cannot act until you truly understand the scope of the problem.
And that’s my topic today. I have accumulated several relevant stats for 2021’s games through May 23rd, then compared them to prior seasons as far back as World War II. Here are a half-dozen indicators that tell an unhappy story.
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Length of game
Let’s address my last complaint first.
The typical big-league game in 2021 takes three hours and nine minutes to complete, according to the diligent statisticians at Baseball-Reference.com. That’s a minute faster than the all-time sluggishness record of 3:10, which was set in 2019.
But an asterisk must be appended. This year’s games are being played under Covid guidelines that coax some games to early conclusions, such as seven-inning contests in doubleheaders or runners on second base to start extra innings.
If those rules didn’t exist, there’s no doubt that games in 2021 would be the slowest in big-league history.
Dilatory play hasn’t always been the fate of a baseball fan. The average length of a game in 2011 — just 10 years ago — was two hours and 56 minutes, a full 13 minutes shorter than today. Durations were much, much shorter if you look back 40 years (average of 2:38 in 1981) or half a century (2:29 in 1971).
Strikeouts
What are we getting for all of today’s extra time on the diamond? Mostly a slew of called strikes or ineffectual swings.
The average game in 2021 features 18.04 strikeouts, the first time in the game’s history that each club’s batters have averaged more than one strikeout per inning.
It’s not my intention to delve into causes or solutions today, since I have roughly a thousand words to play with, not a book-length manuscript. But there’s no doubt that the launch-angle generation has accepted this massive volume of strikeouts as the price for slugging an occasional home run.
The number of strikeouts, as a result, has virtually doubled over the past 40 years. There were just 9.50 whiffs by both teams in a typical game in 1981.
Balls in play
If strikeouts are up, logic dictates that the number of balls being put in play has to be down.
What constitutes a ball in play? Anything from a dribbler in front of the mound to a grand slam over the center-field fence. Any hit or out, in other words, that actually involves the batter putting wood on the ball.
This year’s average game features 49.08 balls in play. That’s down 11% from 55.22 balls in play a decade ago.
This problem is actually compounded by the growing length of today’s game. A ball is being put in play every three minutes and 51 seconds this year, compared to once every three minutes and 11 seconds in 2011. That means the gap between on-field action has expanded by roughly 21% in a decade. (Pardon me if I yawn.)
I keep referring to 1981 because it was precisely 40 years ago. I know it wasn’t a perfect season — what with the players’ strike and all — but you might be interested to know that a ball was put in play every two minutes and 38 seconds back then.
Hits
There are several ways to measure the effectiveness of today’s hitters. All of them yield unhappy results.
The collective batting average for the first quarter of 2021 was .237, which ties 1968’s yearend figure for the lowest since World War II. Historians dubbed 1968 the Year of the Pitcher in recognition of their dominance. The game’s leaders soon made changes — such as lowering the mound and instituting the designated hitter — to reinvigorate offenses.
The number of hits by both clubs this season, 15.74 per game, is actually lower than 1968’s 15.82. And the timespan between hits is much longer. Fans wait an average of 12 minutes from one hit to the next in 2021, compared to a span of just nine minutes and 40 seconds in 1968. (Keep in mind that the typical game back then ran only two hours and 33 minutes.)
And one other depressing fact: There now are fewer hits than strikeouts in the average game — a ratio of 0.87 hits for every whiff in 2021. The balances were much more favorable to the fan only a decade or two ago: 1.23 H per SO in 2011, 1.35 H per SO in 2001.
Stolen bases
The stolen base is an exciting play, one with an integral role a generation or two ago. But no longer.
Perhaps you’re old enough to remember the late 1980s, when the stolen base was an important component of most managers’ playbooks. Both clubs combined for 1.70 steals per game in 1987, the highest figure in the post-World War II era.
And today? There have been only 0.92 steals per game in 2021. That’s the lowest figure for any season in the past 50 years.
Pitchers
is there anything more exciting than a protracted pitching change — or maybe even two — during a long inning?
The question, of course, is facetious. It is also relevant. Managers are no longer allowed to “play the percentages” (the quotation marks are deserved) by switching pitchers for every batter, but they’re still way too eager to go to the bullpen.
The typical game in 2021 includes 8.66 pitchers for the two clubs, down slightly from last year’s average of 8.86, yet still 19% above the norm of 7.26 pitchers per game just 20 years ago. And it’s a massive jump of 62% from 1981’s benchmark of 5.34 pitchers in a given contest.
Has the game benefited from this increased specialization? It’s hard to see how.
The final word
Enough statistics — and enough grousing — for now.
But the facts are clear. Baseball games are getting longer and duller. That’s an especially dangerous trend in a digital age characterized by ever-shorter attention spans. I’ll happily discuss possible remedies in future installments, but the process can begin only with an examination of the warning signs, which is my goal today.
What will the Lords of Baseball say in response? I hope it’s not how they usually counter doomsayers such as myself. Baseball will survive, they like to say, because it’s a great game.
Well, yes, it is. But it’s also in mortal danger. The time for action has arrived.