The MLB Player’s Union (MLBPA) denies the universal DH, meaning pitchers will continue to hit and viewers get one less chance for bat flips and excitement. So we now get to watch more strikeouts and bunts…. FUN!…. sike.
Baseball is a slow, tedious sport that has a pace of play problem. Rob Manfred the commissioner has tried to speed it up a little with the clock between innings and limiting mound visits per game, but what really matters is what happens on the field. The players union denying the DH is just flat out stupid, because it is one less chance for guys like David Ortiz to drop a dinger in the lineup. Instead, we get to see starting pitchers stand in the box with a bat on their shoulder and occasionally lay down a bunt.
In an era in baseball where all we see are home runs and strikeouts, taking away a position player from a lineup just encourages more strike outs and wasted at-bats. The common argument for keeping the pitchers in the lineup is that it eliminates “strategy” involved for managers, having to decide when to pinch-hit for the starter and going into the bullpen. But wouldn’t you rather have your pitcher keep pitching and not take him out with a guy on 1st base in the 6th inning in a 1-0 game? No, I want my stud Jacob DeGrom with a jacket on his arm and the death stare in his eye getting ready for the 7th. The MLBPA denying the universal DH makes this more difficult.
This is just the latest of the self-sabotage MLB is undergoing. Baseball is dying because of their lack of ability to grab the younger fan’s attention. Guys like Bryce Harper, Tim Anderson, and Fernando Tatis Jr. deserve the rights to be household names like Lebron James or Tom Brady, but they have to overcome MLB’s TV regional rights.
Social Media is the way to the younger audience, they watch less games on TV and get their sports fix via MLB highlights on Twitter and Instagram. MLB continuously takes down highlights that don’t come from their broadcast partners, making less and fewer clips appear on feeds of the people who need to see it.
If the MLBPA denies universal DH going forward, we will get less and less stories like these:
TL//DR: MLB Hates its self and its fans by not modernizing and adapting to the world around it. MLBPA denies universal DH
