Why don’t we play 7-Inning games at all levels of baseball? High School, College and Professional:Universal Baseball with Seven Inning Games
Isn’t this a change that should be made???
Universal Baseball with 7-inning games at all levels….
Have the home team bat in the bottom of the 7th, even if the home team is leading and the fans will get a full seven innings of baseball….Only down an inning and a-half of what they would get at the old nine-inning games, when you only played 8 and a-half, if the home team was leading going into the bottom of the ninth…
This sure would speed up the games, although I’m sure the players and the managers would still find a way to slow them down….
Fans could stay for the entire game instead going home on a night after the 7th Inning Stretch, when you are playing on past 10pm….
How about these 7-inning games at all levels of baseball???
We might be changing or messing with the history of baseball, but sometimes change is good and it might a good thing for the fans that really want to stick around and watch the full/entire game….
What about the records??? With shorter games, the players and especially the pitchers might get a chance to extend their careers and we could see a younger brand of baseball fans headed out to the ballparks….
This would pick up the pace and give baseball a chance to catch up with the changing times….
Baseball is trying to find a new identity and fans might identify more with the game if it didn’t last so long on a given night/day…..
You would be afforded a chance to start games a little later, say maybe at 7:30 and this would give families a chance to get home and get things in order and then get out/head to the ballpark for the 7:30 start and this would still allow time for the minor league teams to have the darkness they need, in to get their firework shows in on the weekends…
How do you see this move/change???
Too strong, or do you feel the games are too long?????
This would also allow the players and coaches to get home before midnight and if you like to watch an occasional game on TV, you could sit back and enjoy the entire 7-inning contest….
How does this move/change sit with you????
Should I go ahead and book my visit to the commissioner’s office?
(I have been talking to a lot of tired baseball fans here recently.)
i do agree that there is an issue with the length of games, but if the game is cut down from 9 innings to seven an entire position now becomes extinct. Relief pitchers and even closers are now out of a job and millions of dollars because starters in the mlb tend to go 6 or 7 innings a game. The mlbpa would not let this happen anyway
Say the starter goes five innings and he has qualified for the win, the set-up up man goes one inning and the closer comes in and finishes things off in the last inning working one inning…
This could pro-long players’ careers and you never know…At the minor league level and at the major league level, even at today’s standards, I would say it is the exception for a pitcher go more than five innings and if they that get that from one of their main pitchers under the 9-inning standard they are very happy, they being the managers and the owners…
Starter goes five, set-up man goes one and the closer always goes one inning anyway, do this on a trial basis in the minor-leagues for a year and see what you get and maybe just try it at the A-level(Selected leagues) or the rookie level and on a trial basis and see how it works….
This might change the way we see baseball….
So many times fans are worrying about bothering or changing the history of the game, this move/idea might just make history and new-found subject…
Worth a try???
I like it! A few years ago I probably would have had a different opinion, but with a three year old it is practically impossible to stay for an entire game! I think considering there are 162 games in a season there is no reason a single game should last more than 2 or three hours
I think it’s a bad idea. Our latest generation of fans have become so ADD. We change things because it doesn’t fit our schedule or we are inable to concentrate for more than a minute at a time. There are the same amount of innings today as when Babe Ruth played. What is different is the way it is played. Every player has to have a walk up song so they can linger to the plate while everyone hears their song. Or a player has to have seventy five supersticious twitches or batting glove rearranges after every pitch. Fans have to be entertained by outside stimuli and not what is on the field. We have fricken water slides and pools in stadiums. There is no sense of tradition. If you want to fix the problem start with the generation not the game. The game is the same it has always been. If you want to fix the injury problem how about growing kids not playing in 3 leagues a summer while they are still growing. The youngsters play way too much baseball and lift weights way too much. Arms don’t have any flexibility to them in high school.
It saddens me the way mentality is changing in our country. There is always someone else or something else to place the blame on for why things happen. Let’s blame the coach for a loss or lets blame the game for being too long. No baseball fan,or parent, or player you did it. It is time to break out the mirror and own up to it. The game is pure and perfect. The game never asked to have a water slide crammed up its butt in right field. Go to a game. Listen to the crack of a bat. Clap when a player makes a good play. Block out all the other crap and I promise 3 1/2 hours will seem like a blink. Baseball survived two World Wars and a Great Depression without giving up on the games core values maybe the current generation could figure out how to carve out a little slice of their day.
7-inning games? That loud thud was the turning of the Elias brothers, Branch Rickey and John McGraw in their hallowed graves. (Someone should make sure Bill James is still standing.) MLB games don’t last forever; they just feel that way because today’s batters could circle the bases (in an easy Sunday afternoon gait) in the time they take setting up for a pitch – every single pitch… I polished off War and Peace once during a doubleheader and didn’t miss a pitch.
How about starting college and pro night games at 6 instead of 7? The people who want to see a full, real game will still get at least nine innings most nights (unless there’s rain), and the people who are there with kids or want to hit the bars will get out earlier. Those who can’t make it to the park by 6 can still get there in time to see seven innings or so — just not the first seven.
Very good discussion on this topic, spread the word….Tell some college coaches and put the word on the streets…Thanks…
An idea whose time has come.
Nice post, Michael.
Baseball was made to play 9 innings. I hate playing 7 inning games and can’t stand all this speed up/pace of play stuff going on. Why does everyone want to make this game go by quicker? Call me old fashioned, but if the game is too long for some folks, then watch a sport that has a clock/time limit. There are so many intricacies in the game of baseball that speeding it up will just take away from the beauty of it. Enjoy the game as it is.
Well said John Barrow
BTW John, if you have pitchers that want/need a place this summer to play, send them my way. I’m coaching the Pirates in the NABA.
In nature if a species fails to adapt to the current times it will become extinct. I love baseball, I want to see it back to being the national pastime, which is something it clearly has not been in quite some time. I also agree that the current generation lives life much too fast and would greatly benefit from slowing down and enjoying life, however, grumbling about the past isn’t going to change anything, the game is dying a slow death. It will always be around in some form, but do you really want to see the game you love just become an afterthought?
If baseball made some adjustments they could become America’s top game again.
The NFL/pro football is the top game right now and pro football has sullied itself by becoming so tightly tied in to murderers and wife/girlfriend abusers and what’s the use of going overboard for that league…
The NBA has had to invade the European leagues to complete their rosters with players that have enough pure fundamentals to finish a game with stability and while watching an NBA playoff game today, I did not know any of those European players and if I don’t know by the time you reach the top level of play, I am not going to follow you…
If baseball would pick up the game and find ways to get around those 3 and a-half hour, say the 3:15’s and even the 3 hour games are too long for those that go to the games every day….(This would help, faster moving games)…
The 7 inning game may not be the answer, but it is a suggestion to an area that needs work…
Baseball could capture a whole new audience and they need to reach the young kids in masses….
The game can use some work and it would not take too much tweaking to make it work for those fans that will be newcomers to the games…The old-timers are leaving here as their time runs out and there are not enough new pure baseball fans/people, you know the purists to make it the #1 fan sport, but it could reach that level if they picked up the pace…
You are not going to get too many new fans that would be willing to sit through 9-inning doubleheader games, it just is not going to happen, but with 7-Inning games the doubleheader could make a comeback on the regular 162 game schedule…
That also might be a way in which we could experiment….Bring on some 7-Inning doubleheader games and see how they go over….They do it now with rain-out games in the minor leagues and that seems to work, so why not bring a few of those 7-Inning doubleheaders games on to the regular season schedule in the majors???
Baseball has an opportunity to be the top game again and it will not happen with the way the game is currently structured….When the old fans die out, the younger fans will not sustain the game the way it should be…
I have become one of the older fans and I still would like to see some changes…Baseball is a great game because you see and learn something new every day…
Football(The NFL) is in trouble, there are not enough court rooms to handle all of the abuse and murder cases those guys are continuing to be a part of and the NBA has had to go outside of our nation to bring in talent to make it sustainable….
So I don’t get labeled hypocritical, baseball has gone across the border for talent for many years, heading south in most instances, but this been a fabric of the game of baseball for forever, right…Nothing new….
I would like to see baseball take over, because it is America’s Pastime…
Time for baseball to reclaim its name and its game…
Basketball and football are ripe for the taking, but is baseball willing to do what it takes to takeover???
Time to step up to the plate again and bring it on home here in our homeland….
I could bring up and go into talk on college basketball and the NCAA Tournament, which draws large numbers of fans, but until Coach K at Duke cleans up his act and his foul mouth, I will take my own shots, when the weather permits and take them outdoors…No support from me for Duke and Coach K at all….They can do what they do, but until the make some changes, I will go and look to where the air is much cleaner(Outside)….
Good day for sports talk, with all that rain outside and again on that college basketball level, when you read about all the good that Coach Smith did, then you continue to read about Coach K and his foul mouth, you wonder what does that teach the players as they begin there walk into the outside world…
You may say that is the way it is in the real world, but it doesn’t have to be….
Good topics to keep the home fires burning on this rainy day…
You may cry hypocrisy on my part, but I’m not crying, I’m just telling you how it is and how it needs to be…
Are you buying or flying on this Sunday afternoon???
Interesting reading , Andy. Thank you. I’m a young fellow like you and a (very) amateur baseball historian. Am enjoying a book on Satchel Paige – who was a bit of a free spirit but who, along with Josh Gibson, topped the list of Negro League players of the 30s – 40s capable of starring in MLB . Joe DiMaggio called him the toughest pitcher he ever faced. Have a good week, and thanks for the conversation .