America’s pastime is looking a little different every year as technological innovations, society’s shrinking attention span and big-money marketing concerns creep into Major League Baseball.
The sport, which had been virtually untouched from the turn of the 20th century, has seen a flurry of rule changes in just the past decade and a half. And there’s a strong possibility that the most significant alteration in the game’s history is just 12 months away from taking root.
Baseball diehards at Grapefruit and Cactus League games this month have seen live-action previews of the automated ball-strike (ABS) challenge system, which could very well be implemented in real MLB games next year.
The potential ball-strike earthquake comes in the wake of several other major MLB rule changes. They include prescribing where defenders could position themselves to encourage more balls in play (2023), introducing rules dramatically helping base stealers (2023), awarding teams free base runners to prevent long extra-inning games (2020) and giving National League teams the designated hitter so woeful hitting pitchers don’t need to embarrass themselves at the plate anymore (2022).
MLB officials have had low-level talks about a “Golden At-Bat,” which could permit a star slugger to hit out of order once a game in a high-leverage situation.
Lower levels of baseball have long considered using a double-wide bag at first base to lessen the chances of collisions between a sprinting batter and a first basemen. The elongated bag at first base is being widely used this season across Division I college baseball.
“Rule changes were traditionally made because there’s a problem that needs addressing. In baseball, it had to do with what was happening inside the lines of the field,” said Peter Stolpe, who teaches sports business at the University of…
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