La Velle E. Neal III's Sunday Insider: Why go after the fast teams?

Chronically slow teams such as the Yankees and Red Sox deserve more scrutiny than the Astros and Twins.

By LA VELLE E. NEAL III, Star Tribune

Last update: June 22, 2008 - 12:43 AM

Baseball officials have found their long-lost stopwatches, again, and are trying to shorten the average time of games.

They want to end long conferences on the mound, slow walks to the mound and time-wasting in the batters' box.

The average time of a nine-inning game was 2 hours, 48 minutes in 2006 but passed 2:51 last season and was approaching 2:52 in recent weeks.

Something needs to be fixed, the league and its owners have determined.

Yet it's odd -- make that nonsensical -- how they are going about doing it.

Last week, Twins manager Ron Gardenhire and Houston manager Cecil Cooper were fined for violating the league's pace-of-game (POG) requirements. Gardenhire was fined $1,500 last Sunday after Brendan Harris wasn't allowed to call time during a game at Milwaukee. Cooper was fined because he didn't have a catcher ready to warm up the pitcher during a June 14 game vs. the Yankees in New York.

I didn't have to dig into the archives to know that the Twins and Astros are not slow-playing teams -- the Yankees and Red Sox are. I guess one benefit of having so many Boston and New York games foisted on us via national television is that we know they do more than grind out at-bats to abuse the POG.

But I still contacted the Elias Sports Bureau last week and asked for average times of nine-inning games for every major league team.

Through games on Tuesday, the Yankees led the majors with an average game time of 3 hours, 3 minutes. The Red Sox were second at 3:01. The Rangers were third at 2:59.

The fastest teams: The Angels at 2:43, followed by the Twins and Athletics at 2:44. The Astros were 12th at 2:49.

So in order to get the Yankees and Red Sox to play faster, the league is picking on the Twins and Astros? Puh-leeze.

The league's mandate can't be taken seriously until it stops ignoring the leading POG abusers, the two heavyweight teams from the AL East.

Boston manager Terry Francona, during a series at the Metrodome in May, mismanaged his bullpen so badly during one game that he didn't have his reliever ready to start an inning. He sent the previous inning's pitcher back out to the mound to warm up while the guy in the bullpen kept throwing. Francona then went to the mound and made a pitching change before a pitch was thrown.

That should be a fineable violation. Gardenhire getting angry because Harris' request for time was turned down should not.

How, by the way, can the league implement these changes in the middle of a season at the same time it's trying to implement instant replay, which will lengthen some games anyway?

It's amazing what the millionaires come up with when they get together.

Meanwhile, the Yankees beat the Padres 2-1 on Thursday.

Time of game: 3:12.

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