Major League Baseball, in a proper and dutiful quest to work on the related (but not identical) problems of pace of play and length of games, is again looking at various proposals related to the 2019 season.
The two ideas picking up steam lately: the adoption (finally) of a 20-second pitch clock and a rule stating that unless an inning ends, a relief pitcher must stay in to face at least three batters.
As someone who has enthusiastically watched minor league games and noted the improved flow with a pitch clock, I heartily endorse the first idea. The second one is intriguing, though would probably need a few more caveats to be practical (what would prevent a team, say, from pretending a pitcher was injured and needed to leave the game).
Commissioner Rob Manfred should be commended for pursuing these objectives and not merely being satisfied that MLB shaved five minutes (from 3:05 to 3 hours) off the nine-inning game time between 2017 and 2018.
Unfortunately, the bigger issue lurking within the sport — which saw attendance decline by 4 percent in 2018, the fifth time in the last six seasons attendance was down from year to year — might be one that can't even be solved by such pace-of-play initiatives.
By its very nature of not having a clock, MLB has by far the most significant variance in time of game of any major U.S. sports league.
And that fact — which was part of baseball's charm in a different era, when a lot of fans perhaps had more time than money — is working to its detriment in an era when more and more people often would prefer to part with money than time.
Every Wild game this season that ended in regulation — the vast majority of games — has lasted between 2:18 and 2:42, and even games that go to a shootout usually end in 2:45 or less.
