Talk of rule changes, Harper and Machado dominate MLB off-season

NEW YORK (AP) — The World Series was baseball 2018 in a microcosm.

Half the 44 runs scored by the champion Boston Red Sox and Los Angeles Dodgers came across the plate on home runs. That’s the second-highest percentage in baseball history, according to the Elias Sports Bureau, behind only last year’s 57.4 per cent.

There were 109 strikeouts and 76 hits, a 1.43 ratio that was the secondhighest behind 1.48 in 2012. That followed the first regular season in major league history with more strikeouts than hits and with the lowest overall batting average since 1972 — the year before the start of the designated hitter.

Discussion of possible rule changes to increase action will dominate the off-season, along with speculation about a free-agent market that includes Bryce Harper, Manny Machado and Josh Donaldson, and possibly David Price and Clayton Kershaw if they opt out of their contracts.

“What we try to do is pay attention over the course of the season,” Commissioner Rob Manfred said last week, “think about what we’ve learned during the post-season and see whether we may need to make some change in response to what we’re seeing.”

Discussion will start next week, when general managers meet in Carlsbad, Calif. Owners gather Nov. 14-15 in Atlanta, and then the major off-season get-together will be the winter meetings at Las Vegas from Dec. 10-13.

Talk on rule changes will be conducted as the union watches free-agent negotiations unfold. Last off-season had an unusually slow market that led to player anger. The first 145 free agents hit the market Monday.