A mini-season will yield unwelcome ripple effects
Tony Clark, who heads the Major League Players Association, waited, negotiated, waited some more and finally called a bluff.
“Tell us when and where,” he told commissioner Rob Manfred.
At that point Clark had to know he had Manfred pinned.
Authorized to declare a season resume at whatever odd length after a three-month concession to health concerns, Manfred had let it known that a 50-game agenda was possible. And while the sides continue to argue, with the players willing to play 70 or more games and the owners preferring 60, there was Clark lobbing the burden of common sense toward the commissioner.
Go ahead, the players essentially said.
Run a 50-game sprint. See how that looks. Well … how would a season of 50 games look, feel and play out?
Some possibilities:
• A .400 hitter: After 50 games last season, Cody Bellinger of the Dodgers was hitting .391. But after 47 games, he was hitting .404. Why couldn’t the reigning National League MVP be capable of matching that production after 50 games this season? If so, there would be an open question about whether Ted Williams, who hit .406 in 1941, technically should maintain his status as baseball’s last .400 hitter.
• A home run champion with a total in the teens: After 50 games last season, Christian Yelich had a baseball-high 20 homers, and that was boosted by his feat of hitting a home run in each of his first four games.
The last time a home run champ hit fewer than 20 was in 1918, when Babe Ruth and Tilly Walker socked 11 apiece.
The 1981 season was split into two parts due to a labor stoppage. Even that year, the Phillies played 107 games and Greg Luzinski matched Gorman Thomas’ 21 homers to lead the National League.
• A random and false reflection of the best team: After 50 games last season, the Washington Nationals were 19-31 and their manager, Dave Martinez, was reported to be in grave danger of losing his job. The Phillies were in first place in the NL East and Gabe Kapler was being touted as an early Manager of the Year candidate.
The Nationals wound up winning the World Series. The Phillies didn’t. Martinez kept his job. Kapler didn’t.
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Baseball fans and historians are not so thick that they would be unable to differentiate between statistics produced in a 50-game season and those posted over a buck62. And if 2019 is a reasonable baseline for what could happen this season in the era of shifts and analytics, at least the leaders after 50 games were mostly accomplished stars. So that does seem sufficient to deflate the possibility of the career .230 hitter mixing in a couple of 5-for-5 nights and stealing a batting title.
But it’s not just the statistics and baseball history that would be given the works in a 50-game season. The entire way a team and a season is managed would change.
Would players wait out as many walks, or swing away, aware that their opportunities for offensive achievement would be compromised?
“How many games would Aaron Nola start, depending on off days?” said Ben Davis, the former majorleague catcher from Aston and Phillies TV analyst for NBC Sports-Philadelphia. “Is he going to throw 100 pitches? Or maybe he’ll throw only three innings on Monday, forego his bullpen day, and give you some more innings on Wednesday or Thursday.
“It just depends. No one knows what is going to happen. But obviously you want to see Aaron Nola pitch as much as possible. He gives your team the best chance to win. But you don’t want to burn the kid out, either, because of extenuating circumstances.”
Even if agents, trainers and pitchers themselves would rebel against such an approach, Davis is right that it could be the best way to win games. And in a 50game season, with no time to waste, some manager with a short-term contract could resort to such a mangled pitching rotation.
There is also the possibility that the long layoff, even with some version of a Spring Training 2.0, will warp the standard pitcherhitter balance.
“A lot of hitters have cages in their back yards,” said Larry Bowa, the legendary Phillies shortstop, manager and coach. “They might be swinging every day. I don’t think the hitters are going to take as long as the pitchers to get back in form. So you are going to have to rely on bullpens, let a pitcher go four or five innings, then turn it over to the bullpen. I’m sure that rosters will be expanded and they’ll probably all be pitchers. So there will be a lot of bullpen work.”
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A 50-game baseball season, should it come to that, will affect different teams in different ways.
A built-to-win-now team, like the Yankees, might be victimized by the reality that baseball rewards the best players and rosters over six months, not three. Even if the playoffs are to be expanded as a small hedge against warped regular-season results, 50 games are not likely to be enough for a team to realize a full return on a mega-payroll. Similarly, a low-payroll outfit, which would be at higher risk of exposure over 162 games can fool the sport over maybe 15 series.
Assuming Bowa is right and that the bullpens will rise in importance, the consequences of a 50-game season (or even a 60-game concession) would be dire.
Both David Robertson and Seranthony Dominguez will miss the entire season following Tommy John surgeries. Hector Neris can be a dynamic closer, but also has been prone to dramatic inconsistency. Maybe Vince Velasquez or Nick Pivetta can supply more relief innings with Nola, Zack Wheeler, Jake Arrieta and Zach Eflin at the top of the rotation. But will such usual suspects as Adam Morgan, Tommy Hunter, Victor Arano or Ranger Suarez give Joe Girardi a bullpen reliable enough to win in a season when the great relief pitching is likely to make the difference?
The truncated season, which almost certainly will come with a universal DH, would be to the Phillies’ benefit. Already loaded with accomplished hitters at every position, the new rule will allow the Phils to work Jay Bruce into the everyday lineup, too. The DH will also permit Girardi to keep J.T. Realmuto’s bat in the mix in day games after night games. And if Andrew McCutchen is at all compromised at age 33 by the effects of 2019 season-ending knee surgery, he could be a designated hitter on days his legs need a rest.
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Chances still remain strong that the baseball season will be closer to 70 games than 50. If so, it will be because Clark’s “where and when” challenge to Manfred came with the unstated implication that a 50-game season would pose a risk to baseball history and sensibility.
Cody Bellinger a .400 hitter? A home run champion with 18 dings? Aaron Nola throwing every other day? The Yankees penalized by the realities of short-term baseball results? Jay Bruce filling out a potentially lethal Phillies’ lineup … but a questionable bullpen challenging Joe Girardi’s managerial skills?
It could all happen when the strangest baseball season in history resumes, wherever, whenever.
Follow Jack on Twitter @ JackMcCaffery and reach him at jmccaffery@21stcenturymedia.com