Pace rules need more time, commish says
PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. — New baseball commissioner Rob Manfred says it is too early to draw conclusions about baseball’s latest attempt to speed up the pace of games.
Baseball is requiring batters to keep one foot in the batter’s box in many instances and installed clocks to count down the time between innings and during pitching changes. The penalties are warnings and fines, which will start May 1.
“I thought the feedback on pace of play was positive,” Manfred said Monday after meeting with New York Mets players. “I think they understand what it is we’re trying to accomplish. I think they appreciate the fact we’ve taken kind of a measured approach to the problem to make sure we don’t unintentionally change the game in a way that may not be positive.”
The average time of a nine-inning game was three hours, two minutes last year, up from 2:33 in 1981.
“Spring training games are obviously different,” he said. “We do like the early returns on it, but I think that the very nature of those spring games make it difficult to make any conclusion as to exactly how it’s going to work during the regular season.”
Manfred said MLB is monitoring the drop in offence, but says it also is too early to make any decisions. The average runs per team per game has dropped from 5.14 in 2000 to 4.07 last year.
Meanwhile, Manfred declined to comment on a lawsuit minor-league players filed against MLB in February 2014. They allege violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act, a law that stipulates a minimum wage for workers and requires overtime for most who work more than 40 hours weekly.
The starting salary for minor league players is $1,100 per month for the fivemonth minor-league season, though some players selected in the amateur draft and some international amateur free agents command large signing bonuses.