SI.com and AP reported that MLB has sent about 10 "slow pace: letters have been sent to players since the season started on Sunday.
The new pace of play rules mandates that hitters keep at least one
foot in the batter's box during at-bats, with exceptions such as after
foul balls. The batter has until there are five seconds remaining on the
clock to enter the batter’s box.
A pitcher is expected to begin throwing to the plate as soon as the
batter enters the box and becomes alert to the pitcher. Any batter that
doesn't enter the box with five seconds left and any pitcher that
doesn't throw a pitch with no time remaining will be in violation of the
rule.
Pitchers are also required to start innings before 30 seconds remain on the countdown clocks.
Fines up to $500 per offense will start being handed out to players starting May 1 for those who do not adhere to the new rules.
Last year’s games took an average of three hours and two minutes to
complete. Though the first 35 games this season, a nine-inning game is
taking 2 hours and 51 minutes to complete.
As discussed for years, MLB is worried about the pace of play as today's youth have a video game attention span of minutes not hours. With batters now wearing body armor to the plate, and constantly adjusting their equipment and gloves after each pitch, something had to be done to get all that wasted time corralled for a better game rhythm. However, there are also a lot of pitchers who scuffle around the rubber, wave off signs and take their sweet time between throws.
Baseball is one of sports where the time between action was a social time for fans in the stands. People would talk about the game, its history, experiences, past events, and predict strategy. But it seems our culture is losing some of the basic conversation and social skills that made baseball the national pasttime.
