[0] Interesting. There seems to be widespread ridicule of the extra-innings rule, credit to MLB for trying 'something' but this is a one & done for sure. But there are some real problems with the game, specifically the strike out rate is just out of control. I think Kay was saying the other day that the 'average' K rate now = Doctor K's incredible 1985 season's K rate! Just not enough in-game action, not enough speed, not enough strategy. I will always love having the game on in the background but sitting and watching intently night to night..not really enjoyable when even no-hitters are becoming 'blah'.

I've been watching a lot of basketball during the pandemic and the contrast between MLB and the NBA is very striking. The NBA isn't perfect but it does a good job in trying new things and promoting their best players. Baseball's biggest news yesterday is Tony LaRussa going full Grandpa Simpson and throwing his rookie star under the bus..

If you're not bitching, you're not living. America's new motto. Ugh. I tune into as many games as I can. I feel like I'm one of the only people on earth who doesn't give a shit about the man on 2nd extra inning deal. Meh. Maybe wait til the 12th inning or something.
Thanks for the new thread! I had nowhere meaningful to voice my displeasure at Frazier striking out 2x looking a few nights ago! ; )

[3] 12th inning I could get behind. Frazier..what happened with him? Can't all be the concussion, can it?

[2] Good point, Jazz. I have always hated LaRussa. Not sure why. He just seems like a big jagoff. Unfortuntely he appears to be very good at his job. Hard to hate that.

Looks like the barge at Lake LaMarre is not going to make it.

Hey, I just got a Japanese Uber Eats commercial on my feed. Big Brother is watching.

Tyler Wade did something. Sign of the Apocalypse?

Sac fly?! Who are these Yankees?

[crickets]

[9] Work call done, we got ANOTHER no-no going??
[6] Big middle finger to Uber and everything about them! :)

Farging MLB just cut out on my phone. It does that often. Usually when Judge is up.

Then I tried to log on with my laptop and it says content unavailable. WTF! I'm paying good money for this bullshit?!

Kay just said the "n" word. That's it. It's over.

[11] My mlb.com on the Apple TV was out earlier in the morning but is OK now.

I've never watched a full game of a Yankee no-no.

[14] I was watching Dave Righetti's on tv back in 1983! Missed Wells' and Cone's as had just come to Japan and obviously no online baseball then, just the nightly recap shows on local J tv (which were great)

[14] Me neither. I was at marching band practice during Righetti's, but some how we got the news out on the field. I forget how. Car radio during a bone break?

Gio is so good with the glove. I used to hate those kind of grounders that just eat you up quick (which is why they moved me to 2B halfway through the season..!)

I finally saw my 1st live Yankee triple play at some point in the last 15 years. I can't provide any details,however. I just know I saw it. Lol... 3 more outs!

[1] I'm kind of enjoying this 'blah' wannabe!

[16] Hah! I was only 9, I remember it was baking hot that day though, we were having a BBQ with my extended family, a lot of rum & cokes being poured

Great insight by Paulie on the nerves.

[20] Rum & cokes? Family BBQs? Salad days for sure.

My job was always shucking the corn. My dad's job was burning or under-cooking food.

Yikes!

Hello, Banterites! Had to check in and see how everyone is doing.

Huh, alerted to the no-no. I usually can’t stay up for later games, between the terrorists and looking after my parents.

[22] My family from Trinidad & Tobago, rum & cokes flowed freely!
I forgot Kluber is a two time Cy winner..

Whew! Off the bat I thought that was gonna land.
The one Tyler caught, I mean.

[14] I remember watching Jim Abbott's no-hitter in 1993 like it was yesterday. Hawkins, too, the 4-0 loss against the White Sox the year everything went wrong, but of course that isn't an official no-hitter any more.

Wade is in RF?

Oh hi Shaun, and rbj.

Cue up the Human Beinz!!!! I wonder who even gets that reference.

Klubot delivers!

Beauty!

Yes!!!! The Klube!

No hitter!

[30] Hey, RIYank - been too long! Good to see you.

Woo-hoo!

フレーーー！！

wooo hooo! Just had to pop in and say hurrah!

Who hates baseball? KLUBBBBER!

Gosh Kluber is so excited I'm worried he's going to have a stroke or something.

Night all.

[41] Hah! He'll go wild after he gets home, may even drink half a Bud-Light

KLUBOT!!!

I don’t hate baseball! What an outing by CK.

Now, I fully understand the Klubot moniker.

Yep Klubot totally fitting haha.

[0] Well AB, I don't watch enough other sports anymore to know if their fans complain like baseball fans complain about the aesthetics of their game these days.

I know a lot of NBA fans complained a TON back in late 90s and 2000s when Riley-style ugly defensive dominated; but some people really liked that style of play (I did not mind it at the start, but I did later). And I know NHL fans DESPISED the god awful neutral zone trap that the Devils popularized in the late 90s, claiming it ruined hockey - and it did; it was 100% why I stopped watching hockey. I suppose some fans liked it, but I don't why anyone would like a style of play that literally made such an exciting sport boring. So this isn't unprecedented.

That said, I do feel like we in baseball are stuck in a negative feedback loop: enough announcers and writers complain such that fans pick up that they should be complaining, too, and then the announcers and writers (not all of them) keep complaining because it's what the fans want, and the fans complain more, and... you get the point.

And then there are the idiots who hate baseball, like John Smoltz, who deserves to be fired more than Joe Morgan did back in the day because how do you possibly market your product by having someone constantly bemoan it in the dumbest way possible? Guys like Smoltz very much feel like a baseball-only problem.

Aesthetically, I think the only issue is there aren't enough balls in play (and thus "action" on the field), and I feel like the cause of that is the crazy rise in the strikeout rate. If MLB made the umps calls the rulebook strikezone, and took away the low strike, I suspect that would fix it (forcing pitchers to throw more pitches up in the zone to try to get strikes leads to more contact, which leads to more balls in play, QED). As the wise bird once said, why make big problems out of little problems?

But all this talk I read and hear about going back to 80s baseball... man, some of it was very exciting (Rickey!), but some of it was awful (I really do NOT want to see the return of the all glove no hit middle infielder; it's almost as bad as watching a pitcher hit). I feel like the awfulness has been forgotten in these discussions.

Day baseball!

Rats, Rangers broadcST.

A, a 3-6-5 DP

wasted lead off double.

A RISP hit! A run!

Judge comes through!
Though more crappy base running.

Charlie Brown!

More crappy baserunning

One

Two

Three. Though Chapman closing out a German game is not the best.

Thanks for the game comments rbj, day games no good for us here on the other side! Two straight shutouts is nice. On to the ChiSox!

Shaun P., Oddly enough the guys on MLB TV the other day were arguing that the increase in strikeouts is because of two things:

1. Hitters not adjusting their swings with two strikes and stiking with the swing that generates the best launch angle.

2. Pitchers pitching UP in the zone with more regularity than in the past, which was more east/west.

I kinda of agree with that. But I also think the shift is making the sport less fun to watch. There is nothing more frustrating than watching a hitter trying to pull a ball towards the 9 fielders than hit it where nobody is at.

Delino Deshields? I imagine they can find someone better in the minors.

[0] What I think is stunning is how quickly the pendulum has swung. It wasn't long ago that people were kvetching about how high-scoring the game had become, and I confess I was one of them. Remember Game 5 of the 2017 World Series? Astros 13, Dodgers 12. Out here in LA, it was the only thing anyone was talking about the next day. The universal reaction was, "Sucks that the Dodgers lost, but wasn't that a classic game?" My response was simple -- that wasn't baseball. I bemoaned the lack of drama, the lack of importance to any single run when you knew there would be a handful of runs scored the next inning.

And now just a few years later, we're up in arms about the lack of runs. It's hard for me to get too worked up over it. I've been watching baseball long enough to have seen the Astroturf-fueled go-go 80s, the steroid-fueled Bash Brother 90s, and now our current obsession with launch angle. Five years from now, perhaps when a less stubborn group of hitters forces teams to stop shifting, there will be something new about which to complain.

That's the strangest thing to me, by the way. In a numbers driven game, none of these left-handed hitters has decided to take the sure base hits that shifts are offering. Soon enough someone will.

Oh, one more thing. Remember a couple weeks ago when Judge struck out five times in a game after striking out three times the game before? When a reporter asked Boone about it afterwards, his response spoke volumes. He shrugged his shoulders and said, "I think he some good at bats. Would you rather he had rolled over on one and grounded out to third?" Um, yes.

Surgery for Hicks.

Fine form for the Yankees so far. All strikeouts.

Yay, a hit.

Another pitching duel.

Combined 24 Ks so far.

Hey, a run!

Gleyber Day!

Hmmm, Lasagna for the eighth in a 1-0 game.

Dare I say, this seem to be going according to plan?

I don’t mind John and Suszyn as much as some, but let me tell you what drives me crazy about Sterling. He’s so wrapped up in his home run calls that he starts his routine with every fly ball. But when the other team is batting, he has no sense of emotion that might tell you what’s happening, even in big moments. Like just now — up 1-0 with a runner on third, Madrigal bloops a ball to right. Sterling called it like there was nobody on base in the first inning, then as an after thought — “Eaton scores on the play.” It’s maddening.

I shouldn't have dared. But nonetheless, this is a fantastic game.

Dammit, walking the terrorists had the reverse effect.

Gawd, awful luck.

Jaysus H. Fucking Christ! That was not acceptable.

I hate the contact play.

Fio fucks sake.

Clusterfark.

Holy crap, a triple play!

WOW!
This is one of the best baseball games I have ever seen.

Gotta be a walk off.

Gleybar!!

I am wracking my brain to determine if I’ve ever seen a triple play before other than on sportscenter. If I have it was definitely not in as high a leverage position as that.
Honestly, I’m slightly giddy right now.

Huge W!

The Yankees win! With good old fashion base hits.

Three singles win the game. Maybe that’s the combination.

Gleyber seems to be settling into a groove now too. Bodes well.

[85] It's my first live one.

I think I’ve seen one live before, but can’t remember any details.

I think deep down, Gleyber is the heart & soul of this team. Judge may be the poster boy and certainly a stud, but I think the team rises and falls with Gleyber.

So I guess today is going to be a slugfest.

Bad umping again

Gleyber day! You hang 'em, I bang 'em!

I like this RISP hit thing.

And adding to it.

Hell yeah. Runs without homers? Who knew?

More runs. Walking the terrorists does work, I just can't have the game on on my phone.

Gee even more [98]