COVER YOUR EYES: THIS BASEBALL SEASON IS NOT WORTH WATCHING
An ugly brawl, big-name injuries, New York/Los Angeles domination and a cast of tankers from Oakland to (gasp) the new Wrigley Field & Sportsbook — none of it has made for required viewing
Excuse me for interrupting your seven-year nap, Rob Manfred. But what exactly is the purpose of the 2022 baseball season? Are we here to watch unhinged men throw purpose pitches at heads and punches in the chops, while forgetting the ball is a lethal weapon, leading to a melee that delays a game 18 minutes and ends with eight ejections?
Has the sport sunk so low that a pitcher, no Angel, heaves containers of bubble gum and sunflower seeds across the infield, where teammates pick up the mess? Is it about the Seattle batter who was plunked in retaliation, Jesse Winker, and how he flipped off Anaheim fans before retreating to the visitors’ clubhouse, where he was greeted by a surprise pizza delivery arranged by an appreciative TV viewer in … Arkansas?
Please explain what’s up, Mr. Commissioner. I have tickets for upcoming dates at Dodger Stadium and Pittsburgh’s PNC Park, heavenly destinations, but I’m not bargaining for more hell. “That probably shouldn't happen in the game, what happened out there today, kind of a black eye,” said Mariners manager Scott Servais, stating the obvious.
I still might cancel if Manfred can’t promise an actual ballgame, instead of a riot, in a time frame under four hours. And, oh, what’s happening with the slog-and-yawn-prevention pitch clock he has talked about for eons? Isn’t he supposed to be implementing it unilaterally, for next season, even if the Players Association balks? “We want to hear what the players have to say,” said the so-called leader, once again preferring diplomacy — and ceding control — when immediate action is imperative. “We negotiated that process to make sure we got player input and I don't want to prejudge the outcome until we get that input.” Translation: Some owners are realizing shorter games means less concession revenue. Just as there’s no crying in baseball, there are no money givebacks. Ever.
A bigger clock is ticking, of course. It’s a countdown to the industry’s eventual death, with too many marginally competitive clubs left to play brawl, not ball. Seems only three teams are considered worthy of a championship, and, by no coincidence, they have the three highest payrolls in the major leagues. Two are in the nation’s largest market, the Mets ($260 million) and Yankees ($250 million) of New York, and the third is in the second-largest market, the Dodgers ($261 million) of Los Angeles. The one team capable of disruption, the Houston Astros, never will live down an electronic sign-stealing scandal that still shames the sport with their every postseason appearance. The other 26 franchises only matter temporarily, unless they’ve already tanked away the season — or sabotaged a fan base, as the Athletics are doing in Oakland, where ownership is all but emptying the sewage pipes to keep spectators from a decrepit ballpark and pave a neon path to Las Vegas.
This assumes enough clubs will field the full rosters required to reach October. Thanks in part to Manfred and the owners, who insisted on a 99-day lockout that condensed spring training and jeopardized health, high-profile injuries have dominated the season’s first half. Max Scherzer, Jacob deGrom, Mookie Betts, Manny Machado, Fernando Tatis Jr., Tim Anderson, Ronald Acuna Jr. ... a day doesn’t pass without another star joining the evil Injured List. The owners also are culpable when a heavyweight such as Bryce Harper, his left thumb fractured by an errant pitch, is gone for the season — as are the Philadelphia Phillies, who spent $233 million in vain.
The baseballs are slippery, after all, with pitchers complaining all year that they can’t grip slick balls fresh from the Rawlings factory, owned by Major League Baseball (natch). Such as the ball that unintentionally got away from San Diego’s Blake Snell, who’d been a strike-throwing machine Saturday night — “might be the best stuff we’ve seen from him all year,’’ said his manager, Bob Melvin — before leaving a 2-2 fastball to Harper up and in. As his friend writhed in pain, then screamed in frustration, Snell fell apart in a 4-2 loss. “He knows how I feel. Obviously, I felt terrible hitting him,” Snell said of Harper. “I just don't do that, and he knows that. We've talked; we've handled it. It was never anything. It's just emotional. He plays with a lot of passion, and I can understand why he'd be upset. I'm just as upset as he is. I hit him; I don't hit people.”
Smells like karma when the owners wanted a labor impasse and want the balls slippery — and rampant, season-changing injuries are the result. This isn’t whiny posturing from pitchers who finally are being monitored for sticky substances. They lack control, scattering pitches recklessly around home plate, such as Michael Lorenzen’s 91-mph sinker that beaned his former Angels teammate, Justin Upton. It’s an annual pox on the game, the latest case of Manfred’s office screwing around with the holy grail, either juicing balls or deadening them or polishing them without a rub. Certain pitchers throwing the slick balls aren’t equipped for the majors, which prompted Mike Trout — the one player MLB can’t afford to keep losing to the trainer’s room — to ignite tensions between the Angels and Mariners. When Seattle’s Erik Swanson threw a pitch near his head Saturday, Trout launched an uncharacteristic rant. “If you can’t pitch inside, don’t pitch inside,” he said. “If you’re going to hit me, hit me in the ribs, don’t hit me in the head. I don’t know if that was the intent, but anything at the head, you don’t do that.”
Hours later, after Winker was hit intentionally on the hip by designated plunker Andrew Wantz, the teams were throwing haymakers and hurling bodies in a moving rugby scrum. Know how insane it was? Anthony Rendon is out for the season, for the second straight year, but that didn’t stop the Angels’ $245 million third baseman from entering the fray with his right wrist in a cast. He used his left hand to slug Winker in the face, but what was he thinking? What possesses grown men to fight like little boys? The only thing sillier than the brawls are the lies.
“I was pretty amped up for my first start, and the first one just got away from me," explained Wantz, fingers crossed behind his back. “It was sweaty. I was sweating. First day game I've pitched in (in the majors), and that's that. Second one to Winker was a cut fastball inside, and (I) just yanked it. That's all I've got to say."
How ugly was the fracas? “You don’t want to see people getting stepped on, cleated, hit, punched,” said Angels left fielder Brandon Marsh, trying to play peacemaker.
The Angels, who are wasting the all-time blessings of Trout and Shohei Ohtani, have become one of the sport’s biggest abominations. Ohtani likely will sign his next contract elsewhere, as he should. Trout inevitably will lose patience, as he nears 31, and request a trade to his native East Coast, all of which would assure Arte Moreno a place in sports infamy. He does not wear a halo, this owner, who huffs and puffs and spends but ultimately fails. “Look, you play eight games in a matter of a week against the same team, things like this happen," interim manager Phil Nevin said after the eighth Angels-Mariners game in 11 days. “The scheduling, tensions, that's baseball sometimes, unfortunately. There's some ugly incidents once in a while.”
Who can be blamed for the packed-in, home-and-home scheduling?
Yes, MLB. Everything Manfred touches turns to manure, as his domain continues to lose relevance. The most absurd stories are in Chicago, one of the few remaining pure baseball towns. The Cubs won’t acknowledge it, but they’re in a REBUILD!!!!! mode, an atrocity in the No. 3 market. Yet the Ricketts family, so loathed as owners that Cubdom won’t credit them for the historic 2016 championship, has found enough buried treasure for a $100 million sportsbook partnership with DraftKings. Think about it: Hallowed Wrigley Field, built in 1914, is sullied by a modernistic gambling den. Knowing Chicago, a betting scandal is more probable on the North Side than pennant contention. The White Sox have their own World Series drought, winning only one since 1917, and geriatric manager Tony La Russa continues to make sure the South Side will be quiet this autumn.
Never mind his strategic follies, which have been chronicled here and elsewhere. The Sox are so desperate — 5 1/2 games behind Minnesota in a division they should be dominating — that La Russa and the trainers are telling players not to hustle to avoid injuries. That’s right, kids, don’t run out those groundballs. In yet another corrosive byproduct of the lockout — owner Jerry Reinsdorf always has been an anti-union hawk — the Sox have been pummeled by injuries, with 10 players on the IL. They can’t dump the trainer, having already targeted Brian Ball, who is accusing the team in a lawsuit that he was fired because he is gay. So, La Russa is asking fans to understand why some of his wounded players — Anderson, Luis Robert, Jose Abreu, AJ Pollock and Andrew Vaughn — won’t be busting it around the basepaths. As you can imagine, the edict is going over big among fans who routinely chant “Fire Tony!” at whatever they’re calling Comiskey Park these days.
“We literally have … guys who are playing under trainer instructions that if they make a routine out, they slow it down,” La Russa said. “If you watch closely, there are extra bases we haven’t taken. And you can sit them, but they’re key offensive guys. So as long as the fans understand it, they’re not lazy, but their legs are important.”
Anyone who knows the Reinsdorf Way realizes what’s coming. Though his team remains the most talented in the American League Central, aches and all, he’ll exaggerate health as a convenient cop-out if the Sox fall short of the Twins and (gulp) Cleveland Guardians, whose payroll is $67 million. Don’t be shocked, if they’re eight or nine games out of first place at the Aug. 2 trade deadline, if the Sox are sellers. That would be a more flagrant White Flag fiasco than the original deal, in 1997, when Reinsdorf and general manager Ron Schueler pulled the midseason plug with the team only 3 1/2 games out of the division lead. “Anyone who thinks we can catch Cleveland is crazy,” Reinsdorf roared. The ramifications could be seismic this time: Imagine La Russa walking away at season’s end, claiming he wants more family time, while Reinsdorf realizes he’s pushing 90 and sells his ownership shares while relinquishing power.
Don’t let him play the injury card, Soxdom. All teams have been hit hard, to varying degrees, none more relentlessly than the Dodgers. But they are blessed with extraordinary lineup and pitching depth, thanks to the free spending of Guggenheim Baseball’s ownership and a remarkable player development/analytics staff. The Cubs and Sox could have been fed similar riches if front man Mark Walter, who came to Los Angeles from Chicago, had bid for the local teams. They weren’t available, so Walter formed the power group that bought the Dodgers and honed a model franchise.
Which brings us to baseball’s biggest ongoing crisis. The gap between the Gucci spenders, Target spenders and 99 Cents Only shoppers never has been wider, with numerous major-league teams operating like minor-league shops. Eight franchises have payrolls below $100 million, and four are playing like it: Oakland, Kansas City, Miami, Arizona. Cleveland and, as always, Tampa Bay are in wild-card races at the moment. Baltimore and Pittsburgh are showing signs of life, finally. Owners were incentivized not to tank when MLB expanded the playoffs to six teams in each league, but the A’s, Reds and Cubs — shame on you, Tom Ricketts — are tanking. They’re among six teams, along with the Royals and Nationals and Tigers, on pace to lose 100 or more games. Makes you ponder whether MLB should consider relegation, like the English Premier League.
It’s no wonder baseball mostly is watched only by a dwindling 60-and-over demographic. For every meaningful series, such as the Yankees-Astros cheat grudge match last weekend, or my Dodgers-Padres game this weekend, you have the Yankees playing two games in Pittsburgh. At long last, the Pirates are showcasing ballyhooed prospects, the reward for multiple tanking seasons. But a friend, who owns season tickets, is concerned nonetheless.
He worries that phenom Oneil Cruz, a one-man electric company, will be subjected to typical organizational protocol. He fears the Pirates will send the 6-foot-7 shortstop back to the minors, stuff him in mothballs, extract the most from him for a few seasons, then deal him before cheapass owner Bob Nutting has to pay him real money. Since 2017, the Pirates have groomed and traded, among others, Gerrit Cole, Joe Musgrove, Tyler Glasnow, Jameson Taillon, Starling Marte, Austin Meadows and Josh Bell. So why would a fan become too invested in the machine-gun arm, 118.1-mph exit velocity and sprinter’s foot speed of Cruz — or, for that matter, talented kids such as Ke’Bryan Hayes and Henry Davis?
“He’s the talk of the town. Hopefully, they don’t send him down to save money,” my friend texted. “Baseball is messed up.”
Ya think?
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Jay Mariotti, called “without question the most impacting Chicago sportswriter of the past quarter-century,’’ writes general sports columns for Substack while appearing on some of the 1,678,498 podcasts and shows in production today. He is an accomplished columnist, TV panelist and talk/podcast host. Living in Los Angeles, he gravitated by osmosis to film projects.