Roger Arrieta
Basketball has its shot clock and the NFL has its play clock. Now the MLB is getting on board, speeding up games with its just announced “Pace of Game Changes.”
But hasn’t baseball has always been the “leisurely” sport among sports? Its theme song, “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” is about buying popcorn and Cracker Jack, and even implies that speeding up the game would be a shame: “I don’t care if I never get back…”
But the average duration of a baseball game has grown dramatically. In 1981, the average duration of a game was 2 hours and 33 minutes. Last year, an average game took over three hours to complete. Replay review is one culprit, but the duration of MLB games had grown before the implementation of the replays.
So, the league has decided to speed things up. the goal is to get the duration back to where it was a few years ago: between 2 hours, 25 minutes (locally televised games) to 2 hours, 45 minutes (nationally televised games).
I don’t think too many fans in this fast-paced world will complain about these changes. But I wonder how former pitcher Alejandro Pena would have fared under the new rules. Pena pitched for the Dodgers from 1981 to 1989, and spent a total of 15 years in the major leagues. He was an excellent relief pitcher, ending up with a 3.11 ERA over those years.
But, boy, was he sllllooowww… slow, as he peered into the catcher to get the sign; slow, in getting ready to pitch; slow in his windup. When Pena came in, Vin Scully had to have a couple extra stories to share. It was frustrating for the fan. I remember my dad yelling at the TV, “just pitch!!” My dad was old school — in hurry up mode most of time; his motto was “get ‘r done” long before Larry the Cable Guy came along.
Sam McManis wrote about Pena in the LA Times in 1988, the Dodgers last world championship year:
The mere summoning of Alejandro Pena from the bullpen does not mean he is ready to pitch. Certain rituals must be completed first. There is his entrance, for instance. Pena doesn’t walk to the mound, he strolls. And once there, the Dodgers’ right-handed reliever dawdles.
Pena manicures the mound with his spikes, and seemingly spends minutes kneading the rosin bag.
Inevitably, the plate umpire will have Pena remove his neck chain, which resembles a hood ornament.
Then, finally, Pena stares at the catcher’s mitt, like a marksman lining up his target.
Once he throws a pitch, the routine starts all over again. He takes so much time between pitches that his Dodger teammates kiddingly call Pena the human rain delay.
“He even stands slow,” Ron Perranoski, the Dodger pitching coach, said with a shrug.
If Pena was pitching now, these new pace of game changes would either cost him a lot of money in fines or shorten his career, or both. Even in the 1980s, his deliberate demeanor was a little much. But he was successful — 94.1 innings, 83 SO, 1.91 ERA, 12 saves — so his pokey pace was forgiven.
Come to think of it, pokey or quick, the Dodgers could use an Alejandro Pena in the bullpen in 2015.
-David Posey
