Lets Make Some Rule Changes

It is no secret: I love sports. However, there are some things in sports that frustrate me and I think that there are some rule changes and general changes that could amp up things and make certain aspects of certain sports better. Do I think all of my ideas are picture perfect? No. I realize that, though practical, some of these ideas would never be implemented or worked into the sports, however the discussion is happening and I want to throw in my two cents.

Baseball: My only issue with baseball is at times the pace of the game can really be slowed down. Sure, a lot of the times it typically has to do with strategy, such as having a mound visit or two to give the bullpen more time. But it can be frustrating. Solutions:

- At the home plate umpires digression, institute a pitch clock. The pitcher has 20 seconds to get the ball off of the rubber from the second he gets the ball back from the catcher if the home plate umpire feels like he is stalling the game. This means trying to hold a runner on the bag or making a pitch.

- At all times, the batter is not allowed to step out of the box and take a practice swing unless he swings at the previous pitch, or unless there is a ball that could have hit him and he needs a few seconds to get his head back. No more stepping out every pitch and adjusting your batting gloves three times on each hands, Nomar. Keep the game moving.

- Figure out the Designated Hitter rule. Either implement it to both leagues, or get rid of it all together, there is no reason the American League should have it while the National League doesn't. I don't care which way, make a decision.

- Have at least one day game per day. There are 30 teams in Major League Baseball, this does not seem unreasonable to do and more people than you would think own the MLB Package and would actually be interested in this. Teams could charge less money for a day game based on the fact that less people would be likely to attend, causing people to call in sick to work and bring their kids to a game, this could be especially nice during the summer months where the kids are out of school.

- As far as Little League Baseball, ban the curveball. LL did a great thing by implementing the pitch count rule a couple of years back, but it is not enough. 12 year olds should not be throwing curveballs, end of story.

- If one team chooses, they should be allowed to forgo their attempts at bat and just stay in the field, re-setting opposing base runners every three outs after the seventh inning. Think of it like this, if the home team is up seven runs in the bottom of the 8th inning, taking their at bats in the 8th could be potentially meaningless, and a waste of time. If the home team elects to, they should be allowed to just stay in the field, and forfeit their at bats, and finish the game. If the away team ends up scoring enough runs to capture a lead, that's the home teams problem, but it could make things interesting.

Professional Football: I don't think there is much wrong with the NFL, and the popularity of the sport speaks for itself, however there are a couple things that could be changed to make things better:

- Get rid of the annual game in London. This year, I was livid when I found out that my Patriots are playing the annual game over in London. It just is not fair to do that to teams. And to take a home game away from the Buccaneers isn't fair either. While I'm sure there is a system in play where the Buccaneers will make up for the gate that they will be losing, a game at Wembley Stadium is not a home game, and home field advantage in a sport where verbal communication is key and crowd noise is a big advantage. And not to mention the fact that being jet lagged and adjusting to the different time zones will be difficult, only to then return to the east coast and waste half of the bye week in simply re-adjusting your mental clock. If the NFL wants to make itself more international, try keeping the game in North America. Mexico City? Sure. Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver? Fine. Just keep regular season games out of Europe.

- Play the Pro Bowl during the Sunday of the week off break in between the AFC and NFC Championship games. Players that played in the playoffs have the option of not playing in the Pro Bowl, however are encouraged to make an appearance and be honored as a member of the two teams. The players that are going to play in the Super Bowl are the only players that are officially ineligible to play who have been voted to the team. This would stir even more interest for the Super Bowl and make the Pro Bowl that much more watched. Playing the Pro Bowl a week after the Super Bowl takes all of the hype out of the NFL's version of the All-Star game.

- Get rid of the post kickoff commercial break. Yeah, the NFL makes a lot of money off of these commercials, but it slows down the pace of the game. It cam be pretty brutal to sit through the 'touchdown, commercial, kickoff, commercial, start of possession' sequence multiple times each game. For the fans sake, get rid of these commercial breaks.

- Fix the scheduling. While I think that the NFL has a pretty solid scheduling system, at the same time there is definitely something messed up. 2007 season, Patriots played in Indianapolis. 2008, Patriots played in Indianapolis. This season, what do you know, the Patriots are scheduled to play in Indianapolis. Now I understand the Patriots vs. Colt rivalry, and how the NFL wants it to happen due to pure ratings, however something here isn't right. I'm not complaining that we are playing the Colts every year, (the Patriots actually hosted the Colts three straight seasons from 2004 to 2007), and have played them at least since the 2003 season every year, but bounce it back and fourth each year, there is no reason that two teams that are not in the same division should play each other back to back seasons at the same site. Play one at one teams stadium, then alternate the next year, it's only fair. I am only using the Patriots vs. Colts as an example because I am directly familiar with it, however it would not surprise me if the same is going on to other teams out there.

- Change the overtime rules. There are two ideas, both of which would be better than the current system. One idea would be to make overtime not sudden death, and make it a full length 15 minute period, whoever is winning at the end will be declared the winner, and if the teams have the same score, the game will be ruled a tie. In a playoff game that goes to overtime, if the two teams have the same score at the end of the 15 minutes, then play another one. The other idea here would be changing the system to the system that college football uses, only with different rules. Rather than starting at the 25, start the ball at the 35, as most NFL kickers should easily be able to kick a 37 yard field goal. Keep the rule where after the third overtime the teams are forced to attempt a two point conversion after a touchdown, and starting in the fourth overtime move the ball back 5 yards, and then five more yards for each overtime until the ball is placed on the 50 and keep it there. Moving the ball back makes it harder for kickers and offenses in general. We can't have anymore situations where a team wins the game because they won the coin toss, got a good return, and moved the ball 35 yards to kick a field goal.

College Football: I'm going to not really say anything in this particular post, and save college football for its own because there is so much wrong with it. It will probably be soon after this post and will mainly feature how the BCS needs to go along with Pre-Season rankings.

Hockey: I, for one, actually agree with the rule changes in the NHL from a few seasons ago. The fact that they made rules that appeal to the non-fan was a good move, even though the NHL is the least viewed of the four major sports in North America. And personally, I would not be able to stand another season of watching teams play "Trap Hockey." There is room for improvement, however:

- Less is more; Contract teams. This is a lot easier said than done (based on what to do with the players, their salaries, the owners of the teams, and a plethora of other issues), but get rid of at least four teams. Try to figure out which teams the League can do without, probably based on fan-base, revenues, actual abilities, and contract them.

Basketball:

- Get new referees. The NBA is the worst officiated of the four major sports in this country. Let them all go.

- I personally like the fairly new rule that keeps players jumping from high school into the pro's, but I know that there is a very mixed reaction over this issue. I like it because all it takes is a freak accident for a player to injure themselves for their career and then they do not have a degree or education to fall back on. However, what if there was a rule installed where high school players could enter the draft if they earn a certain score on the SAT test, or some other standardized test? Due to the change in the SAT scoring over the past 3 or 4 years, I don't really know what is a good score if someone tells me what they earned. But if a score is set that the kids can get grade of or higher, then it proves that they are indeed smart enough to get into college based purely on their brains, and then allow them to enter into the draft.

- In college basketball, change the shot clock from 35 seconds to 28 seconds. There is no need for the shot clock to be 35 seconds long.

Soccer:

- Install a back court violation, just like in basketball. Put in a rule where you have 20 seconds to clear the ball to mid-field, and once the ball gets past mid-field you cannot return the ball to the defensive part of the field, otherwise its a loss of possession. A big part of the game of soccer is stalling the game because you have a lead, and also waiting to pick your spot because the game is very long, however I feel like if there was a "Failure to Advance" violation(like in Basketball and Lacrosse), then late in games, "full court press" defenses could be used and cause turnovers in the defensive end to make more scoring occur. The installation of the back field violation could also cut back on stalling.


That's it for now. I realize that some of these are unrealistic, however these are just some suggestions.

Do YOU think that you have a better idea for a sport, or that my idea is completely unreasonable? Let me know! Send me an instant message on AIM at 'i3rian 87' or Follow me on Twitter! and send me a tweet! I will be sure to give you credit for your idea/comment!

The 2009 World Baseball Classic

(Note: Italy vs. Venezuela and Dominican Republic were in process while this was being written, so bear with some of the tense changes)

I feel like I am alone when I say that I actually look forward to the World Baseball Classic. Seeing international competition between countries playing sports is one of my most favorite things to watch. Weather it is the Summer or Winter Olympics or something like watching the international side of the Little League World Series, there is something to me about representing your country. Unfortunately, like most of America, my least favorite sport is soccer. I feel like soccer could make some rule changes that could appeal to the non-fan (like the recent rule changes in the NHL). Although, I did watch this past years European Soccer Championship, Euro '08, and fall in love with the underdog/miracle run that Turkey made. One of my favorite sayings is that sports are poetry in motion. Watching a quarterback drop back and read the coverage and make the right read and throw a magnificent pass, or watching Dave Roberts take his lead off of first base when everybody in the house knows that he is going to steal in what turned out to be the series changing moment in the 2005 ALCS, or where an Autistic member of a high school basketball who was only a team manager before the head coach let him not only dress, but play during senior night where after missing his first career high school shot with three minutes and forty six seconds left in the game, ended up finishing the game shooting 7 for 13, 6 of 10 from behind the arch, accumulating 20 points and posting the high school for the game... his only game. To me, nothing is better than the magic of sports and competition when it is not played for financial purposes, but for national pride.

With Major League Baseball being in its offseason, all we have been hearing are the normal news updates: Steroids. The names of the past being Mark McGwire, Raphael Palmero, Sammy Sosa, Jose Canseco, and of coarse Barry Bonds. This post season is all about one Alex Rodriguez and how he is admitting to taking steriods and just recently went under the knife to repair his hip. I think I speak for most sports fans when I say that nothing gets more annoying than tuning into their favorite sports source and it is about steroids. Although, in the past week, those talks have kind of dwindled a bit and a lot of it has to do with the World Baseball Classic. Sure, Grapefruit, Cactus, and whatever the rest of the names of the spring training baseball leagues are have started and we're starting to see highlights and start to watch our favorite players take a couple of meaninful hacks at the plate before getting taken out in the third inning to let players who won't make the team show what they have. Personally, spring training baseball isn't my cup of tea, exibition games are boring. However, the oppertunity to make a big play in an international game for your country is incredible. Sure, you can argue that the first rounds of the WBC are boring and it weeds out the garbage, some would argue that 16 teams are too many because teams like China, South Africa, and Australia stand no chance against the teams of America, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic and Japan. But games are not played on paper which provides for oppertunity. A team can beat another team on any given day, thats the great part about sports.

I don't think anyone saw the following to take place: Netherlands over the Dominican Republic and Australia over Mexico (by mercy rule, none the less). Yeah Japan, America, Venezuela, Puerto Rico and Korea have already advanced, but the fact that Australia and the Netherlands have oppertunities to move on is awesome. It is comparable to watching that 5 vs. 12 game each March. I for one would love to see the Netherlands make it to the next round and make a George Mason-eqsue run for the glory.

Sure the overglaring thing with the WBC is the pitch count rule, but after all you have to realize that a lot of these players are under salary and the last thing that MLB clubs want is for their star player to throw 25 innings and be worn out by mid-August when Division and Wild Card races really start to heat up, only to risk injury. As much as I look at this in comparison to the LLWS pitch count rules, it is after all a good idea even though I'd love to see a magical 9 inning performance.

Personally, I can overlook the pitch count because of the double-elimination format of the Classic. If it were a 'Series,' that would be different because pitchers single handedly have the ability to take over games, where as batters typically get 4 or 5 at-bats per game. This causes teams to be forced to have depth and rise to the occasion. This is also similar to the most recent LLWS tournaments where it used to be that teams could get away with having two stud pitchers who consistantly threw one hitters. It would be interesting if in some way this could be countered offensively however, such as having batters be limited to something like 10 conscutive at-bats before having to take a game off (i.e., going 2-4 in Game 1, 1-4 in Game 2, and having to be taken out of the game after his second at bat in Game 3). That is something that just popped into my brain, but I'm sure there could be better ideas out there that could balance what should be reason for there to be more offense during the Classic.

To me what really separates the WBC from other sports is the fans, espically the ones that represent the Latin American and Asian teams teams. They proudly wave their flags around and paint their faces and simply are in the stands having *fun*. This is not a knock against any other fans, it just so happens that the L.A. and Asian fans tend to be more over the top, but thats what gets noticed. Also, naturally I wouldnt imagine Italian fans to travel to Toronto to watch Baseball, and other such teams go to various cities where the games are being played. If it was the World Cup, that would be a different story. But these games tend to have a World Cup feel to them, at least based on the fans reaction. Thats what sports are supposed to come down to: Fun.

Steroids, steroids, steroids, blah, blah, blah. We get it, Alex Rodriguez took steroids, I would guess that most of the public doesn't care too much about which specific steroid it was and which little store in the Carribean he was able to send someone to buy them over the counter for. I get it, Rodriguez took steroids. The bigger story coming out of New York should be that the Yankees went out and spent $423 million dollars on four players and then have the balls to ask the city of New York for $400 million dollars so that their stadium is finished in time for opening day. I'm not too upset that the Yankees went out and spent the money on free agents, thats the business behind the game and because there is no salary cap, the sky is the limit(the salary cap is a separate issue for another day). I'm not upset that they spent the money and going to wine about 'the evil empire buying a championship.' Thats not my style, even as a Red Sox fan.

I'd rather be seeing storys about the Neatherlands, a team with few major league stars playing top baseball against a glorified MLB All-Star team and beating them 3-2, and then taking them into extra innings in an elimination game a few days later. This is why sports are great. If the Dominican Republic go on to win the game, will I be upset? No, not really, I think that they can compete with the best and it could make some awesome potential match ups in the later rounds... But to see a team that nobody though had a chance stand up to the Golaith and prevail is special. Thats why sports are special. I am going to be watching the gamecast on www.worldbaseballclassic.com like I have been while I have been writing this article.

One things for sure: WBC, I'm interested.