Big Joke

So, rather than risk a humiliating loss, the Carmine Hose brought up those 21 pitchers to throw against us, and thereby reduced the game to a sort of spring training spin-off.

Smart—this is always our weak spot.  And it's exactly the sort of thing I would like your New York Yankees to do if the positions were reversed:  our top starters injured, elimination at home by our chief rival, staring us in the face.

But this is exactly the sort of thing that is hurting the game.

I don't care what the Sabremetricious tell us.  In baseball, the pitcher is the hero on the field, and the more you diminish him, the more you hurt the game.

Just look at all the excitement over Verlander's no-hitter.  Just look at how many seats in most parks are empty, even when the Mets are playing their fellow Wild Card contenders down the stretch (not to mention all the empty seats at the Stadium Formerly Known as Shea.)

What the Sox are doing are playing into this miserable trend of "the opener."  It will have consequences.

Plus, this little stunt, as Duque mentions, has probably killed the 40-man, September call-up.  It was already on the ropes, hated as it was by broadcasters, who dreaded the extended games they caused.  They made up the excuse that it "unfair" for one team to have, say, 28 players, and another to have 40.

Why IS it unfair, if both teams have the choice?  And to paraphrase something a great Yankee supposedly once said in a brothel, anybody who doesn't want to watch more baseball can leave right now—especially if they are making more money than most people will in a lifetime, for a single season of six months.

Instead, we will probably get a 26-man, regular-season roster—more "openers"!—and an "extended" call-up of only 28.

Me, I loved the extended-roster call-up.  It gave you a chance to see the young talent of the future.  It also gives you a chance to rest the older talent.  Expect more and more injured players going into the postseason from now on.

Which, I'm sure, is just what the Lords of the Game want.  Having already made the playoffs so much less meaningful by letting in one-third of all teams, now they'll dilute them again with exponential, end-of-the-season injuries.

So...

More arbitrary regular-season games, decided by which of your normal, 6-8 pitchers are off that day.  More arbitrary world champions, decided by who happens to be hurt that fall.

More of baseball becoming...like everything else, where on any given Sunday/Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday/Friday/Saturday, anyone can win.

Hooray.  I'm sure attendance will be hold steady around the 10,000 a game mark by 2025.  Fact is, people like form, just as in anything else.