CUT4: Why 9 innings? Why 4 balls?

[weams]

 

Quote

For decades, baseball has remained such a constant that its rules and structure have become as cherished as its greatest players. The run-scoring environment might have changed a bit since 1905, but the fundamental look and feel of the game hasn't. Legendary sportswriter and Spink Award winner Red Smith, as always, said it best: "Ninety feet between bases is perhaps as close as man has ever come to perfection."

 

[DrungoHazewood]

I'm always glad when someone writes about early baseball history. But I think the author missed a few nuances.

- Pitchers such as Jim Creighton were pushing the envelope 10 years before Tommy Bond.

- Harry Wright didn't change the rules. There were annual meetings reviewing and revising rules going back to the 1850s.

- How could teams combine for 60-100 runs when the rules stated the game ended when one team reached 21?

- The 154 game schedule was tried as early as 1898. 1920 went back to 154 because WWI ended.

- During the pitcher's box era you were allowed a short run up or at least a couple of hops before pitching.

- He mentioned the shockingly low 2.96 (actually  2.37) ERA in 1880.  What he didn't say was runs per game were very similar to today at 4.69.  Teams averaged 4.3 errors a game and about half of all runs were unearned.

[DrungoHazewood]

And Alexander Cartwright was fire chief of Honolulu for 13 years.

[Number5]

5 minutes ago, DrungoHazewood said:

I'm always glad when someone writes about early baseball history. But I think the author missed a few nuances.

- Pitchers such as Jim Creighton were pushing the envelope 10 years before Tommy Bond.

- Harry Wright didn't change the rules. There were annual meetings reviewing and revising rules going back to the 1850s.

- How could teams combine for 60-100 runs when the rules stated the game ended when one team reached 21?

- The 154 game schedule was tried as early as 1898. 1920 went back to 154 because WWI ended.

- During the pitcher's box era you were allowed a short run up or at least a couple of hops before pitching.

- He mentioned the shockingly low 2.96 (actually  2.37) ERA in 1880.  What he didn't say was runs per game were very similar to today at 4.69.  Teams averaged 4.3 errors a game and about half of all runs were unearned.

I think they fielded remarkably well, considering the gloves they used.

[25 Nuggets]

This is why statistics prior to 1890 need to be taken with a grain of salt.

They forgot to mention the "walks count as hits" rule.in 1887.

[DrungoHazewood]

55 minutes ago, 25 Nuggets said:

This is why statistics prior to 1890 need to be taken with a grain of salt.

They forgot to mention the "walks count as hits" rule.in 1887.

Modern sites and encyclopedias have removed the walks from the hits column for 1887.  Tip O'Neill hit .435, not .485.

I think everyone is better off thinking of baseball history as a continuum. It has never sat still. They constantly changed rules prior to about 1904, and although that tailed off the parks, players, owners, salaries, cities and other conditions have always been in flux. MLB today is probably as different from MLB in 1940 as it is from Korean baseball or NCAA baseball. I think it's a mistake to say there was a big inflection point in any single year.

[weams]

3 hours ago, 25 Nuggets said:

This is why statistics prior to 1890 need to be taken with a grain of salt.

They forgot to mention the "walks count as hits" rule.in 1887.

Poor Ted. He had to compete with that. 

[LA2]

Might as well ask Why the Nine Openings and Two Balls

[kelsey59]

Thanks weams, I love reading about baseball history stuff like this.

[scOtt]

17 hours ago, DrungoHazewood said:

And Alexander Cartwright was fire chief of Honolulu for 13 years.

And a huge sugar cane baron IIRC...

 

A clip I remember from Ken Burns' "Baseball." 90' to 1st base. Paraphrased quote, "Think of the plays at 1B. If it's 89 feet how many close plays are safe? .300 BA is the norm. Think if it's 91 feet... Pitchers become Gods."

 

Very paraphrased...

[scOtt]

And didn't you get unlimited Balls back in the 19th Century? Pitch until you got 3 strikes or an out or a hit?

[scOtt]

Throw strikes or die.

[DrungoHazewood]

On 1/5/2017 at 4:19 AM, scOtt said:

And didn't you get unlimited Balls back in the 19th Century? Pitch until you got 3 strikes or an out or a hit?

Sorry to dredge up a week+ old thread, but I've been limited in posting lately.

Waaaaay back in the amateur era, like the 1850s, there weren't balls and strikes.  The pitcher was more-or-less tossing the ball in so the hitter could put it in play. By the early 1860s pitchers like Jim Creighton were trying to get batters out on their own with speed and curves, and they started instituting ball/strike rules.  They finally settled on the modern three strikes and four balls in 1888.  It was mainly the balls that changed, essentially going from nine to four in a number of steps.  As far as I know 1887 was the only year where three strikes wasn't the rule, it was four, and that was definitely the only year with a non-three strike rule since 1871.

[DrungoHazewood]

On 1/5/2017 at 4:21 AM, scOtt said:

Throw strikes or die.

I've long been curious about a form of baseball that went back to the early paradigm of putting the ball in play almost all the time.  You could make the rule that a walk was two or three bases, the strike zone bottom of the knees to top of shoulders, and move the mound back to about 75'.  Or just recreate the rules of 1875 - pitchers had to throw underhand and put limits on snapping the wrist and bending the elbow.

[Can_of_corn]

1 minute ago, DrungoHazewood said:

I've long been curious about a form of baseball that went back to the early paradigm of putting the ball in play almost all the time.  You could make the rule that a walk was two or three bases, the strike zone bottom of the knees to top of shoulders, and move the mound back to about 75'.  Or just recreate the rules of 1875 - pitchers had to throw underhand and put limits on snapping the wrist and bending the elbow.

You might have to adjust the ball to keep it from becoming beer league softball out there.  Unless of course you want 30 runs a game.