Mancini ejection?

[tntoriole]

49 minutes ago, Jammer7 said:

Yeah, that’s the narrative. I don’t agree that it should be embraced, but that is the narrative. Again, fitting the game into a neat time slot. That is not baseball. Basketball, football, soccer…they have time clocks. Baseball has innings. It was made that way for a reason.

If they keep using the humidors, we’ll see even more strategy and signs being relayed. More bunts, hit and run, etc… When these headsets get throw out because the pitcher can’t hear it, it will go back to multiple sets of signs with runners on. 

The “reason” lol .. our former manager, the Human Rain Delay 

Chuck with the great and bitingly dry sarcasm.. lol 

 

 

[tntoriole]

But, of course, speeding up the game means we will never see this again … lol 

 

 

[tntoriole]

A great article about ejection history from Retrosheet

https://retrosheet.org/Research/SmithD/EjectionsThroughTheYears.pdf

 

Earl was 4th alltime in ejections with Bobby Cox being first 

Stan Musial had the most games played without ejection, Brooks was 4th (neither ever ejected) 

“Derek Jeter finishes his MLB career having played the sixth-most games without ever having experienced an ejection as a player. Jeter's 2,745 regular season games played without ejection trails Hall of Famers Stan Musial (3,026), Willie Mays (2,992), Brooks Robinson (2,896), Robin Yount (2,856) and Tony Perez (2,777).”  
 

https://www.closecallsports.com/2014/09/umpires-on-never-ejected-derek-jeter.html?m=1

[tntoriole]

Love this one too from David Vincent at Retrosheet that has vignettes about ejections and rhubarbs 

“07/19/1946 – White Sox at Red Sox
White Sox hurler Joe Haynes threw a pitch at Ted Williams' head in the third inning and was warned by HP umpire Red Jones. The White Sox bench rode Jones, accusing him of playing to the Ladies' Day crowd. Ralph Hodgin was ejected from the bench by Jones, followed shortly by Dario Lodigiani, Eddie Smith and Coach Bing Miller. Then Leo Wells was ejected by Jones. When the White Sox continued to yell, Jones went to the bench and sent Mike Tresh, Johnny Rigney, Hal Trosky, Guy Curtright, Eddie Lopat, Whitey Platt, Frank Whitman, Wally Moses and batting practice pitcher Glen Liebhardt off the bench with recall privileges. However, White Sox manager Ted Lyons told that group to change clothes and go to the train station to await early departure for New York. Only Lyons and coach Mule Haas were left on the bench but there were six players in the bullpen. This is the most players ejected in one game for a team.”

https://www.retrosheet.org/Research/VincentD/EjectionsHistory.pdf

[DrungoHazewood]

2 hours ago, Jammer7 said:

Yeah, that’s the narrative. I don’t agree that it should be embraced, but that is the narrative. Again, fitting the game into a neat time slot. That is not baseball. Basketball, football, soccer…they have time clocks. Baseball has innings. It was made that way for a reason.

I'm not sure I agree that there was a reason.  Baseball was kind of charting new territory when it was invented in the early 1800s and then turned into a professional sport and a business from about 1860-1890.  A lot of things just kind of happened.  Or they tinkered with annually to try to make the game more compelling.  In the 1860s the game had a time of crisis before they invented and then took a while trying to enforce first called strikes then called balls.  There was a time where individual at bats would sometimes take 15 or 20 minutes as pitchers refused to throw hittable pitches and batters refused to swing at pitches 5' off the plate.  Then they experimented for the next 20-odd years to try to strike a balance and make the game more interesting.  What they ended up with by 1900 was a game that was typically completed in 90 minutes to two hours.

And it stayed that way until the 30s and 40s and the advent of lights.  There's a relevant Bill James quote where he says people like to say baseball doesn't have a clock, but until lights the sun was the clock.  Umpires routinely pressed the players to move things along and chastised them for dawdling because nobody wanted the game called on account of darkness.

It's a very modern idea that baseball should be this leisurely, slow-paced game where the pitcher and the batter each get to go through this routine between every pitch, and we take a 3-minute commercial break for each of the nine pitching changes.  The folks who invented baseball went and changed major rules when the game started to drag on and threatened to resemble a five-day test match in cricket.

[Jammer7]

1 hour ago, geschinger said:

I've watched more minor league games this year than MLB games and increasing pace of play has not taken anything away from those games it has only improved it.  Once players are used to it, you don't even notice it. 

It rarely makes a difference, true. But it does, and at crucial times. It may be a matter of getting used to it, but I don’t believe it to be necessary. It creates more conflict in the short term, as we have seen in college baseball this season. I like the slower pace of games, at times. But it isn’t a hill I’m willing to die on. In the end, the owners will do what lines their pockets. 

[Jammer7]

5 minutes ago, DrungoHazewood said:

I'm not sure I agree that there was a reason.  Baseball was kind of charting new territory when it was invented in the early 1800s and then turned into a professional sport and a business from about 1860-1890.  A lot of things just kind of happened.  Or they tinkered with annually to try to make the game more compelling.  In the 1860s the game had a time of crisis before they invented and then took a while trying to enforce first called strikes then called balls.  There was a time where individual at bats would sometimes take 15 or 20 minutes as pitchers refused to throw hittable pitches and batters refused to swing at pitches 5' off the plate.  Then they experimented for the next 20-odd years to try to strike a balance and make the game more interesting.  What they ended up with by 1900 was a game that was typically completed in 90 minutes to two hours.

And it stayed that way until the 30s and 40s and the advent of lights.  There's a relevant Bill James quote where he says people like to say baseball doesn't have a clock, but until lights the sun was the clock.  Umpires routinely pressed the players to move things along and chastised them for dawdling because nobody wanted the game called on account of darkness.

It's a very modern idea that baseball should be this leisurely, slow-paced game where the pitcher and the batter each get to go through this routine between every pitch, and we take a 3-minute commercial break for each of the nine pitching changes.  The folks who invented baseball went and changed major rules when the game started to drag on and threatened to resemble a five-day test match in cricket.

As always, we can count on you for an excellent history lesson. Thanks for that. Personally, I miss day baseball. And Harry Carey singing in the 7th inning stretch after his tenth Budweiser. 

The innings simply give each team an equal opportunity to score as many runs as they can. They hit as long as they reach base safely. They other team has to stop them. That is why there are innings, not a game clock, IMHO. 

I don’t know that there is a better way to prosecute a baseball game than that. Unless we want to adopt the little league “5 runs max in an inning rule” for 8 year olds, or make the games an hour and 45 minutes like youth travel ball. Those games usually go about 4-5 innings. (Please note the sarcasm intended, and not directed to you. lol)

There are many things that happen during each pitch, especially with runners on. Certainly the game has changed over the years. Pitchers’ velocity has jumped, and command has decreased. More pitches thrown = more time. More runners = more time, and also more excitement. More home runs, more time, more excitement, more tv money, more fans’ butts in the seats. The game has changed because the players have changed. PED’s changed the game, made it longer and more exciting in the 80’s. And it turns out, a lot of people liked it. Pitchers hated it, but baseball never had a bigger fan base. Until morality stepped in.

IDK, I guess I’m just a bit old school. And a little tired of being told that everything has to change and have those changes forced down my throat. Baseball is my refuge away from the world for three hours. I think we could all stand to slow things down and put our phones away for three hours. Talk baseball with our sons, daughters, grandkids, spouses and friends. Unplug the pressure cooker for a few hours. What is the rush all about anyway? I know, that notion is antiquated, the world has changed.

Sorry for the long post. We kinda jacked this thread. This is what happens when I have a day off. lol

[btdart20]

Mancini's hop was the only time he went in the direction of 2B.  Did the ump think he was going to hop to 2B?  Then the C clearly saw the ump stalking Mancini's slow walk to 1B...  1B coach was pointing but didn't look very animated to get Mancini hustling.

If Mancini would have turned around to sprint back to 1B, could that have been interpretted as an attempt to go to 2B?

From that point on, it's on Mancini.  I'm ok with the ump's call to eject Mancini.  There were less than 4k in the stands.  The one thing players must do is honor the umpire as a position.  Disagree honorably.  It's less about the language (though that is one measuring stick used by the league and some degree of the fans) and more about the approach and attitude.

[NCRaven]

Mancini to the Ump - "Did I ever tell you that you look like a penis with a little hat on."

Ump to Mancini - "You're outa here!"

[DrungoHazewood]

2 hours ago, Jammer7 said:

IDK, I guess I’m just a bit old school. And a little tired of being told that everything has to change and have those changes forced down my throat.

I appreciated your entire post, but wanted to focus on this.  The irony here is that baseball has probably changed the rules and structures of the game as little as any major sport.  But what's happened is that this refusal to change led to players, teams, GMs, managers exploiting loopholes those unchanging rules to radically change the game.

Probably 95% of the rules today are the same as the rules in 1908, when there were teams that hit six homers a year and pitchers who threw 42 complete games.

Baseball has refused to change and the game went on changing anyway but often in ways nobody really wanted.  Would it really be so bad to tweak things in the direction we want, rather than refuse to change anything and wake up one day to four-hour nine inning games of all strikeouts and homers?

[DrungoHazewood]

One other thing I just remembered, if you look at the original Cartwright rules that the Knickerbockers and Doc Adams drew up there was no mention of nine innings.  The winner was whomever got to 21 aces (runs in modern terms) first. Games only occasionally got to nine innings.  It wasn't until 1857 that the original National Association's rules committee decided to change to nine innings, presumably to match the number of players on the field.

So it's hard to tell just how long an 1850 game took, but it wouldn't have been unusual for 21 aces to have been scored in just a few innings.

[Can_of_corn]

16 hours ago, Frobby said:

That’s a bad call by the ump.  He turned towards 2B but clearly had no intention of running.   It’s not like he started, saw where the ball was and then stopped.  

Here’s the text of the rule book:

“A batter-runner cannot be tagged out after overrunning or oversliding first base if he returns immediately to the base”

The batter is out if “He fails to return at once to first base after overruning or oversliding that base.  If he attempts to run to second he is out when tagged.”

Would you say Mancini immediately returned to the base?

I think that it's enough of a judgement call that I wouldn't call it a bad call, just one I don't agree with.

[Can_of_corn]

4 minutes ago, DrungoHazewood said:

One other thing I just remembered, if you look at the original Cartwright rules that the Knickerbockers and Doc Adams drew up there was no mention of nine innings.  The winner was whomever got to 21 aces (runs in modern terms) first. Games only occasionally got to nine innings.  It wasn't until 1857 that the original National Association's rules committee decided to change to nine innings, presumably to match the number of players on the field.

So it's hard to tell just how long an 1850 game took, but it wouldn't have been unusual for 21 aces to have been scored in just a few innings.

Sure with the rate of unearned runs that the norm I'm sure you did.

[DrungoHazewood]

5 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

Sure with the rate of unearned runs that the norm I'm sure you did.

One thing that's taken me a long time to understand is how early baseball often saw scores like 52-32.  In 1871 they were still over 10 per team per game.

But by 1880 we were down to under five runs a game, including roughly 50% unearned runs.  I think that's mainly due to pitching rule changes.  There were years in the 1860s where the pitcher had to pitch underhanded with both feet on the ground, a stiff elbow, and no breaking the wrist.  Imagine fast-pitch softball, but with both feet planted on the ground and no bending your elbow.  It'd be a miracle if anyone could break 60 mph.

By 1884 Old Hoss Radbourne was throwing no-restrictions overhand with a full windup from a box 50' away.

[btdart20]

15 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

Would you say Mancini immediately returned to the base?

I think that it's enough of a judgement call that I wouldn't call it a bad call, just one I don't agree with.

Yes, Mancini was immediately returning to the base.  Otherwise, we would have 1B tagging players not running back to the bag after running through it.