Major League Baseball, moving faster than a locomotive now that pitchers and batters have been ordered to stay on the tracks, has trimmed roughly a half-hour off last season’s average game length.
Frankly, it’s tremendous. Games now typically clock in at just less than 2 hours and 40 minutes, in lockstep with an NHL game.
Houston lefthander Framber Valdez no-hit the Guardians Tuesday — a legit honest-to-Sandy Koufax one-man no-no — and the whole thing played out in a tidy 2:06. That’s 54 minutes and 9 seconds below the Oppenheimer Line, the new standard for measuring all entertainment times based on the acclaimed flick by Christopher Nolan.
Around here, heck, 2:06 is what it used to take the Sox and Yankees to reach the bottom of the third inning on any given Sunday night start at Fenway. We endured it. Somehow. What were we doing, beyond scrolling through our iPhones and meandering off to the concession stands?
Overall, MLB games are being played at the fastest pace since 1984. Had George Orwell only known the pain it would take to write baseball a future.
Going to the ballpark is a load more fun, though those traipsing off to see their teams play in Queens or the Bronx would surely disagree. The Mets and Yanks have their woes, the least of which is the clock, unless they’re counting the time that management frittered away assembling what turned out to be Triple A-quality rosters paid A-plus wages.
Baseball fans of a certain age stay up at night imagining how headlines in the New York Post and New York Daily News would capture the ire of Yankee owner George Steinbrenner, had he lived to see this $222 million payroll deliver with the clout of a pocketful of pennies. “Boss Says Enuf: Take Out the Tra$h!”
Watching the quicker, leaner MLB has inspired me to think what else could be either sped up or slowed down in the games we love, whether we watch on TV or in person. We knew for a long time that there had to be a better way with baseball, and now that we have it, maybe it’s worth reconsidering how some other sports are spending their time — and ours along with it.
Futbol — This one’s the most obvious. Pace of play is fine, along with length of regulation play (90 minutes). But extra time is a joke, the exact amount hidden deep in the referee’s head, no doubt next to his to-do list, another list of favorite sushi joints on the road and fear he left his passport, wait … it’s on the plane!
So easy to remedy. Outfit the ref with a stopwatch gizmo that syncs up with a sideline clock that keeps track of time lost to the flashing of yellow and red cards, player pratfalls, dives, and insulting histrionics. When regulation ends, flip on the OT clock that shows, oh, 4:21 of extra time … shazam!
The action won’t play out faster or slower, but time matters as much as the score, and everyone should know both. Futbol OTs turn thrilling finishes into a group shrug.
Football — Enough with offensive huddles following virtually every down. One huddle only, beginning every series of downs. Otherwise, once the ball is blown dead and all 22 players are on their feet, the next play has to be underway within 12-15 seconds (we can debate length). Substitutions are fine … and fast.
There’s just far too much start, stop, return to respective side of scrimmage, huddle up, call the play, sometimes wait for officials to figure out if there is a penalty, maybe call the penalty, maybe go to review … on and on and on. Brutal. Retirement home mixers move faster.
I get it, football is not a transitional sport such as hockey, basketball, and footie. But let’s see ‘em get at it, and enjoy the mayhem when not everyone comes out of the huddle able to remember three or four plays. In the end, maybe this means every player on the field hears the plays through some form of headphones. Fine. But less standing, waiting, calculating, explaining … just play.
Basketball — Another simple fix, especially in the NBA, with its mother lode of timeouts and intentional time bleeds in the fourth quarter. The end of a game is harder than watching the tail end of “ABC World News Tonight” when it cuts to a commercial after nearly every 20- or 30-second snippet of news. But at least that ends at 7 p.m. On the dot.
New NBA rule: one timeout for the entire game. Works just fine in the NHL. That’s it. If a guy is hurt, give him 20 seconds to get up and ready to go … or switch him out. Too many fake artists trying to buy time.
It should not take, say, 24 minutes to play the final eight minutes of an NBA game (yes, I’ve timed it). I know, I know, I know, commercials, in a sport where some guys are banking $60 million a year. I trust the NBA can find a way to dig out the dough lost in the couch cushions.
All MLB TV — Let it breathe a little, will ya? After the third out, let’s at least get a five- or seven-second glimpse of the sides flipping personnel. I know, again, you want to go to commercials. Tell ya what, add the seconds into the break. MLB just trimmed a half-hour off games. Adding seven seconds before bolting to the endless stream of sales would add back roughly two minutes over a nine-inning game.
Otherwise, as we see here with NESN, the cutaway to Cashville is faster than an Amazon truck driver peeling down the driveway Friday at 5 p.m. At least allow the play-by-play guy to say, ”Third out, two men left … after three, we’re still tied, 2-2.”
Man, my world for a Ned Martin “Mercy!”
Kevin Paul Dupont can be reached at kevin.dupont@globe.com.
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August 05, 2023 at 12:07AM
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Inspired by MLB’s success, let’s adjust the clock with some other sports, too - The Boston Globe
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