I walked up to the plate apprehensively, clueless about the score of the game yet hoping more than anything to help my team out. It's Little League season, and I'm a mere 10 years old and hardly in touch with my inner Micky Mantle.
I grip my bat tight, take a long look at the opposing pitcher, see him start his windup, see the pitch leave his hand and POP!, straight to my back it goes. Fighting through the pain, I was optimistic due to the fact that as a victim of a hit by pitch, I was due a free trip down to first base. Unfortunately, no one told the umpire of that particular baseball standard. I wasn't allowed a free base, promptly struck out on 3 straight pitches and took my seat on the bench.
Now, this minor incident in a Little League game doesn't make any direct comparison to Major League Baseball, but I would use it to show a point. My point, and I'll back it up with the additional information that I was hit again in that game and once again was denied a free base, is that the MLB and it's players are lacking a fundamental quality of toughness.
How do I arrive at this conclusion? Well, while my story above was meant more as a comedic anecdote than undeniable proof, I'm sure that Little League baseball shouldn't have tougher rules on hit batters than the major leagues.
I think it's fair that before I begin rambling and bore you to death, I make a few disclaimers. While I think that players of the olden days used to be tougher than players of today, I don't in any way think that there is a decline of skill. Instead I would say that talent as a whole has increased, not least of all because of the end of barriers such as race and social standing, which have allowed competition to expand and make players better.
I'm not going to go into detail about money, and contracts, and lavish lifestyles of players now compared to players of old. I'm not going to list the guys who left the league in the middle of their careers to go serve their country during wartime, because it's whiny, repetitive and frankly, poor journalism.
I'd like to cite several factors and current trends that highlight a movement towards more specialized players and, in some fashions, weaker players.
Buster Posey is a young catcher for the San Fransisco Giants, who has the unfortunate honor of being a major cog in the wheel of weakness, per se. During the 2011 season, Posey was injured while attempting to block home plate from an advancing runner, a play that has always been an integral and necessary part of his position. Posey suffered substantial leg injuries during his collision with Scott Cousins, and he accepted the circumstances as a professional would, taking his recovery time and working to get back to his teammates. However, the collision sparked a major debate in baseball, turning this age old responsibility of the catcher into an "unnecessary risk", and suddenly several managers and players came out opposing this play and, even worse, calling for Major League Baseball to make changes to protect catchers.
On the bright side, perhaps all the attention on catchers brought some of the overprotective managers off of their pitchers, if only for a little bit. The current durability and stamina of current pitchers is no comparison to their baseball ancestors, and while a fair amount of blame rests on their controlling and worrisome managers, the simple facts tell us that pitchers ain't what they used to be. Sure, they throw faster than they used to, they reach triple digits on the radar guns. For a while, at least. In today's MLB, the most durable workhorse pitchers are not likely to register a complete game in more than 1 or 2 of their starts per season. As recently as the 1980's and stretching back way before that, it was not uncommon for pitchers for complete 5-7 times as many complete games. In fact, it was not unheard of or uncommon for pitchers to start both games of a doubleheader. Ask Tim "the Freak" Lincecum to do that next season.
So now that we have catchers who don't block and pitchers who tire easily, we can at least find some salvation in the grit, determination and toughness of our hitters, right?
According to information on Major League Baseball gathered over time, baseball players have grown by an average of 5 inches and 12 pounds, and that's just over the last 4 decades. As players grow and ballparks shrink, it stands to reason that players today would be putting up power numbers that impress. However, only one active player ranks near the top of the all time home run leader chart, Alex Rodriguez, who is likely to be out of baseball within the next few seasons due to his involvement with performance enhancing drugs. After that, the next closest active player is down at number 28 on the list. Amongst the top 20 leaders sit 5 players who are confirmed steroid users or confirmed users of illegal PED's.
Yes, even amongst baseball's oldest and greatest, today's bigger and better athletes fail to match up with the rough and tumble players of old. The baseball of today is a very specialized game, a game where players are sheltered and, dare I say babied through season after season of ice packs, massages form personal trainers and more "rest days" than practice days. I don't know how it happened, or why, but somewhere along the line, changes to the sport happened and will probably never revert back to the old ways. Hell, half the reason you see Nolan Ryan and Hank Aaron smiling at games is because they know their records aren't gonna be broken anytime soon, not in today's baseball.
So sit back, fans, and get out your radar guns, you might just be lucky enough to see somebody pitch 110 MPH one of these days. If you're really lucky, he might even be able to sign you an autograph with the arm he's not icing after the game.
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