Major League Baseball has announced some rule changes that will be implemented in the independent Atlantic League. It’s not a huge leap of logic to assume that if things go OK there, we’ll see some of those same rules applied to big-league baseball.
MLB has a problem. In 2018, paid attendance went down for the sixth year in a row and the ratings for the World Series — baseball’s biggest showcase — were lousy. In terms of popularity, baseball is trending the wrong direction.
Pardon me for being cynical — at my age you’re either cynical or oblivious — but it seems to me that the people in charge of baseball don’t give the south end of a north-bound rat for the game’s traditions as long as the game makes money.