Do you think a new MLB rule for pitchers should be "One hit batter per game". Two and you are out?

Question

Further, any batter hit in the head is an automatic rejection. If its the second batter hit in the game, there's a fine and a rejection.... maybe a suspension. League decides.

Answer 1

Horrible idea. Pitchers do miss their spots sometimes. This would make pitching inside virtually impossible.

Baseball's been played smoothly for over 100 years, there's no reason to make new rules like this.

Hitting batters serves a purpose in the game - it protects your best hitters.
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Answer 2

I don't like the idea of warning the pitchers at all. This gives a huge advantage to hitters. As soon as the teams are warned, a pitcher can't pitch inside for fear of getting thrown out for throwing at the batter. They might as well put the ball on a tee for the batter.

If MLB wants to make the "penalty" tougher for hitting a batter, they could give a hit batter two bases instead of one or how about an escalating scale with the first hit batter by a team in the game getting 1 base, the second one gets 2 bases, third one three bases, and four or more get four bases. That would stop multiple retaliations in a game.

Answer 3

NEVER. Sometimes the ball slips, and you can't control it. There are already enough rules on the books to guard against pitchers throwing at batters. Some would say there are too many rules, and I tend to agree.

Pitchers have to be allowed to pitch inside. It's part of the game. The strike zone has shrunk over the years, and pitchers don't have too many weapons left.

You mean to say that if it's a 3-1 game, bases loaded in the 9th, and a pitcher hits two batters to force in the tying run, he should be ejected? Ridiculous!

There's too much pampering the hitters these days. We allow them to wear medieval armor to the plate, we shrink the strike zone, now you don't want to let pitchers pitch inside? Next thing you know, the pitcher will be required to place the ball on a tee at home plate for the batter to hit.

Answer 4

Look, even the highest rated pitchers loose control of some pitches. An 80 to 100 mile per hour ball released from a human hand is not always going where he plans it and the batter is standing close to where the target is. It will hit the batter, or the catcher and even blue, (ump) at times. If a pitcher is out of control, and his manager hasn't pulled him, then I think the manager should be fined or suspended. There has to be rules on this, but at present we leave it to Blue to decide and I think that is where it belongs as long as this hasn't gotten out of hand to date. Blue is there for a reason and he can see more from his vantage point than you or me and all the talking heads.

Answer 5

Go to oaklandathletics.com to read the story about what happened to Nick Swisher this past weekend. He got hit Friday, and Saturday and Sunday the pitcher was totally aiming for him when he charged up there getting hit the third time.
The pitcher wass out of control. The Rangers manager isn't like that(he used to be an Athletic coach a very good guy) and even the catcher had no idea what was going on.. but that pitcher has hit 75 people since 2002...and has been fined and suspended before.. pitchers like that should be kicked out of baseball period. That isn't playing the game at all!

Answer 6

What a silly question.....and what is a "rejection?"

First, pitchers don't like to hit batters, most of the hit batters is not intentional. It allows guys on base, hurts their numbers, etc.

Also, umpires aren't ignorant to what's going on. They eject (ha, not reject) pitchers who intentionally throw at batters.

There should not be, and never will be, a silly rule like that.

Answer 7

No, I think they need to go the other way. Eliminate the warnings and suspensions and let the players take care of it. There is no reason to not allow a pitcher to throw inside on a batter to the point where they might hit them.

Headhunting is in poor taste, but I believe if the eliminate the rule than who is going to risk having one of their teammates take a ball to the ear intentionally.

Answer 8

While I agree that intentionally throwing at a hitter is uncalled for, I think that overall, hitters overreact to being hit these days.

It used to be that hitters just trotted to first base on a HBP. Now they get upset and start friction, even if the HBP was totally accidental.

Many of the great pitchers in the game were great because they knew how to pitch inside, something that today's pitchers need to be allowed to do.

Answer 9

Since this is the only way i can comment back to your ridiculous message you left about the bus comment, here i go.
You are ridiculous, why would i ask anything other than what i asked? No kid was hurt, no kids were around. It was an accident and i felt bad and after i realized EVERYTHING WAS OK i than wondered about me getting a ticket, which is not an unreasonable thing to do. When you get at ticket for speeding from a cop do you think " I am so glad that no one was hurt by my reckless speeding" No, you complain about how much the ticket is once you get it. You don't go walking around like mary herself telling people that you were so glad that you didn't kill anyone when you were speeding. So you can take your rude comment elsewhere. You go to yahooanswer to get answers to questions you have, not to get ridiculed by someone you don't know. And why would i have written it any differently that is exactly what happened, me taking ownership for what i did was me TELLING WHAT HAPPENED.

Answer 10

No, I think the strict rules are absurd. It should be like the old days when guys like Bob Gibson would tell you that you were going down, and then fire one under your chin. If you got up and dug in, he fired another. The trouble now is that baseball is trying to keep high priced players from getting hurt, and keeping the seats filled. The same reason steroids offenders are not seriously addressed.