Opening Day Takeaways!

The clock rocks!

I have a friend in Cincinnati who is famous for his glorious ability to complain about anything, to rain on any parade. It is a true gift. Like if you said to him, “Hey, what if you won the lottery?” he would respond, “Aw, Sarge, that would be terrible. Think about the taxes. And then you have all these losers in your life hitting you up for money. And it would totally wreck your ambition. That would be terrible.”

He could do this for any scenario. Like I say, it’s a gift.

And I have to admit I think about him every single time I hear people complaining about the pitch clock. No, of course, it’s not perfect. What is perfect? But I honestly cannot understand how anyone can watch games with the pitch clock and think, “Oh, man, I miss the dead time.” I honestly don’t get it.

Sure, yes, we all want baseball to have a nice, leisurely pace — that’s an integral part of baseball’s magic and charm. But I have to tell you, after watching a bunch of games on Opening Day — there’s PLENTY of time for leisure even with the quicker pace. Fifteen seconds between pitches with no one on base, 20 seconds with people on base, it’s more than enough time for pondering, reminiscing, chatting, telling stories, all that stuff.

Let me give you some numbers.