And Managers Can No Longer Hand in Lineup Cards Because the Ump Might Get a Papercut

On January 16th, Major League Baseball is expected to announce a rule outlawing running into the catcher. It's pretty much a done deal and according to most reports they will have the blessing of the player's association. Even if the player's association tells them to shove this horrendous decision in their obviously puckered little asses, MLB can unilaterally impose the rule starting in 2015.So that should give them plenty of time to find the appropriate spokesperson. Let me suggest Dennis Haysbert. He's articulate, likable, and he's already a mouthpiece for an insurance company, and insurance companies are the only possible explanation as to why MLB is making this move.

We may allegedly be in good hands with Haysbert's bosses, but baseball fans are in lousy hands with Selig and the aging bobbleheads running MLB.

In a sport that has lost market share to MMA's brutal violence and NASCAR's potential for fiery disaster, they are altering the ability of a player to attempt to score because of the slight possibility someone might get injured. 
"This is, I think, in response to a few issues that have arisen," MLB Exec. VP of baseball operations Sandy Alderson said in a press conference. "One is just the general occurrence of injuries from these incidents at home plate that affects players, both runners and catchers -- and also the general concern about concussions that exists not only in baseball but throughout professional sports and amateur sports today."
They sure aren't doing it because the fans want it removed-check any online poll and the fans pretty solidly want runner/catcher contact kept in the game. 

This is a sport that has pandered to fans incessantly and ad nauseum since the work stoppages. I don't want another sausage race, Bud Selig, I want the guy racing around home to score any way possible this side of being nudged by the giant doughnut that races on the Jumbotron so my section can win a coupon I'll never use. We don't come to the ballpark for a dollar off a cruller, you crusty old nightmare, we come to see exciting baseball. And a guy barreling around third with the winning run on his cleats is  the definition of it.

Now MLB is pandering to the companies that insure the eight figure a year contracts of the players and who obviously want to take a risk away. Bud Selig and his cohorts won't admit it, but it's absolutely true. You could see the writing on the radiology room wall when San Francisco's wonder boy backstop and queen heartthrob Buster Posey got his leg busted when he got clobbered by the Florida Marlins' Scott Cousins on a play at the plate. The play, it should be noted, happened in extra innings. That's right, the game was on the line.

So what happens next year, as you sit in your $125 seat drinking your $9 beer? That remains to be seen, but under the proposed new rule the runner cannot collide with the catcher; he must slide. The catcher will no longer be allowed to block the plate-that's right, for all intents and purposes, he'll be asked to step to the side of the plate to attempt to tag the runner out.

It's like the classic cartoon with the two annoyingly polite chipmunks. "After you". "No, I insist, after you".

This is not like the argument against fighting in hockey, where it's a traditional part of the game, affects the ability of the stars to skate freely, but almost never directly involves scoring. MLB is changing a fundamental way a run is scored. 

And I've heard claims that those who are in favor of keeping the play in the game are motivated by some sense of machismo. No, sorry, Dr. Phil, that's not the case. Sports fans who live for contact have moved on to the other sports I've already mentioned or never strayed from hockey in the first place, no matter how hard Gary Bettman has tried to chase them out of the village with a flaming puck. This issue has to do with attempting to win a baseball game, and due to a few high profile incidents, both the offensive and defensive player are being robbed of one of the most effective and (yes, exciting) ways of scoring or preventing a run. There are supposed to be risks involved, otherwise chess would be a popular spectator sport. Jeezus, little girls are paralyzed every year cheerleading. Buster Posey's gruesome, horrible, catastrophic injury ? He recovered to be MVP the very next year. 

I don't care where Allstate stands. I care that someone who makes ten million a year to stand in an outfield and adjust his crotch is occasionally given the opportunity to round the base at third, put it into high gear and attempt to make the guy in the body armor drop the baseball so the team I root for (or bet on) can win. That's where I stand.