Yawn...Stick A Fork In It

MLB's annual Homerun Derby, brought to you by StateFarm, was last night. I'll admit, I haven't watched the entire derby since the game was at Fenway back in '99. Last night however, I watched the whole thing, taken pitch after taken pitch. The format is set up for the hitters to lull you to sleep taking pitches until they feel like they have the right feel for one. The hitters this year seemed more headliners than they have had in recent years although that may be my perception and not fact.

Ever play in a coed softball intramural league in college? The one I played in you had somebody on your team pitch to you while you batted. You were allowed one lousy pitch per at bat. All the pressure was on the pitcher to lay a meatball over the plate. It sped the games up tremendously and added an element of barstool discussion for after the games. MLB needs to change something up. While the one pitch rule in college was extreme, how about something like this:

Round 1: you get 10 outs, but taking a pitch counts as half an out. No more taking 5 or 6 straight pitches, swinging at one, then taking 5 or 6 more.

Round 2: you get 10 outs, but taking a pitch counts as a full out. Less hitters here, should have the guys that hit the ball better in round 1, should be ready to hit again.

Finals : you get 10 pitches, period. Do what you can with your 10.

There really isn't much drama in the whole competition anymore. Don't know if it is backlash because of the steroid years or not but there is less excitement (unless you are in the park I would imagine). The biggest moment last night was whether hometown favorite Albert Puhols was going to smile at his kid after he took his turn and the kid was trying to towel him off. There needs to be something to make it more important, a must see TV moment if you will. Bud, you still there? You still the commish? How about making the Derby decide the home team in the World Series? Would you see a few more big hitters being encouraged to join in? Perhaps from the good teams that are likely playoff bound. Ok, it started as a joke and then got worse...bad idea.

How about each team sends their representative to the first round? Not only would there be some team pride introduced but you could then include some fans too? Each team brings a fan (from a local competition) to get some swings in as well. The fans' homers (maybe have a second fence in about 50' for the fan participants would not count toward the overall player's score but there would be a secondary winner (fan) and the team he/she represented. Imagine David Ortiz being there representing the RedSox and giving advice to Mr. Fan from Andover, MA?

Whatever MLB decides to do, which likely will be nothing, they need to do fast. I can likely say with confidence that I won't be watching the entire event next year unless there were some changes made.