Maddon On 2019's Baseballs: "You could have just stamped Titleist on the side of these things."
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This is not the appropriate time to gripe about the juicing/tinkering/fudging with the baseballs over the last few years. The ones that led to silly-long World Series games, pitchers like Kenley Jansen losing a pitch grip due to a mysterious change in surface, the many fans injured by faster-flying balls now requiring stadiums to extend netting. And I’m not going to point out that the emphasis on launch angle and speed has players hitting balls into the stands harder and faster than ever, leading to severe injuries, longer and more boring games centered around home runs, and the death of small ball.
I also won’t point out that this messing with the ball—size is now in question—likely is some moron’s idea of how to attract a younger audience since home run’s are more social-media friendly. Meanwhile, baseball’s mostly-amazing stadiums sport more empty seats this year.
And since we have plenty of time after The Open to consider all the ways power-pursuing sports have regretted the chase for distance, I’ll resist this opportunity to suggest that golf will never learn a single thing from the this idiotic effort by baseball.
Instead, I’ll just let the disdain of Cubs manager Joe Maddon do the talking regarding what he sees as a smaller ball…though a nice branding moment for Titleist as a noun that made Maddon’s point!
