Commissioner Rob Manfred prior to a regular season Sunday Night Baseball game (Photo by Phil Ellsworth / ESPN Images)(NEW YORK) — Major League Baseball could soon restrict the number of different pitchers teams use per game.
MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred was a guest on ESPN Radio’s Mike & Mike Thursday morning, and listened to nine suggestions from the hosts on how to potentially improve the sport. One of those suggestions included a restriction on relief pitchers allowed either per inning or per game.
“I am in favor of something like that,” the commissioner said, adding that the league has spent “a ton of time on this issue in the last few months.”
Manfred also said that relief pitchers have become too dominant in the modern game. “The pitching changes themselves slow the game down,” he said, “and our relief pitchers have become so dominant at the back end that they actually rob action out of the end of the game, the last few innings of the game.”
The average length of a Major League Baseball game this season has been three hours and four minutes. In 2005, the average game was just two hours and 49 minutes.
Manfred said earlier this year that he was unhappy with the pace of games, and would entertain “creative ways” to improve the sport.
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