4 Responses to Do You Agree With George Brett on the DH?

1. Eagle
   January 13th, 2012 at 12:07 pm

   You know what I hate more than watching pitchers “swing like they are swatting flies?” I hate watching guys who only stroll to the plate 4 times a game and spend the rest of it on their … backsides.

   If you can’t play the field you shouldn’t be in baseball.

   I might agree with an 8 man order before I’d agree a DH.

2. John D
   January 13th, 2012 at 2:40 pm

   I have never understood this whole argument. Pop up in the middle of the infield, what happens? The batboy would be preferable to run out on the field and catch it instead of the pitcher, but no discussion is ever made of a pitcher’s defense. And hitting? I think it would have been better strategy to bat out of order instead of letting Al Leiter get up there with men on base. And that’s just pitchers. Remember Mike Piazza behind the plate? He couldn’t have thrown out a baserunner if the guy was trying to swipe the pitcher’s mound. We don’t keep pitchers and other players out of the HoF based on lousy defense.

   My point is defense is ONE part of the game and a guy like Edgar Martinez excelled at a position that has been an accepted part of baseball for a long time. Would the writers have liked it better if he was the hitter he was, but trotted out there and been as horrific as Mike Jacobs at first base?

   I am all for getting rid of the DH and hope it happens soon, but Martinez deserves to be in the HoF.

3. Ralph C
   January 13th, 2012 at 3:24 pm

   I like one aspect of the pitcher hitting: when a pitcher does get a big hit, it is pretty exciting.
   I see many more advantages to the DH though: 1) If there is a close game and your pitcher is having a great game, he can stay in. In the NL, the pitcher often has to come out to try to break open the game or start a comeback.
   2) I know many like the strategy–bunting and double switching–in the NL game but this doesn’t make or break a game for me. With first and third and one out, is it really more exciting to have the pitcher bunt the runner at first to second and not get an RBI than to have a DH up who is actually trying to drive in the run?
   3)Only the NL and the Central League in Japan still have the pitcher hit in all games.
   This said, I don’t mind the pitcher hitting and if it was possible, I’d favor the elimination of interleague play and keep the separate AL/NL rules. This may be irrelevant minutia but at this point, the AL/NL are becoming more and more like conferences in the other sports.

4. Ken Bland
   January 15th, 2012 at 2:25 pm

   The designated hitter is as much an embarrassment to the game as
   the BBWAA being the largest selector of Hall of Famers (save the Veteran’s Committee, of course). Back in the day, writers were the singular link to the public mentality of the game. There was no TV. Radio was considered secondary to print. The evolution of society has put newspaper guys on airwaves all over, and quizzing each other on what they will do for work 10 years from now.

   The DH was implemented thanks largely to the mindset of one of baseball’s great creative minds, Charles O. Finley off a time when the American League was battling for respect. It was after the blacks and Latins were gobbled up by NL clubs at a faster pace, and perhaps coincidentally, left the AL in the dust. Course prior to Jackie Robinson, the AL was thee superior League, and wasn’t no designated hitter rule needed to allow no NL to start kicking butt in the 1960s. Now, the best 4 teams in baseball are AL clubs, and it’s only slightly debatable. Then, with only small exaggeration in mind, the best 10 clubs in baseball were in the NL (I’m an NL guy, so subjectivity is no crime). Not only do the top clubs play in the appropriately named Junior Circuit, but there is no shortage of offense, and it’s very probably true even without the add of an extra hitter.

   The concept was acceptable to spruce up offenses. I guess, he frowned. But it absolutely crushed the strategic interest of the game. I value that way over the NL needing a boost to match the AL’s offensive inventory by fighting fire with fire, and engaging in 2 wrongs trying to make a right. On top of that, I’ll take 2-1 over 9-7 9 days a week.

   Chances are I’ll be a baseball fan up through a minimum of my death cert being John Hancock’d, reality of afterlife pending. But I have wondered attentively everytime I read an article on that stupid rule if that will prove me wrong, and a DH in the NL will prompt exit stage see ya faster than would have been designated runner Herb Washington running from the batters box to first base. If he could have even hit. Specialization sucks. Watching 7th 8th and 9th inning relievers pitch by appointed time slots is joke enough, but I’ve come to accept it. it was more fun watching closer Tug McGraw come in during the 5th inning of Phils 23, Cubs 22.

   In case interpretation is needed, I freaking ABHOR the DH.

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