Pitching is much more scarce these days and make a ton more money than when Ryan was an active player.

Teams are going to take the wait and see approach and watch the Rangers develop their young pitchers closely over the next couple of years and see how durable they are in this new program.

If there’s an increase in DL stints by Rangers’ pitchers over the next couple of years – the other teams aren’t going to change anything about their program.

This isn’t something that’s going to catch on around the league until Texas starts showing results that prove their program works.

How could it have been that pitchers, at least those who were cheating, weren’t able to go further along in the game. We might be able to say that, pitchers who were cheating were of a lesser quality, but, the likelihood is that, there was a spectrum of pitching quality spread across those that used stuff. Even the high end pitchers, didn’t seem to have the stamina for seven innings (let alone eight or nine).

Perhaps we could say that steroids, etc. helped batters become better players more so than the junk helped pitchers become better (a hanging slider cares not who threw it). Maybe the stuff helped pitchers recover faster (between starts) more than it helped with velocity, and even more than it helped with location.

Either way, it’ll give “cover” for any number of pitchers who become injured, providing ample opportunity to argue whether it’s a result of more pitching or of less medical assistance.

I welcome, what clearly seems to be the game returning to a more normal state.

This is how it should be. Mechanics are what causes arm problems, and the pitching coaches should be on the look out for guys that may alter themselves when they tire. Those are the guys to yank.