Yesterday’s quickness
Saturday’s game was 1:39, but here’s some more helpful facts from the Mariners that unintentionally may tick you off:
Actual game time was barely over an hour. From the game notes, “there were 17 inning breaks of 2:05 in yesterday’s game, so clubs were in commercial for 35 minutes and 25 seconds.”
That doesn’t include in-game commercials, of course (this reminder brought to you by the U.S.S.M. Mariner, recently called “not harsh enough” — try us today! the 2-2 pitch…).
I’ve never been rabid about reducing game time. I enjoy watching a game, and my major gripes about it are
– pitching changes are stupid and take forever
– batters get to step out and take guided tours of nearby historical sites between pitches
– post-season commercial breaks are crazy-long
That game, though — man, that was something else.
As a comparison, the rest of the league took 2:11 – 3:46 (Yanks-Orioles at 3:46). The A’s – Angels game ran 10 innings and took 2:24. Average game length was about 2:50, maybe a little longer than that.
Comments
16 Responses to “Yesterday’s quickness”
My opening day thought was that the length of that game (2.5 hours) is perhaps the perfect length of a baseball game. Long enough so you get your money’s worth, not so long that it drags.
Regardless of length of game it is always preferable when pitchers work quickly. As studies have shown it benefits the pitcher as well as the batter’s eye has less time to adjust.
No stats but it does seem the best pitchers get the ball and throw.
I may well be the only person out there who would be perfectly happy with an unbroken string of four-hour games. I think my desire for long game times is directly proportional to the level of spurious chaos in my life. A few hours in front of the TV, or better yet, sitting at the park, provides that lovely baseball oasis that I crave.
Pitching changes are just nature’s way of telling you that it’s time to fluff up your couch cushions and make sure your children are still breathing. 🙂
Even weirder than game time, I think, is that Buehrle pitched a complete game 3-hitter with all 3 hits by the same Ichiro! Anybody know how to figure out how often that has happened in baseball history? Maybe what, 10 times? Any thoughts?
My pet peeve in this area (in addition to the ones you mention) is endless throws over to 1st when there’s a runner on. These slow down the game and break up its rhythm. I’d like there to be a requirement that the pitcher has to throw to the plate after one throw to the base. After the pitch, he could throw to 1st again, and so on. Of course with this the runner could go on the pitch, knowing the pitcher has to throw home, but the pitcher and the catcher would also know, and could pitch out if they wished, so the guessing game would still be there.
it appears that Ron Fairly is reading USSM. During the bottom of the first on Sunday, he cited the time info you wrote about.
And Franklin, as the M’s announcers always like to tell us, throws to first more often than any other pitcher in MLB (not that it seems to help his SB numbers all that much). So it could have been even faster.
I still think it’s amazing that Franklin threw a 91 picth complete game and lost. And that the total game was under 200 pitches. Heck, there are lots of games where both starters hit their 100 pitch limit by the 5th.
#6 Heard the samething. Perhaps the only useful bit of info that Fairly wiil speak today..Unless he keeps tabs of running posts on site during game.
Into their pets already one would think the game is a blow out already..
Rizz isn’t doing much better…
Re: “Actual game time was barely over an hour. From the game notes, “there were 17 inning breaks of 2:05 in yesterday’s game, so clubs were in commercial for 35 minutes and 25 seconds.—
[Please pardon the additional nit-picking.]
This presumes that teams go from offense to defense (and vice-versa) instantaneously.
They don’t. IIRC, making the transition, even in sandlot ball, usually takes very close to 2:05.
I was at the game (Seattle born/raised, in Chicago for school). Let me give you an idea of how quickly this game went. Will call line to seats (arrived in line right before the game started) – bottom of the 2nd inning, almost the 3rd. I thought there was some kind of scoreboard error. Half a bag of peanuts and one beer – 7th inning stretch. Opened up a water bottle, barely a drink or two – game over. Got off the Red Line at about 1:00. We were back on it by 2:45.
Re: (# 6)- So you think Ron’s been reading this stuff? Well, try to remember who’s in trouble here, or you might get put in the moderation cue like that of David.
It’s unlikely Fairly reads us. Today’s game notes had a section on this stuff, which is almost certainly where he read it off.
Well, if we’re complaining about timing issues and commercial breaks…
Two things really bug me about KOMO’s broadcasts. The first is “Station identification” breaks between pitches. The count’s 2-1, man on second, one-run lead, hey, great time to remind us that whenever the Mariner’s aren’t playing, listening to KOMO is a good cure for insomnia.
The other thing I really, really hate is how they extend that 2:05 just a little too long. How many times do we come back from break to hear Dave explaining that we’ve already missed the first two pitches. Sometimes, there’s a guy on second by the time KOMO finishes with the commericals.
This is only quasi-on-topic, but:
I’m sure we’ve all seen (and shared) Derek’s rants against FSN and their commercial campaigns where they just film one commercial and change the home-team details for every market. For example, this season’s “fans work together” campaign has the one where a guy in the home team jersey sees a ball land in his yard while grilling at his house, relays it through 8 people back to the stadium, and we close with the announcer crowing about the fans throwing the ball back on the field while our griller looks awfully pleased with himself considering he’s burning tofu dogs. Now, considering this ball would have landed across the street from the stadium, I’m not sure why it takes 8 people and several city blocks to get it back onto the field, but that’s not the point. This weekend, while watching the Angels/A’s game, I was treated to:
1. inning ends
2. random commercial plays
3. the A’s version of this commercial plays
4. the Giants version of this commerical plays
5. the A’s version of this commercial plays AGAIN
6. inning starts
I write this off to it being Intern Night in the FSN studio, but I ask you, is it really necessary to extend the game length for this, or the other 15 instances of this commerical being played during the game?
Even Jim Street is mentioning this, now:
“Did you know? The Mariners played their fastest game in club history Saturday afternoon with an official time of 1:39. But it really was a 1:05.40 game. There were 16 half-inning breaks so there were 33 minutes and 20 seconds of commercial time.”