Warm-ups and throwing to first: how to solve baseball's time killers

Mar 30, 2017

Complaints about the length of ball games have been going on for years but MLB commissioner Rob Manfred’s solutions won’t solve much

“Baseball games are too long,” wrote Tracee Hamilton in the Washington Post in 2013, setting off a chorus of complaint. “I never thought I’d say that, but even a baseball lover like me is growing impatient with the pace of the games. And I can’t be the only one.”

That year the average Major League Baseball game clocked in at 3hr 7min. In 2014 things got worse with the average time jumping six minutes to 3hr 13min. In 2015, pushed by umpires to speed things up, players and managers finished their business in an average of 12 minutes faster, down to 3hr 1min. Last season, though it crept back to 3hr 7min.

Tags: Baseball MLB Sport US sports