A few months ago, I was doing some advanced scouting for the upcoming draft and noticed that, while our minor leagues do use the designated hitter, neither the major league, nor the amateur college/high school leagues do.
My proposal: We add the designated hitter to the major league, as well as the amateur leagues, for the 2028 season.
Doing so will lengthen the careers of hitters (like, say, Sherman Evanoff), who approach free agency with a powerful bat, but a pitiful glove. Evanoff, my example, has been an elite power hitter for his entire career, but was a terrible LF -- the easiest position to play.
He's a free agent this winter, and isn't likely to earn big bucks -- unless we add the designated hitter to the league. Adding the DH would also allow younger players, who may not have a position, to thrive in lineups. We use the DH in the minor leagues to allow players who don't have a position to get regular at bats, why not in the major leagues?
Alternate proposal: We eliminate the DH in the minor leagues, so that pitchers have to hit at all levels.
I don't support this, but logic dictates that it's all or none with the DH.
What do you think? Please share your opinions. Zev and I decided to make this the first topic discussed this offseason so owners can make their roster decisions if we do decide to add the DH.
Just to weigh in with my two cents and to give a little historical perspective...
ReplyDeleteWhen I set up the league, I purposely chose NOT to use the DH for the major leagues. While I do like it in real-life baseball, I never cared for it much in simulations... but that's just a personal quirk on my part. The minor leagues had the DH turned on by default when we started the league back in 2002 (in version 4) and we just left it that way.
Bottom line: I like not having the DH, but it's just a personal quirk, and Michael does make some compelling arguments to include it. If the majority want to have it, I certainly won't stand in anyone's way. :)
I very, very strongly support use of the DH in the minor leagues. In contrast, I don't care if it's added to the major leagues or to the high school and college league. Here’s my thinking.
ReplyDeleteDH in the Majors: I grew up in an American League town, so I used to be a strong proponent of having the DH in the majors. But I was in the minority and didn’t press the issue. Now, I’ve gotten used to having pitchers hit and organizing line-ups around it. The strategic benefits of dealing with pitchers hitting (double switches and the like) are minimal in the game because we don’t control the game manager (and the game one is kind of insane). Switching to add a DH would also kind of invalidate the history we’ve built up in the game, as every team and league record would be need to be thought about whether it was pre-DH and post-DH. So, in the end, I’m perfectly happy either way but would, if pressed, probably vote against using the DH in the majors. I could be persuaded otherwise though.
DH in the Minors: I’m a huge proponent of having the DH in the minors. The minors, to me, are all about developing players. There’s no other purpose to them. Having a DH in the minors allows one extra position player to get regular at bats. It gives one more prospect a change to develop. Maybe that guy playing DH is a guy who, with playing time, develops faster and becomes a quality major league player. In contrast, having pitchers hit in the minors serves absolutely no purpose. The pitchers seem to arrive in the majors with the expected distribution of hitting talent even if they never swing a bat in the minors. Because having DHs increases the number of players who might develop into good major league players and because it has no observable downside, I very strongly support keeping the DH in the minors.
DH in the high school and college leagues: I don’t care very much, but if forced to choose would pick having a DH there for the reasons outlined above about the minor leagues.
Consistency between the Majors and the Minors: I don’t care whether we have the same rules for the majors and the minors. The major leagues are where the game action is and the focus is. The minor leagues are a tool for developing major league players. They don’t serve the same purposes or roles at all, so I don’t see why we should insist that they follow the same rules.
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ReplyDeletehi as far as the DH is concerned i have no problem with using it..in the previously mentioned payroll issue we could employ a luxury tax against lets say top four payrolls and disperse to the low 4 ...but like real baseball must protect against teams not willing to spend money either
ReplyDeleteIve been a fan of National League and like the strategy of putting in pinch hitters for pitchers so im Not for DH.
ReplyDeleteMack: Your argument that the DH exists in the minors to serve prospects but doesn't need to serve positionless and veteran hitters to be contradictory. Should we make innings have 4 or 5 outs in the minors, to generate more at bats?
ReplyDeleteFred: Save your comments about payroll for th a discussion, please.
John: We don't decide to pinch hit for pitchers in games with our sims, so unless you completely customized your team's settings, you have no control over the manager's decision to pinch hit for a pitcher, or what hitter is used.
I can go either way on this. I don't think ha b ing a DH or not having a DH will change anything in this league and will actually help the higher budgeted teams as they can afford the extra player more than the lower budgeted teams. There are much larger issues in this league than this.
ReplyDeleteI grew up an AL fan and prefer having a DH. My opinion is not having a DH forces teams to use more players (more bench hitters, more relievers) thus favoring the big budget teams that can pay to have a deeper bench. Plus I don't care who it favors - I prefer it. I think not using it in the minors (so pitchers can get more experience hitting?) isn't a very good way to go either. Those extra OFs and stone hands IFs need the at bats.
ReplyDelete"Switching to add a DH would also kind of invalidate the history we’ve built up in the game, as every team and league record would be need to be thought about whether it was pre-DH and post-DH."
ReplyDeleteWhy? Does anyone really make any distinction between pre-1973 AL team records and post-1973 team records?
Zev
Michael, I don't see the contradiction at all. Prospects are potential assets that every team has. Having a DH in the minors increases the odds, for all of us, that those prospects will turn into major league players. That's really all I care about with the minors. Winning and losing there is irrelevant.
ReplyDeleteFree agent hitters who can't play defense aren't any one team's asset. They're just flawed players, like a hitter with no patience or power or a pitcher who has limited endurance. Their lack of defense is just something that affects that player's market value.
In short, having DH in the minors helps all of us develop prospects. Having a DH in the majors helps certain computer-generated players, but doesn't offer benefits to all of the owners. It admittedly helps those owners who happen to have good hitting, crappy defenders, but it's not a universal benefit. I can adjust to either regime in the majors, but I don't see the majors and minors as comparable.
Zev, I'm probably the only person who would care, but when I look back to see who had the most strikeouts, for instance, I would differentiate between a mark accomplished when pitchers hit and a mark when we had DHs. Otherwise, it's not really the same thing.
ReplyDeleteI'm not saying this is a big deal, but in a world where I don't care much if we have the DH or not in the majors, it tips the balance ever so slightly. In the end, if the options are all DH or no DH, which I think is a false choice, I will vote for the DH to keep it alive in the minors.
I agree with Jeremy that this is a very minor issue compared to other issues in the league. I don't have a strong preference either way, but I vote to add the DH to the majors and keep it in the minors.
ReplyDeleteI also agree it's a minor issue, and definitely not the most important. But, I wanted it to be discussed first so that teams could enter free agency knowing if there was going to be a DH spot to fill in the lineup, or not.
ReplyDeleteConsidering that even the National League is starting to discuss using it, I think our league should, as well.