Not to mention the fact that the question isn’t always “did the ball pass the goal line”, it’s “Did any part of the ball pass the goal line prior to the ball carrier being down?” Which isn’t really solved using lasers or GPS. And the position of the ball doesn’t matter for going out of bounds, again it’s where the runner touched.
American Football
Do away with instant replay (except perhaps during the playoffs or in overtime). It creates too many artificial stoppages of play and, for me at least, really ruins the tension of the game (whereas playoffs and overtime are inherently tense enough to withstand it). If the ball came loose 3/100 of a second after the runner’s knee his the ground, I don’t mind if it’s ruled a fumble 20% of the time. Don’t want close calls to go against you? Then don’t let the plays be so close.
Also, do away with the extra point, as has been discussed. After a touchdown, you can take an automatic 1, or go for 2. Note that this is already the system we have, except we waste time by going through with the formality of kicking the automatic 1-pointer.
Baseball
Get rid of home plate umpires, and just have the cameras call balls & strikes. Probably this is inevitable someday, though it might take another couple of decades.
Agreed, and get the hell rid of fighting once and for all. Major suspensions and fines handed out for whoever instigates or participates in a fight.
There will be no fights in the Olympics, and it will be marvelous hockey. Notice no team has an “enforcer” on the roster? Get rid of these goons all around.
I could not agree more.
Baseball: Agree with cameras calling the balls and strikes. I’d add that the strike zone should be the same size for everyone, regardless of a player’s height or batting stance. I’d be OK with letting the batter determine where the bottom of the strike zone was, though.
Ditto a batter only being allowed one free time-out per plate appearance. Second time he steps out of the box, the ump calls a strike; no pitch necessary.
Going the other direction, only one free pitching change per inning. If there’s a second pitching change in the inning, the ump calls a ball as the pitcher comes to the mound. A third, two balls. A fourth and subsequent, and the batter gets walked.
And barring injury to the previous pitcher, or time-out by the batter, the new pitcher must throw his first pitch no more than 2 minutes after time was called so that the manager could go to the mound to take the previous pitcher out, otherwise a ball gets added to the ball-and-strike count.
Basketball: whenever a player fouls out, it essentially becomes a free timeout. I think the coach is allowed one minute to send in a substitute, but they always end up using every second of the stoppage to plan strategy with their teams. There should be only 10 seconds to send in a replacement. A violation would be a technical foul.
Without having thought too hard about it, I’d say that the way to set the upper and lower boundaries of the strike zone without umpires would be to have varied, pre-defined dimensions based on the batters’ heights.
Boxing.
On a 12 month cycle.
First 8 months boxers show and prove skills over network tv. More exposure for a lagging sport would be nice.
This leads to a poll to identify top 16 per weight class.
8 matches in month 9 per weight class.
4 matches in month 10 per weight class.
2 matches in month 11 per weight class.
Month 12 is the Championship month. Winner gets a bye to next years top 16.
More visable boxing matches and no perceived ducking of opponents.
Absolutely not, even if speaking as a defender.
The process has so improved the game I believe it should be used in soccer.
What they do want to remove are the tomahawk and also drag flicking at penalty corners.
For Aussie Rules:
Any mark taken from ball kicked backwards by the team in possession should be called “play on”.
Golf: the USGA/RPGA needs to acknowledge the fact that many golfers play on courses whose maintenance ranges from mediocre to poor. I propose a rule offering golfers who play on such courses relief from “poor maintenance” such as ancient divot holes, sand that’s been slopped outside of the normal range of the bunker, standing water, fossilized animal droppings, areas where the grass has been burned off through poor irrigation and too much sunlight, and similar hazards which would be unfamiliar to most country club patrons. (I understand that in many of these cases the groundskeepers are supposed to mark a relief zone around these hazards, but when you’ve got poor maintenance elsewhere, that doesn’t always happen.)
I wouldn’t go so far as to suggest “winter rules” (allowing the golfer to pick up and replace as long as they’re on the fairway) though. That seems a little too much of a game-changer.
Football/soccer/whatever
Make the goals smaller.
Yeah. Let’s cut down on all those high-scoring blowouts.
For professional baseball I endorse Bill James’ recommendation for speeding up the game and eliminating the dance of changing pitchers in mid-inning late in the game, as follows:
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Each team is entitled to one unrestricted pitching change per game.
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With the exception of that one unrestricted change, no pitcher may be removed from the game in mid-inning unless he has been charged with allowing a run in that inning. With an exception for injuries, of course.
For American college football, I endorse paying the players some identical amount for each player, and eliminating the tie-breaker format. Either go back to allowing ties, or implement the NFL’s sudden-death tie-breaker format.
I’d change the structure of this a little, like by having an ongoing qualification tournament going on (sorta like that qualifying tour the PGA has) at the same time as the big tourney for the dough, but overall I like your thought processes. I’ve long thought boxing would be a viable sport with just a little structure and transparency. And I don’t even like boxing.
NFL - No punts allowed once you cross the 50 yard line. Statistically you shouldn’t be punting on 4th and < 4 yards anyway.
Adopt college football’s overtime rules.
While I understand the idea here, this would be such a massive change in the rudimentary mechanics of the game that it would result in a massive displacement and turnover of ballplayers, to the extent of being a PR disaster. You’re not fixing any problem here, but you’re creating one.
It seem to me that they aren’t having any problem at all setting Pitch FX to the batters’ respective heights, so I do not know what problem needs to be solved except to start using Pitch FX to get the calls right. The technology works amazingly well. Just use it!
The only sports I follow close enough to have an opinion on are Baseball and (American) football.
I really see no reason to change either. However,
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I would not object to a rule making batters stay in the batters box between pitches.
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In football, unless I’m remembering wrong, the clock stopped anytime the ball carrier went out of bounds. Not they have some algorithm about when it does and doesn’t stop the game clock. I’d like to go back to the old system, easier for me to figure out and easier for teams to manage the clock better.
Football should think about throwing out the clock altogether and just having a play count. After 130 snaps, the game is over.
In basketball, the rim is the same height for everyone, tall and short. I’ve just always thought it was stupid that a small player (or one that had a crouched-over stance) should get a smaller strike zone. And there’s no reason why the pitcher should have to hit a smaller target just because there’s a midget at the plate.
Baseball:
One step-out allowed per at-bat, unless for a broken bat or other non-optional event. Stand in there and take your cuts, dammit.
Institute real revenue-sharing and salary caps - it isn’t good for the game or the business to have first and second class franchises.
Football:
No challenge flags - use the last-two-minutes rule throughout the game; every play gets reviewed upstairs if it’s needed.
Cushion the *outsides *of helmets to cut down on spearing.
Basketball:
Get rid of the practice of the last two minutes taking half an hour real-time - how about allowing only 1 timeout after that point, and granting automatic points for fouls then without taking the shot?
Hockey:
Yes, make fighting an automatic ejection, like in every other damn team sport at any other level.
Require much better helmets than those thin plastic shells, to cut down on concussions.
Auto racing:
Open up tech specs to allow some innovation, no more single-type rules like Indy and NASCAR.