Designated hiitter ,the best thing baseball could do. What a great move it was. Pitchers in the playoffs average.084 .What an amemic dead spot int he lineup. They can pitch around the #8 hitter fro crying out loud to face the automatic out. The American League sure giot that one right.
When I was a kid listening to the games at night ,I used to plan the potentials with the disaster of a pitcher coming up. One old Tiger pitcher was called old 2 for 3. He had 2 hits in 3 years. Being blessed with a good arm does not qualify you as a professional hitter.
They should have a world-class sprinter stand in the box too, so when the big hulking hitter drives one to left, you get a run. Being blessed as a good hitter does not qualify you as a runner.
Oh, and I got it! They should hire all the thin, agile, wiry guys on to dive all over the infield and jump high to stop grounders and line drives. But then don’t make them bat…being blessed as a fielder doesn’t qualify you as a professional hitter, after all.
Sorry, I disagree. The pitcher should have to bat, just like everyone else, for the following reasons.
[ol]
[li]It makes it that much more impressive when a pitcher has a great at-bat (e.g. Suppan’s home run in game 3 of the NLCS, or less excitingly, his well-executed bunts).[/li][li]It requires more strategy. (Should the manager leave the pitcher in or replace him with a pinch hitter?)[/li][li]A few pitchers actually are decent hitters, and there ought to be a place for them.[/li][li]Most importantly, it’s truer to the spirit of baseball, in which every player (not just the pitcher) has two separate roles to play.[/li][/ol]
Okay, I went to Wiki and read about both Designated Hitters and Pinch Hitters but I still don’t understand the difference. Could someone enlighten me please.
I believe religious discussions are supposed to be in GD (the fact that the OP is heresy makes it religious).
OTOH, incendiary topics that are likely to devolve into flame-fests should be in the Pit to begin with.
OTOOH, since the evil that is represented by the designated hitter is a matter upon which everyone surely agrees, perhaps MPSIMS would have been the place to go…
Baseball is a gift to mankind from the Deity. Its purpose is to teach us proper behavior and respect for those values which are absolute and universal.
Chief among those values is the fact that the highest benefit to which a human being may aspire is the opportunity to stand upon the ground and attempt to strike with a stick, a ball that has been hurled at you at speeds in the neighborhood of 90mph.
A close second is the value which demands that EVERY person who is granted that supreme benefit must earn it with the good karma that comes from playing on the defense for one’s team, in whatever capacity.
Under such Universal Truths, the d. h. rule can only be described as an abomination. There is great support for the argument that the Bible verse branding a behavior as an abomination in the eyes of the Lord was actually referring to the act of scheduling an acolyte of the diamond to take a turn in the batter’s box without scheduling the acolyte for service on the defense (a lesser abomination, but an abomination still, is the act of being the acolyte who goes along with it). The amount of misery that has been visited upon the world as a result of faulty translation is breathtakingly tragic.
Having thus typed references to the d. h. rule, I must now destroy my keyboard and purify my hands. A burnt offering of a Dodger Dog to the avatar of Bowie Kuhn should be enough to absolve us all of a requirement to smash our monitors.
A designated hitter does not play in field and is placed in the lineup specifically to hit for the pitcher.
A pinch hitter is used situationally to take the place of any hitter in the lineup. The pinch hitter then takes that person’s place in the field and the person who is being hit for has to come out of the game (the pitcher never comes out of the game for a DH).
I agree with the OP, by the way. I want to see people hit, not flail away. I hate seeing rallies get killed by pitchers hitting. I also think the DH extends careers for older guys who can’t necessarily get around in the field anymore but can still help a team with the bat.
I see no more reason for a pitcher being forced to hit than for kicker in football to have to be on the field for every offensive play. Pitching is a specialized position just like kicking and should be treated accordingly. I’ve never been able to figure out what’s so entertaining about watching pitchers chop down trees at the plate and I don’t want to see hitting considerations have to figure into how a pitching staff is managed during a game.
- I don’t think it’s impressive so much as surprising, like when the unathletic kid in gym class gets a hit.
- I’m not fond of strategy based on how to deal with an incompetant player
- There is still a place for good hitting pitchers, as pinch hitters. If they’re not better than the other backup players, they’re not actually “good”, just better than most pitchers.
- Regular players have two roles, hitting and fielding. Pitchers have three, pitching, hitting and fielding, the DH just let’s them get back down to two, where they might actually have a chance to be good at both of them.
Actually, that’s an aspect of the secondary reason I have for not being a football fan: all this business of not playing the whole game.
My primary reason, of course, is that they don’t play every day. I can’t be bothered with having a favorite team that I have to wait a week between opportunities to watch.
[/end hijack]
I like the current situation, where one league has the DH and one doesn’t. I like the way it gives each league a little distinction from one another. National League fans can enjoy watching managers worry about substitution, and American League fans can enjoy not having to watch pitchers trying to hit.
But if I had to have the DH in both leagues or neither, I would have it in both. Not having to watch pitchers trying to hit is more important to me than managers worrying about substitution.
I’ve said it before, but it’s worth repeating: Rule 1.01 of baseball states that “baseball is a game between two teams of nine players each”. The DH rule may be something, but it certainly ain’t baseball.
The DH removes strategy and makes for dull baseball.
If you want more action, go watch a football game: baseball is about suspense, not action. It’s Alfred Hitchcock instead of Jerry Bruckheimer.
Hear, hear!
And if the AL wants to have a point of distinction from the NL, they can damn well paint their baseballs red, white and blue, the way the ABA did with basketballs.
To clarify, a pinch hitter often doesn’t take the field but is replaced by a different player who takes over that player’s defensive position. It’s a matter of one player being taken out of the game and replaced by another, who’s taken out and replaced by yet another.
Often, though not always, this happens when a pitcher whose turn it is to bat is taken out and replaced by a player who’s a good hitter, after which a different pitcher (a reliever) takes the field. In the American League, which has the D. H. rule, the same pitcher could have kept on pitching.
Last time I checked, there were more than 9 players on NL teams, so I guess they don’t play real baseball anywhere.
Weird, I think we’re talking about two completely different things. I’m not getting too worked up over it, but if you want to explain I’ll come back to read this thread at a later date. Probably not worth the effort for either of us though. 
Where is the strategy in:
-
Down by 2 in the ninth and the pitcher’s spot is up. You PH your best hitter (L/R), right?
Not much real strategy there. -
Men on 1st and 2nd no out pitcher is up in a tie game. You bunt-I bunt-everyone bunts.
Once again no strategy.
In a DH league:
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1st and 2nd no outs and Jeter is up. Do you have him bunt or don’t you? STRATEGY!
-
Your starter is going into the 8th inning (down by 1), right after the 9th spot batted in
the 7th. Since there is no pitcher batting, you weren’t FORCED to lift him the previous inning,
so now you have to decide if you will in fact keep him in. STRATEGY!
Naturally a number of NL decisions do involve a geniune choice, but to say pitcher batting
automatically adds more strategic decisions is silly, as is the corrollary that in the AL you
just let everyone bat and pitch and just sit back and see who wins.
Despite being a lifelong AL fan (Orioles), I would like to see the DH abolished. Every player should perform all the roles of a player.
The moderator has spoken. I’ll notify Art Bell, or whatever that commissioner’s name is…
** TESTIFY! **
In soccer, everybody plays. It’s true the goalie generally stays back, but they can pop up the other end of the field for a last-minute corner.
In rugby, everybody plays. They all have to be able to run, pass and tackle. Somebody also has to kick the goals, but he does everything else too.
Both games feature almost continuous action, and my preference is for these type of sports.
(I like watching American Football, even with offensive + defensive + special teams, because the short bursts of planned play appeal to me as a chess player. But the substitutions slow the game down.)