I can’t take credit for it, and I am not sure who said it first, but Velcro has added so much time to baseball games.
My understanding of the AAA rule is that the batter has to be in the box by the time there are 5 seconds left on the 20 second pitch clock or it’s a called strike.
I’ve never seen this actually called because I’ve never seen a batter not ready in plenty of time. Since the rule went into effect the pitchers and batters have simply stopped futzing around.
I wonder if there’s been any effect on overall batting averages this year… 
We go to a lot of Florida State League The Official Site of Minor League Baseball | MiLB.com Homepage games. That’s a single A Advanced league; so pretty far down the MLB/minor league ladder. But still 100% a MLB affiliate league.
They use a 15-second shot clock that starts when the pitcher receives the ball and stops when he comes set. I’ve seen a few balls called for slow pitching, but like balks, it’s pretty rare mistake.
I’ve yet to see a batter penalized. In fact I’m not sure there is a timing obligation on the batter. Although we see very few batters futzing around MLB-style.
It’s all of the above, plus much more stealing and thus much more time throwing to first base.
I started listening to baseball games in 1947. I was such an addict at age 10 that I discovered that I could listen to the Phillies at 990 and the A’s at 950 simultaneously by turning to 970. Of course, that happened only after they started broadcasting the away games.
Around 1950, Richie Ashburn won the SB title with 27. Ty Cobb’s record somewhere in the 90s seemed utterly unreachable. Then they started getting serious about the balk rule and stealing took off and so did throws to first (and second).
Pitchers did pitch in a steady rhythm. And there were no Garciaparras, having elaborate resets between pitches. Commercials were short and confined to the spaces between innings (few games were on TV). Games were generally over in 2 1/4 hours, 15 minutes per full inning. I once listened to a 9 inning (well maybe only 8.5) that finished in 90 minutes. And there were few pitching changes. They take a few minutes each.
So it is a bunch of little things each of which adds its own increment of added time.
I saw a game in Seattle three or four weeks ago that Seattle used 5 pitchers to win a 2 hit shutout! One of them pitched to one batter (walked him and got the hook). I commented on FB that this wasn’t my father’s idea of baseball. I also recorded a DP I had never seen before: 4-3-5. Second baseman playing a short right field fields a very hard hit ground ball, flips to first who throws to the third baseman covering second who tags the runner coming from first. Why it wasn’t 4-5-3 I don’t understand.
4-3-5 isn’t that unusual, but it’s not usually the way you describe it. It’s usually runner on second with a pull righthander at bat. Ball to second baseman left of second base, runner holds at first, then tries to get to third after the throw. Or runner on first who is running with the pitch and tries to take third on the groundout.
Because the second baseman probably has an easier time making the throw to first, getting a certain out, since he doesn’t have to worry about twisting against his body to throw to second. Furthermore, with the shift on, covering second isn’t as natural; if the SS does it, he’s coming from the wrong side of the bag (the same side as the throw); if the third baseman does it, he’s probably coming from fairly far away, since he’s not playing a normal SS position. So throw to first, get the sure out, then let the first baseman throw to second, by which time the covering player will be ready to try and apply a tag.
One thing I’ve noticed when watching videos of old games is that the batter used to wave the bat around, and would only get into hitting position when the pitcher started his motion. Today you won’t see the pitcher start his motion until the batter has taken his set. In other words, the batter used to react to the pitcher, but now the pitcher reacts to the batter. I suspect if a pitcher today started his motion before the batter was in his set, it would be called a quick pitch.
This was true 30 or 40 years ago, when players like Rickey Henderson, Vince Coleman, Willie Wilson, Joe Morgan, and Tim Raines were active, but the stolen base has decreased as a part of the game over the past couple of decades; it’d peaked during the 1970s and 1980s. Steals per team are now as low as they’ve been since the 1950s or early 1960s.
Here’s how many stolen base attempts (successful steals + caught stealings) per team have happened in MLB, in 10-year intervals:
2016: 118
2006: 129
1996: 164
1986: 190
1976: 192
1966: 144
1956: 73
(That said, that’s just actual steal attempts. It could be that pitchers throw to first more often than they used to; I’m not sure where I’d find that statistic.)
This is my take.
Especially if the 2B is right handed and is already moving towards first as he gets into position to field the fast grounder. If instead the hit was to the second base side of wherever the 2B was standing *or *the 2B was left handed he’d be more likely to flip to second *if *there was a fielder already in position to receive the throw.
Particularly now that the “no charging the guy defending second base” rule is well absorbed by the players, it’s not *that *much riskier for the player defending second to tag the runner vs. merely stepping on the bag well before the runner gets there. In the older days that was … less true. 