General Managers meetings

by craig on Nov 3, 2008 10:11 AM EST in News and Rumors

The General Managers meetings start today in Dana Point, California. Not exactly sure where that is and I'm way too lazy to look it up. However, I'm sure it is nice town filled with wonderful people.

The General Managers meetings are scheduled to take place from November 3 to November 6. Normally, this isn't a big news event, but sometimes the meetings have ramifications. Example: the GM meetings led to a changing of the rules in 2007 that when a suspended game was tied it would be resumed from the point of suspension instead of starting over from scratch. I liked the old rule better.

One of the topics that is expected to be discussed is whether the World Series should be played at a neutral site. Neutral, of course meaning, somewhere the games won't have to be played in ungodly cold and rainy conditions.

In order to guarantee that there isn't a weather delay which causes a game to end at 1:50 a.m. the stadium will need a roof.

If I recall correctly that would be:

Arizonia

Houston

Milwaukee

Minnesota (for now)

Seattle

St. Petersburg (for now)

Toronto

The only problem is if you select the site in advance of the season, I can't see how you can guarantee that any of the sites above will be neutral come time for the playoffs. Then again, if they treat it like the Super Bowl, the average fan isn't going to be able to buy a ticket anyway seeing how they won't be made available. So I guess they could end up being neutral for all the wrong reasons

Can't say I'm onboard for a neutral site, but I completely understand why it needs to be discussed. Baseball isn't supposed to be played in a driving rain with temperatures bordering in the 30's.

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7 games

I don’t see how a neutral site can keep up the support for 7 games. Even if you have 2 sites, I don’t see many people coming out to see game 3 of Phillies/Rays in a place like Milwaukee or Seattle.

Maybe they just need to pad the postseason schedule a bit to allow for the occasional rain/snow delay.

How about making the division series best of 7?
I have no problem catching a late game for west coast teams, but starting an east coast game at 8:30 is beyond reason.

by brickell on Nov 3, 2008 10:26 AM EST reply actions

Move season up

I’d rather see people freezing their asses off on March 15 in a regular season game at Wrigley instead of almost guaranteeing a team celebrating a WS victory with freaking ear flaps on their caps.

2 Time Defending Post-Season Ichthyomancy Champion

by hurricane on Nov 3, 2008 10:52 AM EST reply actions

Call me crazy, but...

seeing as how MLB has been a predominantly Northeastern and Midwestern team for 130+ years, why is it that they just noticed now that it gets pretty darn cold/snowy/possibly rainy in October?

I realize the wild card has stretched the playoffs out by a week or so, but is that really the difference between dry baseball weather and freezing sleet?

by Fishcrazy on Nov 3, 2008 11:31 AM EST reply actions

how about ..

First of all they are never going to shorten the season, and regular 2 for 1 doubleheaders won’t fly either.

But I think the solution is to do a little of each. Reduce the number of off days by a little bit in the regular season and playoffs, and have a couple of neutral site games. I’m thinking you do games 1+2 in the AL team’s stadium (since they win the All Star game every year), then games 3 + 4 on a weekend somewhere nice. There are no domes in LA, but it never rains there so they could host games too. Then games 5 + 6 in the NL teams’ park.

by elricsi on Nov 3, 2008 12:26 PM EST reply actions