'Slow'-pitch baseball

Some people don't enjoy sports. Like anything else, it's an acquired interest that not everyone will have.

Some people prefer certain sports over others. An energetic football fan may not care for bowling, or sitting down to a nearly four-hour baseball game.

I once heard someone compare watching baseball to the same level of excitement as watching paint dry. While I think that may be a stretch in general, sometimes it's not that far off the mark. The pace of major league games these days seems to be getting longer and more drawn out than ever before.

I'll even provide you with a couple of real-life examples from this season. A couple weeks ago my family and I attended a Twins game on a Tuesday evening. It ended up being a Royals blowout, with a lot of pitching changes and a lot of runs. The game dragged on so long that we didn't even stay for the duration, leaving before the eighth inning.

That was the third game this season where I left early, which I don't usually do. Granted, the other two games lasted into the 12th and 15th innings, but still. My beef here isn't with extras; although I wouldn't object to formulating some sort of quick-fix tie-breaker.

Pick up the pace
The pace of the game is the problem. This isn't a new concept, and I'm sure I'm not the first one to write or complain about it, but it still is an issue. Most other sports have game clocks, play clocks, time limits. Even tennis has made some good strides with its rules. The clocks are there for a good purpose - to keep things moving.

It may seem unfair to compare baseball to other sports, because obviously they're different. But with no rules in place regarding the pace, players and teams begin to use certain aspects of the game to their advantage.

When I watch games on TV, it's much harder to focus on a Twins game than say, a Wild game which is filled with nearly constant skating, hitting and shooting. First pitch... wait 20 to 30 seconds... second pitch... wait again.

Sure hockey has stoppages in play, but even those have been sped up in the past few years with the "hurry up" faceoffs. In fact, a hockey game is about 2.5 hours. Even with the five-minute overtime and possible shootout, it's still fast-paced with a good solution for a tie-breaker.

Just play the game
Adding to baseball's slowness, why does the batter have to readjust his batting gloves after taking a ball in the dirt where he doesn't move an inch? (And does Big Papi really need to soak his gloves with saliva a handful of times in an at-bat?)

Why does the pitcher have to spit three times, readjust his absurdly large necklace and pace the mound before he's ready for the next toss? (With the exception of Mark Buehrle, who is one of the fastest workers on the rubber.) To me, these little mannerisms can get ridiculous. Throw the ball, take a breath and then do it again.

Even though baseball isn't a timed game, it goes by number of innings, the powers that be should take a hard look at the lengths of games and start making some changes.

Here's my dad's idea: how about a pitch clock? Football has a play clock, basketball has a shot clock and tennis limits the amount of time taken between a changeover and isn't afraid to dish out warnings to players.

Give the pitcher a certain amount of time to throw the ball, or else he assumes some kind of penalty, like a ball added to the count, or a balk. By the same token, give batters some rules too. They need to be in the box within "x" number of seconds or the pitch is a strike.

The amount of time it takes for pitches to be thrown isn't the only contributor to lengthy ball games, but I think by trying to speed this part of the game up, it will help a ton. My plan here isn't a fool-proof and perfect solution, it's simply a brainstorm of ideas in order to speed things up.

It's a great game, but who has three to four hours each night to devote to watching your favorite team?