However, It is what it is. This was a reaction to the tie. The right thing would’ve been for Torre to tell Brenly back in ought-two: ‘too bad, you forfeit, we win.’ Instead they cried to Selig. Bud caved and inexcusably changed a rule mid-game. I was hoping Francona would be forced to forfeit. Then mgrs would learn NOT to use the whole roster. Play Utley. Bench Uggla, etc.

To put it in perspective, ALL games are exhibitions. It was a great game. I like the rule. It’s not perfect, but it’s better than what it was.

MattyMatty: home field advantage does not “only” matter if the series goes seven games. Having the first two games and home and having the opportunity to go up 2-0 in the series is a tremendous advantage. The series can be pitched/played differently if you have a 2-0 game lead.

I think that the best regular season record should determine home field. If you play the best baseball, regardless of schedule, over six months, you should be rewarded with home field. They don’t play the same schedule in any sport but in every other sport the best record determines home field. Why is this so difficult?

That’s the problem with the pitchers. Guys are throwing 1 or 2 innings a piece, because the manager wants to get all of them in. Obviously this is the biggest difference from a “real” baseball game. Then, we see what happens – it’s a tied in the 15th inning and there are no pitchers left because guys that could have pitched all night only pitched the top of the 3rd.

Pitching is just something that doesn’t “work” with midseason exhibition games. You could say that the game could be treated as a real one, with a starter who should go about the same amount as he would in a normal game, but what team would want their ace to pitch 5+ unnecessary innings and screw up the rotation on top of that?

I like all your solutions. One additional one would be to not have a strict cap on the roster size. I mean, when you’re basically obligated to take Albert Pujols out of a one-run game in the 8th inning, isn’t that a bigger hit to your chances of winning than having an extra 30 players would help?

I say let the fans vote and select 5 or 10 “reserve pitchers”. They’d be there so this can’t happen Then maybe before the game, the manager can designate which of the normally-selected pitchers can pitch and which can’t (eg. Kazmir would be on the can’t-pitch list). Then you’d say the reserve pitchers can only enter the game after everyone NOT on the can’t-pitch list comes in.

I don’t know, something like that. But you’re right, it’s a joke. And for the record, I too watched about 1 inning, and could not care less about missing the rest. I have no interest whatsoever in the game.

Personally, I’m a Mariner’s fan, which means I don’t agree with the 1 True Goal, otherwise I’m a fan of something that has never mattered :).

Maybe more importantly, why is the old way of just handing home field to each league every other year any better? Its essentially a coin flip now and it was a coin flip then. The way they do it now is certainly no stupider than it was before.

If they really want to be fair about it they need to go back to even schedules and then give it to the team with the best over-all record. But that’s not going to happen. Just giving home field to the team with the best record isn’t fair either because teams don’t play the same schedules.

I wonder if there is a way to make the game “matter” to the players but not in such a ridiculous way. Doesn’t the winning team get more money than the losing team? I guess it’s probably not enough to make a whole lot of difference to most of the players, but right now it’s a lot more fun to watch than say, the Pro Bowl.