Does the MLB have a bad baseball problem?

This week in a USAToday article, Bob Nightengale posed the idea that the MLB is running into  bad baseball situation that is driving away fans.  THe article is a little broad in its criticisms, ranging from a concerning drop in attendance at games to an overplayed attack on analytics in baseball.

Nightengale's criticism of analytics follows the typical pattern.  Somehow using statistics that give a better view of how efficient players or actions are is a bad thing.  Statcast is one of the most innovative ways of sharing information any of the major sports leagues has developed.   He quotes Mike Trout about RBIs and runs as the most important stats, since scoring runs wins games.  However, scoring runs has not been the issue this year.  Since 2010, the 4.38 runs per game is tied for 3rd best.  His issue with walks is also misplaced, since the rate this year of 3.29 per game is essentially unchanged from anytime since the 1990s.  Hits are down this year, but its a bit out of the ordinary.  SInce 1990, the number of hits per game has hovered around 8.7, with the mid to late 90s seeing a slight uptick and recent years hovering there again. 

The drop in MLB attendance so far this year is disconcerting.  The league is currently lagging about two million attendees over last years same pace, which would not be a positive sign.  However, there are a few teams that are currently dragging those figures down that might not be of such real concern.  The Blue Jays get mentioned in the article, but they're a team in rebuild mode that has put their average attendance back to their typical from 2009-2014, before they became a playoff contending team. The other teams dragging are other rebuilders that had seen huge recent success (Kansas City, Baltimore, Detroit, Pittsburgh) and a couple of teams that have struggled for years (Oakland, Cincinnati).  The other big faller is the Marlins, whose ownership group basically came out and said they were going to burn down the team and follow the route the Astros set out to tank hard to acquire talent that will be MLB ready in 3-4 seasons and take charge.

The MLB as a whole as well up to 2017 from 2009 actually saw an attendance growth of 1%.  So this might just be an anomalous year.  It is also not difficult to imagine that with the NFL seeing its own ratings hurt, and the NBA seeing attendance decline in 16 of its franchises over the past two years to imagine that people just are not consuming sports in place as much anymore. The MLB does have an issue with game length, which a pitch clock would help to adjust.  The league might also want to consider fewer mound and pitcher warm up times to help ease the number of minutes fans wait late in game for relievers to enter to do their work.

The Tommy John Epidemic

I came across a pair of ESPN articles the other day, both relating to the current "epidemic" of Tommy John surgeries.  Its interesting, because one posted last year I believe has the answer for why we're seeing more and more pitchers opt for this rout.  Matt Harvey wrote What we missed about Tommy John surgery, in which he details some new findings about the true success rate of the surgery and some potential reasons why we're seeing more players go under the knife.  On that front, I actually think  Jayson Starks' Tommy John Epidemic article hits the nail on the head.  He discusses the fact that shoulder issues just a couple of season ago were the reason most pitchers spent time on the DL.  However, the surgery payoff for those injuries has been pretty low.  The oft discussed number though for fixing UCL injuries is 80%, so it makes sense more players would risk the surgery when the odds are that good of returning.  Harvey does point out though that rate of players returning for 1 game is 80%, but those returning for 10 or more is just 67%.  I think what we're seeing is the sort of revolution though that we've seen in the NFL in regards to ACL injuries.  In the mid 90s an ACL tear was career ending.  Today there is a 96% recovery rate.

The most interesting part though from Harvey's piece is the interviews with youth coaches and parents, an astoundingly large percentage who felt preemptive surgery was a good idea.  That the surgery would somehow bring an uptick in velocity is beyond me.  Harvey shows for the most part velocity drops a little (or is at best not significantly worse).  This mindset that this injury is going to happen, and so you might as well do the surgery I think is putting pitchers at risk going forward.  At the youth levels guys should not be throwing curves, they should instead be working on correct pitching mechanics and strengthening the major muscles.  If this is a sign of things to come, its going to cause a talent drop in baseball, as we've seen largely in the NBA.