Did you watch the World Baseball Classic championship game? Japan is up 3-2, two outs in the top of the 9th and Shohei Othani is on the mound against Mike Trout. Arguably the two best players in the world, facing off with a championship on the line. That's what we all craved.
So why don't we do this more often?
I've always said that one of my "it will never happen but here is a rule change I'd love to see" proposals is to create exactly what just happened. With the game on the line, why not have your best hitter at the plate?
To take a step back, baseball has always been about the lineup and whomever happens to be up in the lineup is at the plate for big plate appearances. It has been like that for nearly 160 years. That very situation could happen in the World Series and the number nine hitter just happens to be due to hit.
The other sports don't act like this. In the NFL, the best player on the team -- typically the quarterback -- has the ball in his hands to make the comeback happen. Hell, the NFL keeps changing overtime rules to make this happen. We want Patrick Mahomes, Joe Burrow or Josh Allen to have the ball in their hands for a final drive. When Allen didn't get a chance to get the ball in overtime in the Chiefs-Bills playoff game in 2022, the NFL changed the rule so both teams get a chance. In this past Super Bowl, everyone was disappointed that Jalen Hurts didn't get a chance for a final drive.
In the NBA, who has the ball in their hands for those game winning shots? Yes, their clutch guy. Their star. We live for that. We wanted Michael Jordan, down one, to have the ball in his hands to make a play. We want LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Ja Morant, Steph Curry, Luka Doncic, etc to have the ball in their hands with the game on the line for the game winning shot.
Not baseball. You get whoever happens to be up next, or he is replaced by a pinch hitter than never plays. Baseball rarely has the best hitter happen to be up with the "game winning shot" is on the line, so we all understand just just how awesome Othani vs Trout really was. So why not allow this to happen. So what is my rule?
Allow for a team to be able to switch two players in the batting order ONCE every game.
How does that work? Well, at any point in a game ... but just once ... a manager can do a switch where he can take anybody in their lineup and have them replace the hitter due to the plate, and that scheduled hitter then moves to that other player's spot in the lineup. Sort of a pinch hitter, but using someone already playing.
I love that.
Imagine the Yankees have two guys in scoring position and Jose Trevino is due up to hit. Manager Aaron Boone walks out to the home plate umpire and decides that he wants Aaron Judge to hit in this situation. Trevino then moves to Judge's old spot in the lineup and Judge comes up to hit.
I love it. Who wouldn't want their best player to be there for the key moment in the game. Again, you can only do it once so there is some strategy to it; for example, do you really use it to put Judge up there because they could walk him with an open base? If you do put Judge up, does the other team counter with a pitching change? Does that then become a play to try to force a pitching change?
When I first proposed this about five to ten years ago, there was no way I thought it could be a thing. It is too big of a change that baseball won't even think about doing. But we are in a new era and baseball now has pitch clocks, limits throws to first and certain timeouts, universal DH, everyone plays everyone and larger bases. Thirty years ago, interleague play was one of the biggest changes baseball has ever implemented and deemed sacrilege at the time ... and now we've gone all in where everyone will play everyone for the first time ever. So now I think this lineup move wouldn't be just shooed away by 99% of people like it was the first time I said it. All of those changes baseball has made recently is to kill the dead time and to make baseball a more exciting, action-packed product.
In a sport that has changed where starters go into the 5th inning and we parade specialized relivers for each following inning, why not allow your best hitter to come to the plate in the biggest moments? This move would add more excitement throughout the season and especially the postseason.
I know, I know, there have been those Francisco Cabrera moments where the no-name comes up with the timely hit that wins the game and makes a lasting memory. Those moments don't necessarily go away. They will still happen. But the moments where the best hitters are making big moments will also make clutch moments go way up. Isn't that what we want?
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