MLB Announces Further Rule Changes to Take Effect For 2024 Season
After a season full of rule changes in 2023, Major League Baseball is making further changes to the game in 2024.
Per Talkin' Baseball on social media:
The MLB competition committee has approved changes for 2024, per @JesseRogersESPN:
-18 second pitch clock with runners on
-Four mound visits instead of five
-If a pitcher warms up before an inning, he must face at least one hitter
-Runner's lane to 1B widened to infield grass
Nearly all of this is being done in the name of further quickening the game. While the pitch clock and associated rule changes were a large success in 2023, game times skewed slower again as the season went on (although still faster than previously) and baseball wants to keep the briskness going.
Tony Clark, the Head of the Players Association, was against the changes being ratified:
“This afternoon, Player Representatives voted against the 2024 rule changes proposed by the Commissioner’s Office,” the statement reads. “As they made clear in the Competition Committee, Players strongly feel that, following last season’s profound changes to the fundamental rules of the game, immediate additional changes are unnecessary and offer no meaningful benefits to fans, Players, or the competition on the field. This season should be used to gather additional data and fully examine the health, safety and injury impacts of reduced recovery time; that is where our focus will be.”
The previous pitch clock with runners on had been 20 seconds but reduces to 18 now. Several pitchers were in favor of 20 seconds all the time, now they will get it never.
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