In honor of new intentional walk rule, fan made a funny blooper reel
ESPN reported on Tuesday night that Major League Baseball has a very, very small change planned for the upcoming season.
Managers will be able to signal from the dugout for an intentional walk, saving a pitcher from throwing four balls out of the strike zone. The MLB players' union has agreed to the change, the Associated Press reported Wednesday.
Why is that a small change? It won’t save much time.
MLB Random Stats determined that would shave 35 seconds from a game this season. Someone else figured that would work out to about 1 1/2 pitches per game.
The rule change means the end of some intentional walks that included unintentional wild pitches.
A sports fan with the Twitter handle DylansFreshTake made a video of times when the intentional walk has gone horribly wrong.
•The MLB has approved to change the intentional walk rule. Which now will be granted following dugout signal. Take a look at these classics. pic.twitter.com/g3iyEW5kB3
— Dylan (@DylansFreshTake) February 22, 2017
The Society for American Baseball Research tweeted this list of times when a batter has put the ball in play when a pitcher was trying to intentionally walk him.
Not too many batters have put the ball in play on an attempted intentional walk. Here’s the full list: https://t.co/VfGEacIeaQ #SABR pic.twitter.com/ujUygnVoje
— SABR (@sabr) February 22, 2017
Here is the time Miguel Cabrera had an RBI single while he was being intentionally walked.
As we say goodbye to the intentional walk(for now), I'd like to remind everyone of this absolute boss moment from Miggy. pic.twitter.com/KouH4Ixvew
— Jason Ochart (@Jason_cOchart) February 22, 2017
SABR amended the list later, adding this sacrifice fly from the Yankees’ Gary Sanchez in September:
It’ll be the last time we see that, perhaps forever.
Pete Grathoff: 816-234-4330, @pgrathoff
This story was originally published February 21, 2017 at 8:39 PM.