Former KC pitcher criticizes Royals and other teams for extending time of beer sales
The Royals’ 4-0 loss to the Texas Rangers on Monday night was completed in a tidy 2 hours and 2 minutes.
None of the Royals’ 17 games this season has lasted even three hours, which used to be considered an average length for a game.
With fans spending less time at Kauffman Stadium this season, the Royals and other teams have extended beer sales. Instead of cutting off sales in the seventh inning, the Royals are selling through the eighth inning.
Former Royals pitcher Matt Strahm criticized the decision to extend sales.
Speaking on Rob Bradford’s “Baseball Isn’t Boring” podcast, Strahm called it a safety issue.
“This has been on my mind lately: teams are now extending beer sales into the eighth inning,” said Strahm, who pitched for the Royals in 2016-17. “Have you seen that? Let me just run this by you and see if I’m thinking about this right. The reason we stopped in the seventh before was to give our fans time to sober up and drive home safe, correct?
“So now, with a faster-pace game — and me just being a man of common sense — if the game is going to finish quicker, would we not move the beer sales back to the sixth inning to give our fans time to sober up and drive home?
“Instead, we’re going to the eighth, and now you’re putting our fans and our family at risk driving home with people who have just drank beer 22 minutes ago.”
Strahm, who is now with the Philadelphia Phillies, said teams were putting financial considerations ahead of fan safety.
“When you mess with billionaires’ dollars, they find a way to make the dollars back. My thing is, when you’re looking at the safety of your fans, that’s probably not the smartest decision to extend it into the eighth,” Strahm said.
“Again, just being a common sense thinker, I think as a fan of the game and just looking out for people, it would just make more sense to stop the sales in the sixth.”
