By now every baseball fan on the planet is aware of the proposed rule changes being considered by Major League Baseball and the Major League Baseball Players Association that were widely reported on Wednesday – if not all of them most certainly two of them.

Topping that list and the proposed rule change that garnered the lion’s share of attention (and debate) was the proposal to bring the designated hitter rule to the National League; a proposed move that absolutely riled old-school baseball purists. And while even the most old-schooled of old-school purists have pretty much come to grips with the fact that the DH in the NL in inevitable, the consensus among them is: ‘What’s the rush, especially after going 130 years without it?”

Truth be told and in spite of all of the hype and hoopla that Wednesday’s announcements caused, the likelihood of the DH coming to the National League for the 2019 season is very remote regardless of what many (most) of the so-called baseball experts suggest will happen; if for no other reason than Opening Day is exactly 48 days from today and spring training five days away. As such, National League teams were not given the opportunity to structure – or restructure – their rosters to properly accommodate the addition of a DH (i.e., sign a player [or players] specifically to be a designated hitter), as is common practice in the American League.

But in addition to potentially adding the DH to the NL and the other elephant in the room – the proposal that would require pitchers to face a minimum of three batters before they can be removed (unless injured, of course), there were several other proposed rule changes which, for the most part, flew completely under the radar of the media and fans. However, thanks to Washington Post national baseball writer Dave Sheinin, here are all of the rule changes proposed by MLB and the MLBPA:

• The adoption of the designated hitter in the National League, making the DH universal across both leagues.
• A rule requiring pitchers to face a minimum of three batters, except in the case of injury or when finishing an inning.
• A 20-second pitch clock, a time-saving device Manfred has espoused for more than a year now.
• A single trade deadline before the all-star break, to replace the traditional July 31 deadline and the Aug. 31 waiver-trade deadline.
• The expansion of rosters from 25 to 26 players, with a maximum of 12 pitchers.
• A reduction in mound visits from six to five per game.
• A rule, which would be tested in spring training and the All-Star Game, in which each half-inning in extra innings would begin with a runner on second base.
• Tweaks to the draft order to reward winning teams and penalize perennial losing teams.
• A rule that would permit two-sport athletes (such as Kyler Murray) to sign major league contracts as enticement to play baseball.

You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to realize that many/most of these proposed rule changes are going to require considerable discussion and/or negotiations between MLB, the MLBPA, and team owners. In other words, the likelihood of many/most of them being implemented in time for the 2019 season is extremely remote. In fact, a good many of them are of a nature that they would have to be agreed upon in a Collective Bargaining Agreement before (possibly) coming to fruition and the current CBA doesn’t expire until after the 2021 season … so there’s that.

Then again, there are a couple items on this list that MLB commissioner Rob Manfred could implement immediately with the stroke of a pen.

Ah, it’s good to be King.

…or is it?

Stay tuned…

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