Gary Seymour, sports@wolfrivermedia.com
Baseball wasn’t supposed to be much fun this year for fans of the Milwaukee Brewers.
The season was projected to be a train wreck of such planetary proportions that watching it was advised only with a refracting lens, through a pinhole in a shoebox.
But, with two-thirds of the season in the books, the Brewers – still in the thick of a pennant race – have been baseball’s best surprise of 2017.
Not so surprising in baseball this season are the calls for changes in the game, which increasingly are coming from the players and their advocates.
In the same week that Detroit’s Ian Kinsler decried the ball-strike calling of umpire Angel Hernandez and urged his speedy retirement from the game, Ben Zobrist of the Chicago Cubs spoke of the need to let today’s Pitch Trak technology call the pitches.
Zobrist noted the obvious: Pitch Trak is unbiased and consistent, and could eliminate 100 percent of the missed balls-and-strikes calls, 100 percent of the arguments and 100 percent of the ejections.
Arguing against Pitch Trak on the basis that blown calls are part of the game is like opposing a retractable dome because rainouts are part of the game. With Pitch Trak and replay technology, the correct call on every pitch and every play is possible.
Those hoping for a quick resolution shouldn’t hold their breath, though, because baseball tends to move toward progress like it’s got a piano on its back, plus the guy tuning the piano.
This is the league that took 15 years to repeal a senseless rule giving home-field advantage in the World Series to the team from the league that won the All-Star Game.
So, good luck to Bryce Harper’s agent in his bid to get the bases changed.
Forbiddingly stationary and slippery of surface, the composition of the bases was cited as the cause of the hyperextended knee and bone bruise suffered by Harper, Washington’s former Rookie of the Year and Most Valuable Player.
He was legging out an infield grounder on a close play, and on the final stride hit the top of the base and skidded over it. After sliding across the bag, his spike caught the dirt behind it and his momentum forced his knee to bend in the wrong direction.
With Harper on the 10-day disabled list, it is only the second-worst base-related injury suffered by the Nationals this year. Their center fielder, Adam Eaton, is out for the season after tearing an ACL on a similar play at first.
Base-related injuries don’t always occur at first, either. Harper also missed a few months of the 2013 season after spraining his thumb on a head-first slide into third. A partial list of others victimized by the anchored bases include Washington’s Ryan Zimmerman (broken thumb), the Rangers’ Mike Napoli (dislocated finger), the Dodgers’ Yasiel Puig (strained thumb ligament), Boston’s Dustin Pedroia (torn thumb ligament) and the Angels’ Andrelton Simmons (sprained thumb, broken finger).
Earlier this season, two-time American League MVP Mike Trout of the Angels missed 38 games with a torn ligament in his thumb from sliding into second.
In an age where new construction materials include translucent wood, light-generating cement, pollution-absorbing bricks and biodegradable furniture, it doesn’t seem like too tall an order to find a less vinyl-like substance to make bases out of, one that doesn’t promote hydroplaning.
Sliding injuries occur because the bases are hard and immovable. Bases don’t get worn out and more pliable because the league uses new ones all the time, offering the “game-used memorabilia” bases to paying fans — the same fans targeted a while back when the league sold advertising space on the bases to promote an upcoming Spiderman movie.
Players may be filling up the disabled lists, but used-base sales have increased 150 percent over the past four years. So, they’ve got that going for them.