OCTOBER 4, 2011 BY PATRICK SMITH

Baseball isn’t broke, Patrick Smith writes, but there is one thing it could do without.

Tom Matlack has some ideas about how to fix baseball.

Do something about those wacky salaries, he says. Then baseball will be interesting again. Tie a player’s paycheck to his performance. And give the World Series champs $1 billion.

Well, OK. But while we’re at it, let’s put a team on the moon. Because that would be A) awesome and B) just about as likely as incentive-based salaries and a ten-figure World Series prize. These fix ideas simply aren’t realistic. How come? Because nobody in baseball wants them.

The players don’t. Their association, which is very much not a union, has leverage like no other players group in sports. Last week, in the going-nowhere NBA labor talks, the commissioner pointed his finger at one of the league’s marquee players, who promptly yelled at him and walked out. Nobody in baseball sneezes without asking the players association.

And the owners don’t want those fixes either. Because baseball ain’t broke. Sure, some of the owners would like to see a salary cap, to save them from themselves. But they keep signing left-handed set-up men to bazillion-dollar deals. If baseball wanted to surpass the NFL in the hearts and wallets of America, it would figure out how to install a salary cap. But it won’t, so let’s not discuss it further.

And anyway, who cares what the players make? You’re not paying them. I mean, sure, a piece of your ticket money and your hat money and your cable TV money winds up with Albert Pujols. But so what? You think your cable bill would be lower if Alex Rodriguez didn’t make $32 million this year?

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The game doesn’t need to be saved. It needs an adjustment.

If there’s anything wrong with baseball, it’s the relentless sameness of the games, night after night. When baseball discovered that television needed more than just sporting events to offer viewers, it jerry-rigged the schedule so that the Yankees would play the Red Sox 19 times a year.

Yep. Nineteen times. Awesome, right? The “unbalanced schedule” meant that each team would play the teams within its own division 19 times per season, cutting down on travel expenses and fostering inter-city rivalries.

Well, for every BOS@NYY on the schedule, there’s a KCR@CLE and a PIT@HOU. And nobody wants to watch the Royals play the Indians or the Pirates play the Astros 19 times in one season.

For that matter, not many people really want to watch Boston and the Yanks that many times. In 2001, Major League Baseball, still high off the fumes of interleague play, instituted the current schedule. And 10 years later, the jury has returned a verdict: it’s boring.

If I wanted to watch the Blue Jays 19 times a year, I’d move to Toronto.

So, even if it comes at the expense of the most holy interleague play, let’s rejigger the schedule and spread things around a little. Broaden those horizons, people!

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Here’s another fix. But if I’m honest with myself, it’s about as likely to happen as Tom Matlack’s ideas. Still, here goes.

No more designated hitter.

Let’s just admit it—the DH is over. Sure, we had some laughs. And we’re grateful for Edgar Martinez and Harold Baines and Vladimir Guererro and Jim Thome. But the DH feels like polyester pants and orange shag carpet: way out of date.

Did you watch game 2 of the Diamondbacks-Brewers American League Division Series on Sunday? I hope you did. With the score tied at 4 in the sixth inning, Brewers catcher Jonathan Lucroy came to the plate with one out and teammates at first and third.

In the American League, the batter would’ve tried to hit one into the parking lot. Or at least a fly ball long enough to score the runner. What wouldn’t happen in the AL is a squeeze bunt. Bunts are rare in the American League, since each lineup contains an extra slugger.

But Sunday in Milwaukee, Lucroy put down a perfect squeeze bunt to the right side. It was a work of art. Jerry Hairston bolted home from third with the eventual winning run. If you didn’t see it, you really missed something.

More of that, please. As a fan of American League team, it’s a treat to get to watch the management machinations that happen in the late innings of an NL game. Making your pitcher bat affects everything—how long your starting pitcher stays in, where the power hits in the order, who comes up next inning, all of it. It’s why National League managers have to think a couple innings ahead all the time.

Baseball needs to give its fans more credit. Fans don’t need “story lines” and gimmicks. Just give us the game.

Maybe there was a time in life when we only wanted ice cream and candy. But our palates are more refined now. We understand subltelty, beauty. and nuance. Give us organic baseball.

—Photo Flickr/Homini

by Bruce Reed

Everyone seems to agree that youth sports should be fun, social, safe, and instructional.  Even while competition increases as kids mature, no one wants to see the core objectives of youth sports diminished.  Most youth leagues do a good job of providing a fun, social, and safe experience for their participants.  And there are many knowledgeable volunteer coaches who offer top notch instruction to their individual players, however, most leagues could provide even more educational value by choosing to make teaching their sport the top systemic priority.

Change rarely comes easy in any organization.  Even small leadership mindset shifts, however, can make a profound impact.  While it’s more realistic to start with small ideas, a healthy thought exercise is to brainstorm bold ideas.  To start that process, here are my bold ideas to improve youth sports:

1. Share. Youth coaches should share their best ideas.  Create a Document Library on your league’s website where coaches can upload their best coaching ideas, success stories, drills, and practice plans so newer volunteer coaches have resources to help them succeed.
2. Collaborate. Youth coaches should help everyone in the league improve, not just the players on their team.  Create a tutoring program in your league so a coach can help an individual player on an opposing team, 1-on-1, each season in fundamentals.  The coaches who have the most to offer should seek opportunities to coach the players in the league who can benefit most from them.  Youth coaches in a given league should see themselves as a selfless collective unit — similar to a staff of counselors at a sports camp — not competitive adversaries.
3. Report. Instead of participation certificates, I give each of my players personalized “scouting reports” at season’s end.  They include confidence-building highlights from the season and constructive suggestions on areas to improve.  Create a communication system for your league that allows all coaches to provide helpful feedback to developing athletes.  These players’ future coaches could also benefit from the collection of these insights from previous seasons.
4. Survey.  At the start of the season, ask parents and players to indicate what they hope to get, educationally, out of their participation.  At the end of the season, solicit specific feedback and share it with coaches.  Did the coach help the player reach his or her educational and developmental objectives?  Players and parents could also be offered a chance to self-evaluate their own contributions to the team and their individual development at season’s end.
5. Mentor. Create a mentor program to form bonds between older and younger players and teams.  Assign older teams to younger teams and encourage them to attend each other’s games for support.  Older players could attend an occasional practice of a younger team and assist with drills.
6. Teach Back. Create a set of player-led skills clinics, pre-season, for younger players.  Give your veteran players an opportunity to teach back what they’ve learned through their participation in your developmental league.  Every age level in your league could teach back one level down the chain.
7. Standardize. Develop a set of best practices that are taught all the way up.  Introduce players to proper technique and vernacular, taught in a consistent manner, to build educational continuity from year to year.  Tap into the most experienced coaches in your area to help establish these best practices.
8. Shuffle. Mix kids up year-to-year.  While many young players find comfort in knowing a friend or two on the team, youth sports should be an avenue toward new friendships.  Kids should learn from youth sports how to navigate a range of teammate personalities to form a cohesive, productive unit.  Phase out the practice of handpicking entire rosters based on existing cliques and social circles.  And if a team wins a championship one year, its coach should have the chance to lead the last place team the next.
9. Go Blind.  If your league has a draft, encourage a blind draft where every coach works together to form balanced rosters, and then draw teams out of a hat after rosters are set.  The current system probably won’t change, but suggest it anyway just to see who reacts, and how.  Adults should realize, in most youth league drafts, highly-rated players are over-rated and lower-rated players are under-rated.  Youth coaches should worry less about getting the best players at the outset and worry more about developing the best players over the course of a long season.

10.  Brainstorm.  I’ve saved the last bold idea for you!  I encourage you to brainstorm ideas that would improve youth sports and then share them with the Team Snap community. And if you have a different take on any of my ideas, I’d love to hear your perspective.

Leave your comments below or post on the TeamSnap Facebook wall with your bold idea for the chance to win a $50 gift certificate to Dick’s Sporting Goods!  So go on, have at it and hit us with your best idea for improving youth sports.  Don’t forget… be bold!