Originally Posted by Amazin69
Just because the pitchers' hitting performance has been declining recently does not mean such a decline is inexorable or irreversible. I can think of many baseball trends that went first one way and then another. It's not as though offense kept spiraling upwards as it did during the Steroid Era and now we see nothing but double-digit bombfests and yearn for the occasional 8-7 "pitchers' duel", is it? Once racial integration happened, more and more African-Americans got a chance to play, and one day in 1971, the Pirates featured an "all-black" starting lineup. (Including Dock Ellis on the mound.) But it's not as if the white baseball player went the way of the white cornerback; barely a half-dozen years later, M. Donald Grant struck a blow for racists everywhere by turning the 1977 Mets into 24 whiteys and Designated Negro John Milner. (Who was traded after the season to, appropriately enough, Pittsburgh.) Defensive shifts, a staple of the dead-ball era, went away for a long, long time, but are back with a vengeance nowadays. Platooning, batter's walks, stolen bases, all have waxed and waned with the greater trends.
Rather than "throwing their hands up" as pitchers' averages decline, this will only increase the pressure on managers to get their pitchers to hit better. It may not be easy to turn a .150 hitter into a .250 hitter, but you can get a guy from .100 to .150. (With a smaller base, you require fewer additions for an equivalent boost in performance.) Imagine a league where all of a sudden, a .150 hitter gives you a distinct advantage…you think no manager is going to try to exploit that opportunity? I disagree.
Or, NL teams and their GMs might place a higher emphasis on finding pitchers who had converted from other positions (such as Jacob DeGrom, a former shortstop) or even converting them in the minors, because the pitchers' advantage at the plate would make them even more valuable. (And hey, they don't have too many "young innings" in their arms, either, so they are less likely to get injured! A corollary to the "Skip Bertman, You Jerk!" principle, where the Orioles took LSU star Ben McDonald as the #1 overall, only to realize that Bertman, his college coach, had burnt McDonald's arm out by overusing him in the CWS.) Perhaps instead of the Rick Ankiels and the Adam Loewens going from pitcher to outfield, we'll see, even at the major league level, the Hal Jeffcoats and the Willie Smiths being encouraged to take to the mound, because good-hitting pitchers are useful and hey, if you can throw, we can teach you how to pitch, but batting takes reflexes and skill…
Equilibrium exists. Water seeks its own level. And all that. So there's no reason to go all "Doomsday!" today, I say.
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