When The Roundtable is Commissioner of All Sports

Collin HagerJul 7, 2008

After watching nine innings of a baseball game where there were people behind home plate waving on their cell phones, people down the lines waving based on where the cameras were, and umpires that missed calls, it’s time for changes.

So we got the ‘Table together. And we came up with a list of things that will change when we’re Commissioner of All Sports. Without further ado.

Any idiot sitting behind home plate that spends the game on their cell phone and waving will have his or her arm broken. No cell phones will be allowed in those sections.
While we’re at it, idiots on phones waving from over the shoulder of left and right-handed hitters will also have said arms broken and phones taken away. Bottom line, your seats will go to real fans.
The DH will be used in all All-Star games. I’m not spending my time to watch Tim Lincecum grab a bat.
While we’re at it with the MLB All-Star game, it’s being moved back to the actual midpoint of the season. The game will be played on July 4 every year. Nothing says America like baseball, and its captive audience.
Owners will not be able to hijack teams from cities.
As recompense, we immediately give the Sonics back to Seattle and will put the current owners on display, along with Howard Schultz, for people to throw their over-priced Starbucks latte’s at.
When you retire, you’re done. No comebacks, no farewell tours, nothing. You listening, Brett Favre?
Officials in all sports will report to an independent body. The organization will assign them to games and that information will be publicly available at the beginning of the current week.
Officials will also have to pass a rigorous fitness and eye exam as well as a test on the rules of the game, to be administered every three years. You have to be able to catch up with the game you’re calling and know the rules in order to enforce them.
Instant replay for all! Baseball managers can challenge two calls a game and, should they win both, they get to challenge a third. All calls are reviewed by a fourth umpire, seated in the stadium press area, same as hockey and football.
Anyone found to have been using performance enhancers should still be allowed entry into the Hall of Fame. It should be every Hall of Fame’s right to put at the bottom of the plaque or bust that the player was suspected, or found guilty of, drug use.
No more music during NBA games. Remember when fans just knew how to cheer? The noise-meter has got to go. As does the constant thumping of ridiculous, unnecessary noises in places like Orlando.
We’re all for cheerleaders, but they too must have rules. If you are going to be a twenty-something year old woman and want to cheer in New England, you don’t get to wear a snowsuit. You know what you’re getting in to. That’s not the outfit of a cheerleader. Don’t want to do it? Think twice about being a cheerleader in the cold weather areas then.
We’re going to relax the rules on payments to college athletes. If the institution and the NCAA are making millions of dollars off what these athletes are doing, then they’re entitled to some of it. We’re not going to allow agents, but we’re going to stop prosecuting guys for getting a free meal. It has to be a true, egregious violation.
There are too many bowl games. Time to cut the number in about half. That means the Poinsettia Bowl, Humanitarian Bowl, Freedom Bowl, Seattle Bowl, International Bowl, Insight Bowl, Motor City Bowl, Papajohns.com Bowl, and the New Mexico Bowl, at least, are being eliminated. If you don’t want to create a playoff, then make the postseason still mean something.
Actually, we’re commissioner of sports. No more bowl games. Each bowl can use its name as part of the new 16 team tournament for the National Title.
Hockey must go back to Canada. I want teams in Winnipeg, Quebec, and Nova Scotia. We’re also putting The Whale back in Hartford. Atlanta, Florida, and Nashville, it was great having you and we have some lovely parting gifts. Hockey is not supported there, so it’s not ripping the team away.
Everyone, at all levels, will use wood bats. No more “pings” in the College World Series and it’s time to teach hitting properly at a young age. All bats will be made of ash. No more maple bat splinters.
Once fired from a coaching or management position three times for complete and abject failure, you cannot be put in that position again. We have to open the pool up a bit here. Its borderline incestuous.
We’re requiring the NHL to change standings. It takes up half the page of my paper in the morning and I still don’t get it. We’re going back to Wins and Losses, that’s it. You lose in a shootout, you still lose. That will make teams play harder. No one wants points decided just on that. (We’re open to other suggestions here.)
Start times for playoff games have to be adjusted. If the Super Bowl can start at 6:30 p.m. ET on a Sunday, then weekend playoff games in the NBA, MLB, and NHL do not have to start at nine. Baseball will be required to have one weekday afternoon World Series game.
We’re bringing back the bullpen carts. A complete necessity for humor value alone.
A committee will be formed to define the following terms: traveling, blocking/charging, hooking, interference, pass interference, holding, and strike zone.
No more in-game interviews of coaches and managers. They rarely give anything insightful because someone is sitting in the back watching it to relay messages. Most of them hate doing it. Wouldn’t you if you got peppered with questions by Joe Morgan?