MLB Rumors: League Interested in Pitch Clock to Shorten Games amid CBA Talks

Major League Baseball is interested in adding a "14-second pitch clock with the bases empty and a 19-second timer with runners on" as a part of any new CBA agreed upon with the MLBPA, according to Jesse Rogers of ESPN. 

Experiments with the system in the minor leagues cut the average game time down about 20 minutes, per that report. MLB games in 2021 lasted about three hours and 10 minutes on average. 

The pitch clock tends to divide opinon among the players. New York Mets ace Max Scherzer and the retired CC Sabathia have offered differing takes on the idea in recent years. 

"I know as players, that's something that MLB is trying to negotiate," Scherzer said in 2019. "I don't think there's negotiation here. As players, it just shouldn't be in the game. Having a pitch clock, if you have ball-strike implications, that's messing with the fabric of the game. There's no clock in baseball, and there's no clock in baseball for a reason."

"This is a time to make some changes fundamentally to the game," Sabathia argued on his R2C2 podcast. "But the thing is that players are like most baseball purists, they don't want the game changed. Some of these guys still want a DH in the National League and all this different sh-t like no pitch clock. Have you been watching the f--king games we've been watching?"

The MLB and MLBPA are set to resume talks Sunday as the league's owners continue to impose a lockout with a new CBA not yet in place. MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred has already canceled the first two series of the 2022 season. 

The league is also looking to speed up the implementation of rule changes such as a pitch clock, per Rogers. In the previous CBA, the league could make changes one year after presenting them to the MLBPA. The league is looking to reduce that time frame down to 45 days, though it would still receive input from the players and put together a rules panel with "six management officials, two player reps and an umpire."

Alongside those issues, the league and its players remain divided on the competitive balance tax, minimum salaries, service time, the league's desire to expand the postseason to 14 teams and the pre-arbitration bonus pool, among other topics.