{"id":82698,"date":"2025-08-14T17:21:17","date_gmt":"2025-08-14T17:21:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/82698\/"},"modified":"2025-08-14T17:21:17","modified_gmt":"2025-08-14T17:21:17","slug":"the-mound-is-too-damn-close","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/82698\/","title":{"rendered":"The Mound Is Too Damn Close"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

MLB<\/p>\n

<\/a>For nearly 130 years, the distance between pitchers and batters has remained the same. But as pitchers get better and bigger\u2014and balls in play become increasingly rare\u2014MLB could benefit from giving hitters some space.\"\"MLB<\/a>For nearly 130 years, the distance between pitchers and batters has remained the same. But as pitchers get better and bigger\u2014and balls in play become increasingly rare\u2014MLB could benefit from giving hitters some space.Getty Images\/Ringer illustration\"\"<\/a>By Ben Lindbergh<\/a>March 15, 2021, 2:04 pm UTC \u2022 20 min<\/p>\n

In his later years, sportswriter Red Smith was prone to waxing philosophical about the distance between bases in baseball. The language he used<\/a> varied, as did the way it was transcribed<\/a> and<\/a> repeated<\/a>, but in the most streamlined form of his aphorism, Smith asserted that the 90 feet between bases is as close as humans can come to perfection. Smith was neither nearly the first nor nearly the last to marvel at what Roger Kahn called<\/a> the \u201cmagic 90 feet apart.\u201d Before the observation became associated with him, Smith himself attributed similar<\/a> sentiments<\/a> to Branch Rickey and Moe Berg.<\/p>\n

Decades after Smith\u2019s odes to the diamond\u2019s dimensions, and more than 160 years after the distance was standardized, 90 feet between bases still works well enough. (Although the actual distance, accounting for the sizes and orientations of the bags and home plate, is technically neither<\/a> 90 feet nor uniform between bases.) Runners are bigger and faster, but fielders are faster and stronger, and the balance between them is mostly maintained. Well-placed slow rollers still turn into infield hits, routine choppers sent directly at defenders still yield easy outs, and numerous force and steal attempts still produce plays too close to call with confidence. That a rule laid down a few years before the first shell was fired at Fort Sumter remains suitable today cements the perception that, as, Kahn wrote, \u201cthe ball field itself is a mystic creation, the Stonehenge of America.\u201d To tamper<\/a> with its layout would be sports sacrilege.<\/p>\n

But the ball field, like Stonehenge, didn\u2019t spring forth fully formed. Through trial and error and hard labor, the builders of baseball established how long the basepaths should be, just as ancient Britons transported<\/a> and raised heavy slabs of stone. In both cases, the architects built and improved on their predecessors\u2019 more modest foundations. (Some<\/a> suspect<\/a> that the basepaths were once 75 feet, and the structures at Stonehenge were once rotting timber.) And while 90 feet between bases may still seem close to perfection<\/a>, the second-most-famous measurement on the field\u2014the 60 feet, 6 inches between the pitching rubber and home plate\u2014arguably hasn\u2019t held up as well.<\/p>\n

In an era of giant pitchers, rising pitch speeds, and spiking strikeout rates, baseball\u2019s best hope of bringing back balls in play may well lie in moving the mound\u2014not downward, but back, to a point perhaps a foot or three farther from the plate. MLB\u2019s official historian, John Thorn, isn\u2019t endorsing the idea, but he\u2019s \u201copen to changes that some might see as radical\u201d to combat the contact decline. \u201cBaseball has periodically stepped in, since the 1870s, to correct course on trends that might deter spectators,\u201d Thorn says. \u201cIt is hardly heresy to say that it may do so again.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last week, MLB stepped in to announce<\/a> a slew of experimental rules that will be tested at various levels of the minor leagues in 2021. The new rules\u2014most of which were previously implemented at MLB\u2019s behest in the independent Atlantic League in 2019\u2014were \u201cdesigned to increase action on the basepaths, create more balls in play, improve the pace and length of games, and reduce player injuries.\u201d They include automated strike zones, timers between pitches, batters, and innings, restrictions on shifting, pickoff moves, and the number of pickoff attempts, and bigger bases (and thus, shorter basepaths\u2014sorry, Red). For a few reasons, they don\u2019t include moving the mound. But some evidence indicates that pushing the pitcher\u2019s starting point back from the place where it\u2019s stood since 1893 would be among the most effective and least obtrusive means of suppressing strikeouts.<\/p>\n

Anyway, this is MLB not addressing the real issue \u2014 pitchers are too close to batters \u2014 and instead trying to win the press conference. <\/p>\n

Baseball\u2019s problem isn\u2019t where the shortstop is standing. Its problem is that the shortstop has nothing to do 40% of the time. Fix that.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Joe Sheehan (@joe_sheehan) March 12, 2021<\/a><\/p>\n

The rationale for moving the mound back is simple: Modern pitchers are much taller and throw far harder than 19th-century pitchers. Thus, their pitches are being released closer to home plate and flying faster toward their targets, which means that today\u2019s hitters have less time to react. Four years ago, 29-year-old Buster Posey\u2014then baseball\u2019s best-hitting<\/a> catcher\u2014remarked<\/a> on an influx of flamethrowing pitchers capable of touching triple digits. \u201cI\u2019m about ready to move the mound back a little bit,\u201d he joked. Posey was responding to a significant increase in average pitch speeds even in the fairly short time since his 2009 big league debut. From 2008 to 2020\u2014the period covered by MLB\u2019s PITCHf\/x and Statcast pitch-tracking systems\u2014the average speeds of four-seam fastballs<\/a>, all fastballs<\/a> combined, all breaking balls<\/a> combined, and all off-speed pitches<\/a> combined all rose by roughly 1.5 to 2 miles per hour.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s just the latest spurt of speed increases. Pitch data recorded by Baseball Info Solutions video scouts from 2002 to 2007 shows<\/a> an uptick of another 1-2 mph over that span for most pitch types. And while the public pitch-velo trail goes cold there, information from a Reds scouting database analyzed by The Ringer in 2019<\/a> suggests that speeds rose substantially over the preceding decade, too. Those leaked Reds records don\u2019t begin until almost a century after the rubber took up station at 60 feet, 6 inches, which means we can only speculate about the full extent of the speed increase since 1893\u2014a period that encompasses a great growth of athletic talent<\/a>, fueled by a massive expansion in the pool of potential pitchers, increasingly rigorous approaches to scouting and player development, and an explosion in the financial incentive to pursue playing baseball professionally.<\/p>\n

The current pitching distance was set less than a decade<\/a> after full overhand deliveries were first permitted and hitters lost the right to specify whether they wanted pitches high or low. Pitchers have been throwing from 60 feet, 6 inches since long before integration and internationalization; before the rise of relief pitching and an invasion of one-inning arms<\/a>; before the advent of weight training and scientific velocity development<\/a>; before recent advances in injury prevention and treatment; before the invention of velocity-tracking technology and the subsequent quantification<\/a> of<\/a> (and fixation on) the value of throwing hard.<\/p>\n

And also before the player population experienced a growth spurt. Modern MLB pitchers, weighted by workload, are almost 6-foot-3, on average, more than 4 inches taller than they were in 1893.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Taller pitchers generally have longer limbs, which allow them to stride and extend their arms farther forward. According to Statcast extension data provided by Baseball Prospectus, MLB pitchers from 2017 to 2020 released the ball 6.15 feet in front of the rubber, on average, or less than 54.5 feet from the plate. That data confirms the connection between height and extension, although the correlation (0.3) is somewhat weak, probably because shorter pitchers who make the majors tend to compensate for their statures by punching above their height in terms of extension, Lincecum-style<\/a>. The momentum-generating mechanics of today\u2019s flexible and ultra-athletic pitchers likely also give them greater extension than 19th-century moundsmen even on an inch-per-inch basis. Doug Thorburn, a pitching analyst formerly of Baseball Prospectus and the National Pitching Association, says that based on his video review of pitching mechanics from earlier eras, \u201cthe extremes of long ago in extension would compete with the extremes of today. But my hunch is that the average extension is better in 2021.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chris Young, who pitched in the majors from 2004 to 2017, didn\u2019t get great extension (or speed) for his size, but he can testify to the fact that pitchers have gotten a lot larger. Young stands 6-foot-10, or 8 inches<\/a> taller than any pitcher who threw more than three games in 1893. \u201cWith the average velocity having increased significantly over the past decade, I think at some point the dimensions have to be evaluated to see if we are physically exceeding the way the game was designed,\u201d Young says, adding, \u201cToday\u2019s athletes are bigger, faster, stronger, and you have to accommodate that to preserve the entertainment value of the game.\u201d<\/p>\n

Granted, position players have gotten more talented too, and air-oriented launch angles have allowed them to lift the lively ball enough to prop up scoring. But sharper eyesight and swifter reactions aren\u2019t enough to help hitters compensate for faster pitch speeds and stop contact from cratering. They haven\u2019t yet<\/a> benefited from tech-aided training to the extent that their pitcher opponents have, and pitchers are poised to take advantage of new advances in pitch design<\/a> and biomechanics<\/a>. The velocity surge has leveled off<\/a> lately, as has pitcher height. But absent intervention, MLB would be stuck with its powerful-pitcher problem, just as the NHL would with its big-goalie problem<\/a> and the PGA would with its big-golfer problem<\/a>. Bigger isn\u2019t always bad: In basketball, where dunks are exciting and the offense and defense have sprouted in synchrony, 10-foot rims have sufficed (with<\/a> some<\/a> dissenters<\/a>) since 1891. But when athletes outgrow their environments in a way that leads to less entertainment, there\u2019s an obvious solution: Make their jobs more difficult, as the NFL did in 2015 when it moved<\/a> extra-point kicks from the 2-yard line to the 15-yard line in a successful<\/a> bid to make kicks less automatic and encourage teams to try for two-point conversions.<\/p>\n

Young was hired as the Rangers\u2019 general manager in December, but before that, he worked as an executive at MLB, joining the league office as vice president of on-field operations, initiatives, and strategy in May 2018 and rising to senior vice president in charge of on-field operations and umpiring in February 2020. Although Young acknowledges that some fans, players, and media members are loath to tinker with a tradition that dates back almost 130 years\u2014why mess with supposed perfection?\u2014he points out that despite the longstanding continuity in pitching distance, \u201cWe\u2019re not playing the same game that has been played historically. I know that there\u2019s a nostalgia attached to 60 feet, 6 inches, but I think that the style of the play is probably more important than the distance between home plate and the pitcher\u2019s mound.\u201d<\/p>\n

The league\u2019s style of play has become increasingly contact-averse<\/a>. Hitters struck out in 23.4 percent of all plate appearances last season, more than four times as often as the 5.2 percent rate in 1893. The K rate has climbed slowly but fairly steadily since the beginning of major league baseball, plateauing or receding only when steps were taken<\/a> to restrain it. Although the latest upward trend has been especially steep and sustained, the addition of the NL DH in 2020 presented a promising opportunity<\/a> for at least a temporary pause. However, even pulling impotent pitchers<\/a> out of the batter\u2019s box couldn\u2019t halt the inexorable ascent, which has stretched to a record 15 consecutive seasons.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

There\u2019s every reason to expect the streak to reach 16 years in 2021, especially in light of the reversion to NL pitcher hitting (barring an improbable<\/a>, buzzer-beating deal to restore it). Pitchers struck out in 43.5<\/a> percent of their plate appearances in 2019, and they\u2019ll likely whiff even more often in 2021 after a long layoff.<\/p>\n

Increased speed and extension aren\u2019t the only factors inflating whiffs. Moving the mound back, in isolation, would do nothing to address some of the others: an<\/a> expansion<\/a> of the strike zone, accelerated by a tech-aided adherence to the rulebook zone and a data-driven cultivation of catcher framing<\/a>; an analytics-fueled reduction of the stigma surrounding offensive strikeouts, enabled by the epiphanies that strikeouts aren\u2019t any more damaging, on average, than other types of outs, and that they sometimes go hand in hand with patience and power; the low-drag ball that makes it more rewarding for hitters to swing for the fences (as does the shift, albeit only when lefties are up<\/a>); and teams\u2019 efforts<\/a> to prevent hitters from facing the same pitcher three or four times in a game.<\/p>\n

But blunting the velocity advantage would be a big step, and moving the rubber back by, say, 2 feet would have a meaningful effect on pitches\u2019 perceived speeds. When I visited this topic<\/a> for the first time almost seven years ago\u2014during the 2014 season, when the strikeout rate cracked 20 percent\u2014I asked Alan Nathan, a professor emeritus of physics at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a decorated<\/a> expert on the physics of baseball, to calculate the effect on flight time of moving the mound back. According to Nathan\u2019s equations, a 95 mph pitch released at 57 feet would have the same flight time as a 91.7 mph pitch released at 55 feet.<\/p>\n

Thrown from 2 feet farther back than usual, that 95 mph pitch would fly for about 15 more milliseconds before reaching the plate\u2014a roughly 4 percent increase in travel time. But because batters can only observe a pitch for about half<\/a> of its roughly 400-millisecond total flight time before deciding to swing\u2014after that, it\u2019s too late for the hitter to process and apply any new information\u2014Nathan says the increase in useful observation time is actually about twice the increase in flight time, or approximately 8 percent in this scenario. That doesn\u2019t sound enormous, but it would hand hitters back much of the reaction time that pitchers have whittled away in the 21st century.<\/p>\n

It’s nowhere near that simple. Teams pay players based on their value, so you’re advocating to override the free market – a dangerous idea. The fix is to make the skill of putting the ball in play *more valuable*. Move the mound back. Deaden the ball. The market will fix itself. https:\/\/t.co\/jB5dZsVC6Q<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Rany Jazayerli (@jazayerli) January 14, 2021<\/a><\/p>\n

Not everyone agrees that moving the mound back and dialing down perceived velocity would reduce strikeout rates. Although the ongoing strikeout-increase streak predates the days of data-driven pitch design<\/a>, optimized pitch<\/a> selection<\/a>, and soaring spin rates and breaking-ball movement<\/a>, Kyle Boddy, founder of player development facility Driveline Baseball and director of pitching for the Reds, believes that much of the recent strikeout spree stems from hitters seeing a steady barrage of nasty non-fastballs\u2014which would move even more from farther back. Consequently, he thinks the change would hurt hitters. \u201cEveryone focuses on reaction time, but hitters also expect certain shapes on pitches, and increased distance gives the pitch more time to break,\u201d Boddy says. \u201cI strongly, strongly suspect increasing the distance will lead to increased walks, increased strikeouts, and fewer homers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Further suppressing balls in play and intensifying the three true outcomes\u2014which accounted for a record<\/a> 36.1 percent of plate appearances last season\u2014is the opposite of the intended effect. But Boddy\u2019s opinion seems to put him in the minority, both about the breaking-ball calculus and about the overall impact on the pitcher-batter balance of power. Nathan doesn\u2019t agree that the added breaking ball movement would help pitchers. \u201cThe amount of movement on a pitch depends on the square of the distance over which the pitch travels,\u201d he explains. \u201cFor example, moving the rubber back 1 foot would increase the distance by about 2 percent, which increases the movement by about 4 percent. That is probably the origin of the statement that it helps pitchers. On the other hand, the batter has more time over which to observe the pitch \u2026 2 percent more time, in my example. So my own guess is that this particular effect is a net wash, favoring neither batter nor pitcher.\u201d<\/p>\n

A front-office analyst who asked not to be named comes down on the side of increased offense. \u201cI think added reaction time will help hitters more than pitchers,\u201d the analyst says. \u201cI think pitchers would really struggle to throw bigger breaking balls for strikes depending on the distance.\u201d The analyst adds that prior proprietary research suggests that subtracting 2 feet of pitcher extension, all else being equal, is probably worth about .003 runs per pitch in favor of the batter. In this case, all else wouldn\u2019t be equal\u2014pitch movement would be slightly augmented\u2014so the benefit to the batter might be more like .002 runs per pitch, which would boost scoring by about .25 or .30 runs per team per game. (The analyst adds that the three true outcomes could still increase if hitters adopted more uppercut-oriented swings to launch pitches on more negative approach angles<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

Glenn Fleisig, the research director at the American Sports Medicine Institute and a consultant to MLB, also suspects that moving the mound back would help hitters. \u201cThe extra break is going to be an extra challenge,\u201d he concedes, \u201cbut I think the extra time would be beneficial.\u201d And Young believes that moving the mound back is the best way to address the strikeout\u2019s ascendance.\u00a0<\/p>\n

All of these parties are experts on pitching, physics, or both. Not all of them agree. So how do we decide what the true effect would be? \u201cThe only way to know for sure is to test it,\u201d Boddy says.<\/p>\n

About that: In effect, a few field tests have already been performed. The pitching distance was lengthened substantially three times in the late 19th century, as the fledgling National League refined its rules and periodically sought to pump up offense deflated by other developments. In 1881, the minimum pitching distance was pushed from 45 feet\u2014where it had stayed since a convention of New York clubs codified<\/a> many of the game\u2019s foundational laws in 1857\u2014to 50 feet, in an attempt to \u201cincrease the batting<\/a>.\u201d As of 1887, the pitcher was required to keep his back foot on the border of the \u201cpitcher\u2019s box\u201d 55.5 feet from home when delivering the ball. And in 1893, the box was replaced by a slab positioned another 5 feet farther back: 60 feet, 6 inches. (A persistent story about that pesky 6 inches resulting from a surveyor\u2019s mistake is a myth.) It\u2019s impossible to isolate the effects of the changes in distance, because baseball was more malleable in those days, multiple rules were often in flux, and the data is full of confounding factors. However, each season that featured a major move back coincided with the strikeout rate sinking and offense rebounding significantly, especially after full overhand pitching was approved in 1884.<\/p>\n

Previous MLB Pitching Distance ChangesYearEffective DistanceDistance ChangeK%BAOPS188150 ft5 feet-11%.023.041188755.5 ft5.5 feet-37%.025.071189360.5 ft5 feet-38%.035.092<\/p>\n

In the 19th century, nobody had ever seen a slider, let alone a splitter, and the stuff we take for granted from a fifth starter today would have reduced contemporary commentators to the equivalents of Ewoks worshipping C-3PO. But it\u2019s still suggestive that in both cases, strikeouts and offense shifted in the intended directions. And the motivations for pushing pitchers back were strikingly similar<\/a> to those on the minds of many fans today.<\/p>\n

In November 1892, just before the final 5-foot move, Sporting Life editor Francis Richter endorsed<\/a> a multipronged plan by Philadelphia Record sportswriter W.R. Lester \u201cto restore the game of base ball to high favor.\u201d (Even before it was spelled with one word, baseball was said to be<\/a> dying<\/a>.) Lester and Richter believed that this blueprint, which called for the pitching distance to be placed in the center of a slightly enlarged diamond, would bring about \u201cthe restoration of the proper equilibrium of between the two great principles of the game\u2014attack and defense.\u201d Richter\u2019s description of the desired results is too pertinent not to excerpt.<\/p>\n

\"\"Sporting Life<\/p>\n

With the pitcher reduced to the ranks, nine men instead of two will play the game; there will be a marked increase in that feature so dear to the popular heart\u2014clean, hard batting; less pitchers\u2019 intimidation of the batsman and fewer chances of injury to the batter; more baserunning, because of the greater number of men to reach bases; more brilliant fielding, because of the increased number of chances for the infielders and outfielders; better fielding chances and less danger for the pitchers; more swing, dash and go to delight the spectators, for whom the magnates should legislate.<\/p>\n

All of that sounds as appealing in 2021 as it did in 1892. Who wouldn\u2019t want to swing, dash, and go?<\/p>\n

Less than four months after Richter signal-boosted Lester\u2014and future Hall of Famer<\/a> Henry Chadwick chimed in<\/a> to call Lester\u2019s suggestions \u201cmost practical\u201d\u2014the NL adopted<\/a> the 60.5-foot distance in a 9-3 vote. As the table above indicated, equilibrium was restored. A.J. Flanner of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch wrote<\/a> in November 1894, \u201cThe monotonous strike out game has been legislated into a reminiscence, and in its stead is a system of play which requires nine experts to carry it to a full measure of success. Increased batting has given rise to more opportunities for brilliant fielding, involving perfect handling and throwing of the ball.\u201d Aside from the \u201coutrageous conduct of the players, which became so offensive in some cases \u2026 that riots resulted,\u201d it all sounds swell.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Smash Mouth in 2020: Randy Cooke, Sean Hurwitz, Steve Harwell, Mike Klooster, Paul DeLisle<\/p>\n

The Brooklyn Daily Eagle<\/p>\n

We don\u2019t have to turn back the clock quite so far to find precedents in baseball\u2019s closest cousin, softball. The pitching distances in both men\u2019s and women\u2019s softball gradually migrated<\/a> farther from home throughout the 20th century, beginning at 30 feet and eventually landing at 46 feet for men and 43 feet for women. The NCAA made the move from 40 feet to 43 feet in women\u2019s fast-pitch softball in 1987, following a period of offensive stagnation. (The NCAA says the change became official in 1988, though contemporary<\/a> accounts<\/a> make<\/a> it<\/a> clear<\/a> that<\/a> it happened the preceding season.)<\/p>\n

\u201cFor many years there was a regular drumbeat that softball had become a boring game because of the dominance of pitching,\u201d recalls National Fastpitch Coaches Association Hall of Famer Mary Higgins, who coached Creighton from 1977 to 1993 and served on the coaches committee that approved the change. The increased distance, she says, \u201cmade the game more offensively-minded and thus, more engaging for fans.\u201d The NCAA\u2019s stats<\/a> support her recollection, although more measures<\/a> followed to keep the Ks in check. The National Federation of State High School Associations followed the NCAA\u2019s lead in 2009, and the 3 added feet made<\/a> the<\/a> game<\/a> less<\/a> static<\/a> at the lower level too.<\/p>\n

NCAA Division I Softball Stats, 1982 to 1988YearAVGR\/GHR\/GERAK\/7 IP1982.2403.55.151.433.701983.2303.03.101.363.591984.2313.13.111.354.021985.2333.09.141.603.551986.2233.02.121.633.331987.2473.46.121.862.701988.2493.42.141.912.75<\/p>\n

Last month, at The Ringer\u2019s request, a team at Driveline Baseball conducted one additional demonstration. On February 17, a group of nine collegiate hitters faced a total of 426 pitches\u2014a mix of 90 mph fastballs and 75 mph curves, with constant spin rates and directions, delivered by an iPitch pitching machine\u2014from 57 feet, rather than their normal 55. The Driveline staff tracked their swings and batted balls with Blast Motion, TrackMan, and HitTrax sensors.<\/p>\n

A pitching machine in an indoor cage is much more predictable and a lot less intimidating than a living pitcher in a game situation, but the consistent conditions provided a controlled experiment, albeit one with a fairly small sample. Compared to their 55-foot baselines, the hitters collectively raised their swing rates by 3.1 percentage points, their contact rates by 4.8 percentage points, their pull rates by 6.0 percentage points, and their hard-hit rates by 16.8 percentage points when they had 2 extra feet to time their targets. There\u2019s nothing stopping MLB from organizing a larger-scale study along the same lines or paying amateur or ex-pro players to be willing subjects in experimental-mound scrimmages.<\/p>\n

In 19th-century National League baseball, 20th-century softball, and 21st-century high-tech training, increasing the pitching distance produced corresponding increases in contact and offense. None of those scenarios is precisely analogous to modern major league games, but to borrow a phrase from Red Smith, it\u2019s the closest we can come to perfection\u2014so far.<\/p>\n

\"\"The Driveline testing siteDriveline Baseball<\/p>\n

As late as mid-March<\/a> of 2019, the Atlantic League and MLB were agreed on moving the mound from 60.5 feet to 62.5 feet in the second half of the Atlantic League season. Although a 6-inch or 1-foot move may have been an easier sell, a 2-foot difference would help clarify the effects, with the first half providing a basis for comparison. But in early April, the two leagues tabled<\/a> the mound-distance move, tentatively until the second half of the following season. Of course, the coronavirus pandemic ended the 2020 Atlantic League campaign, and the dream of moving the mound, before that part of the plan for the season was formalized.<\/p>\n

According to a source familiar with the talks between leagues, the 2019 plan was scuttled largely over worker\u2019s comp concerns. Pitchers were (and are) wary<\/a> of throwing from a different distance than the one they\u2019ve always known, and any pitcher who gets injured while working from 2 feet farther back may blame the mound, even if a link can\u2019t clearly be established. But multiple sources with knowledge of the league\u2019s thinking confirm that support for exploring the mound distance change has grown at the commissioner\u2019s office over the past few years, and there\u2019s still a possibility that the mound move will be put into action during the 2021 Atlantic League season, which opens on May 27. From a diplomacy standpoint, testing a new mound distance in affiliated ball may be a nonstarter, and a successful trial in one of MLB\u2019s newly christened \u201cPartner Leagues<\/a>\u201d could help get the union on board. Depending on the details of the next CBA, commissioner Rob Manfred might have the power to impose a new mound distance without<\/a> the players\u2019 approval (as he<\/a> did<\/a> with the three-batter minimum rule), but doing so might prompt a pitcher revolt.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s understandable that pitchers would be uneasy about the mound moving under them, and no athlete with a limited time in their prime is eager to be treated as a guinea pig. To assess the real risks, MLB approached Fleisig and ASMI in February 2017 about studying the effects of lowering the mound, and again in January 2019 about studying the effects of moving the mound back. The resulting MLB-sponsored studies, published in January 2019<\/a> and February 2020<\/a>, respectively, reached a couple of counterintuitive conclusions. Fleisig and his colleagues found that lowering the mound might \u201cslightly reduce shoulder and elbow kinetics, possibly reducing the risk of injury.\u201d But no significant differences in ball movement were detected at the lower elevations.<\/p>\n

\u201cDropping the mound, to me, is not as radical an idea, but our study showed it might not give the advantages you\u2019d think it would,\u201d Fleisig says. Although it\u2019s commonly believed that lowering the mound from 15 inches to its current 10-inch height played a part in reviving offense after the anemic 1968 season, the more robust offensive environment of 1969 may have had more to do with the strike zone<\/a> returning to its smaller 1961 size.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the second study, the ASMI team monitored the biomechanics and ball behavior of pitchers as they threw from the standard distance, 2 feet farther back, and close to the geometric center of the diamond (63 feet, 7.5 inches). As expected, the longer distances yielded longer flight times and increased pitch movement. But the pitchers\u2019 kinematics didn\u2019t differ significantly at the longer distances, leading the researchers to conclude, \u201cIt is unlikely that moving the mound backwards would significantly affect pitching biomechanics and injury risk.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although the paper didn\u2019t estimate the offensive ramifications, \u201cThe most important thing from my perspective is that it showed it would not change the risk of injury to the players,\u201d Fleisig says. \u201cI think that\u2019s the first step before Major League Baseball can consider these things, and it has passed that test.\u201d If Fleisig is right, then moving the mound back might actually help keep players healthy. As Lester and Richter noted in 1892\u2014when thrown and batted balls moved much more slowly than they do today\u2014pitchers would have more time to protect themselves from comebackers, and batters (who\u2019ve been pummeled by pitches at<\/a> historic<\/a> rates<\/a> in recent years) wouldn\u2019t be hit as hard. (Pitchers might also be better at checking runners and racing to first, though a few more dribblers would become base hits.)<\/p>\n

In theory, pitchers shouldn\u2019t have to dramatically alter their approaches on the mound from 2 feet farther away. Fleisig and Nathan note that the necessary changes in the angles of release at 60.5 and 62.5 feet are negligible, and pitchers already raise and lower their sights depending on whether they want to aim upstairs or bury a ball in the dirt. Young observes that a max-effort throw at 95 mph from the current pitching distance would easily sail to the backstop if the catcher weren\u2019t in the way. So from 62.5 feet, the pitcher wouldn\u2019t have to throw harder than usual; the ball would simply be stopped slightly farther away. (As it is, the distance at which the catcher crouches varies by a foot or two from catcher to catcher and pitch to pitch.)<\/p>\n

That said, structural hurdles remain, in addition to the difficulty of convincing players and fans to go against the grain. For one thing, while leagues with lower velocities wouldn\u2019t need distance adjustments, many, many mounds and rubbers across the country would have to be moved to keep conditions consistent throughout MLB\u2019s developmental pipeline. That may be more manageable than banning foreign substances<\/a>, but who would handle the grunt work and foot the bill? For another, the change in the mound would probably have to be paired with a more<\/a> aggressive<\/a> deadening<\/a> of the baseball (or a strike-zone reshaping<\/a>) to stop hitters from launching more and more homers, and to prevent excess scoring and longer games.<\/p>\n

But if the mound movement were to work as designed, it could help replenish baseball\u2019s ebbing biodiversity<\/a>. The readjusted sport might be slightly more hospitable to slap hitters and, perhaps<\/a>, older hitters who\u2019ve struggled to stay relevant in an era that favors youth<\/a>. Moving the mound back might also offer pitchers blessed with less speed a helping hand. \u201cIt\u2019s really important that our game does not become one-dimensional, focused on power\u2014both power offensively and power defensively with power pitching,\u201d Young says. \u201cAnd I think that right now velocity seems to be the no. 1 predictor of success as a pitcher.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sixty feet, 6 inches isn\u2019t a round number; it\u2019s almost asking to be altered. Moving the mound back a bit would barely be noticeable from afar. We\u2019re all accustomed to the idea of mounds moving farther back as young athletes grow<\/a>; why not move them as major leaguers grow? And after last year\u2019s pandemic-shortened season showed that games can last seven innings, extras can start with a runner on second (another idea baseball borrowed<\/a> from softball), and the playoffs can contain the majority of teams, then why can\u2019t the rubber be 2 feet farther away? Because baseball grumps<\/a> would grumble<\/a>? In baseball, change is a tradition<\/a>, too.<\/p>\n

Hunter S. Thompson once wrote<\/a> about his own plan to fix baseball, \u201cPurists will bitch and whine, but so what? Purists will Always bitch and whine.\u201d And strikeouts will always increase, unless something stops them.<\/p>\n

Thanks to Dan Hirsch<\/a> and Kenny Jackelen<\/a> of Baseball-Reference, Lucas Apostoleris<\/a> of Baseball Prospectus, Tom Shieber<\/a> of the National Baseball Hall of Fame, and Noah Thurm<\/a>, Kyle Lindley<\/a>, Richard Prigatano<\/a>, Luisa Gauci<\/a>, and John Soteropulos<\/a> of Driveline Baseball for research assistance.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Ben Lindbergh<\/p>\n

<\/a>Ben is a writer, podcaster, and editor who covers culture and sports. He hosts \u2018Effectively Wild\u2019 at FanGraphs and previously wrote for FiveThirtyEight and Grantland, served as editor-in-chief of Baseball Prospectus, and authored \u2018The MVP Machine\u2019 and \u2018The Only Rule Is It Has to Work.\u2019