Charlie Pride, yes, the country music singer, used to be a highly regarded pitching prospect in the St. Louis Cardinals  farm system during the 1950s. He regularly sang during the seventh inning stretch while in the minor leagues in Billings, Montana. He took up singing full time after a major elbow injury.

Manfred needs to quit trying to do NFL things in MLB. He needs to quit tugging at the fabric of the game.Baseball is naturally un-timed. Leave it alone.

The new three batter minimum presents several problems. What if a pitcher just doesn't have it? I can see a three pitch minimum. Three batters is different. Maybe it causes extra intentional walks? Do you bring in a player to pitch and move the previous pitcher in the outfield for one batter? Who knows?

No 7th inning orange wedges here. It's time to bring back the real intentional walk.There is simply too much that can happen in a pro baseball situation  to have a rule that allows someone to be waived on to first base. A wild pitch can allow a runner to move up. An accidental pitch across the plate can be hit out of the ballpark. Let's play big boy baseball.

The designated hitter was instituted in the American League in 1973. The rule, that lets a position player hit in place of the pitcher, was the brainchild of notorious Chicago White Sox owner Bill Veeck.*

If the Designated Hitter comes to the National League in 2017, I predict position players will be allowed to re-enter games by 2020. If those things become reality, the active roster limit should remain at 25 players to keep some strategy in the game.

*Note: This blog post…