The designated hitter debate really flares up around the World Series, when in the biggest set of games that either team will play all season, their lineup will, for a few games, be fundamentally altered due to differing rules.
Commissioner Rob Manfred likes that.
“I think the problem is picking what that one set of rules is,” Manfred told ESPN’s Jayson Stark on Friday. “The National League plays without a DH all year. Their team is built to play without a DH. It’s the opposite in the American League. And I think the competitive ramifications of picking a single set of rules would be significant.
“Both teams have to adjust. Each of them has to adjust at some point in the series. And given that we play the game two different ways during the year, that makes some sense to me.”
It’s probably unfair to give one team an inherent disadvantage over the course of a season as opposed to letting both teams split the disadvantage. It does mean things like this happen. The easiest thing would be to come up with one set of rules for the entire sport that applies all year long, whichever way that may be, but it doesn’t seem likely to happen any time soon either.
