Shorter Spring, Shorter Yet Extended Games Sal Romano Will Start Friday

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To borrow a term from HBO's Bill Maher, MLB announced New Rules.

The player's association lobbied for and got a shorter spring training.  Hitters had two days of linv batting practice and are thrown into games.  A lot of players just track pitches in early spring game which should lead to low scoring games in the beginning.

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But Joe Torre in his tour of the Major League camps, issued an mandatory 10th inning.  In the past if the game was tied after nine innings the game would end in a tie unless a team had a pitcher who needed to pitch and the other team agreed to play another inning which could be just a half inning.

This spring, the 10th inning will start with a man on secondbase.  The rule was used in the World Baseball Classic to prevent teams with limited rosters from running out of pitchers.  It is the same in spring pitchers have a set amount of innings, that for development purposes can't be exceeded.  Visiting teams bring a limited amount of pitchers to games in the Cactus League.

"The fans want a win or loss, an end result," Price said.

Baseball has experimented with the rules with the minor leagues in mind.

"The concern is for minor league games or special tournament events like the WBC," Price said.  "I'm not sure if that includes the All-Star game.  It's factual, when you have one of the minor league teams plays one of those 15-inning games, an entire organizations shift.  Players are moved to different rosters and people are flying all over the country to have players recover without risk of injury."

The rule is in addition to the speed up rules that limit visits to the mound to six, including infielders and catchers trips.  In the past players and coaches had no limits to the number of times they could visit the mound in a game.  The only stipulations were that umpires gave the manager around 30 seconds from the time the manager left the dugout.

"Most umpires know the game situations and would give leeway in a tight game," Reds' manager Bryan Price said.

Cleveland Indians manager, Terry Francona, was concerned about players habits, like a shortstop going to the mound.

"We may have to make adjustments and remind players about visiting the mound during innings," Francona said.  "I asked Joe to tell me where we ranked with trips to the mound.  He was going to get back to me.  We may not have to make adjustments at all."

Bryan Price named Sal Romano to open the Cactus League season against the Cleveland Indians and Mike Clevenger and Ryan Merritt.

Tyler Mahle will follow Romano along with Jackson Stephens, Kevin Schackelford, Keury Mella. Barrett Astin, Jesus Reyes and Jimmy Herget will be available.

"Not all of them will pitch," Price said.  "A lot of these guys are scheduled for multiple innings."