"Each team’s at-bat in the 11th inning and beyond will begin with runners on first and second bases. Teams may start the 11th at any point in their batting order under format changes announced Friday by the International Baseball Federation and adopted in time for next month’s Beijing Games."

http://sports.yahoo.com/olympics/news?slug=ap-bbi-extrainningchange&prov=ap&type=lgns

if old, sorry

7/30/2008 10:50:54 AM

this is a joke, yeah?

7/30/2008 10:55:35 AM

Guess they don't want any six hour games to start the day. I don't really care either way.

7/30/2008 11:07:46 AM

That is utterly rediculous.

Quote :

" “But you know, in the Olympics, where you have (a) finite amount of time to get your program finished (and) the early game goes 15, 16, 17 innings, then what does that do? Television is affected, transportation is affected—a lot of logistical things that we don’t have to worry about on a Friday night in Durham. It’s a domino (effect).” "

How the hell can this guy be running USA baseball?

If you have a problem with the length of games crammed together, just allow for a tie in the group play. The time issue shouldn't be a problem in the tourney, since there are fewer games to be played.

7/30/2008 11:16:59 AM

did Bud Selig come up with this idea?

7/30/2008 11:17:01 AM

This is stupid. What about sports like soccer? If nobody has scored at the end of regulation are they just going to do away with offsides? I'm tired of seeing American sports corrupted to cater to the Olympics.

7/30/2008 11:30:27 AM

Especially basketball. I know someone's going to bring up the fact that Dr. Naismith was Canadian, but he was living here at the time and started the game in a YMCA in Springfield, Massachusetts. Also he continued to live and work in the United States having gone on to be the head basketball coach at Kansas, and later became a naturalized American citizen in 1925. Seriously what is the deal with the fucking lane in international basketball. Ever since basketball was started the lane (no matter how small) has always been a rectangle. Fucking FIBA.

7/30/2008 11:55:17 AM

^^ don't you worry about corruption. Baseball and Softball are on their way out of the olympics after this year.

7/30/2008 2:40:07 PM

If you have to make rules like this, you might as well pull baseball from the Olympics. We don't even send the best players, we just send the BEST players from the minor leagues that the franchises will allow to leave their farm systems.

7/30/2008 3:43:16 PM

I didn't think it was possible, but someone came up with a dumber overtime system than NFL overtime.

7/30/2008 3:46:03 PM

Quote :

"We don't even send the best players"

well in fairness, half the best players in the league arent American

7/30/2008 3:49:47 PM

Some of the comments here I just don't understand. The issue is that they need some sort of system that helps end the fucking games. Got a better idea? Obviously this isn't ideal, but when trying to run a massive tournament I am guessing games lasting forever is something they don't want to deal with. This helps make sure the games actually end, ideal? No, but in the spectrum who cares. At least they are still playing the game of baseball.

To the person who made this comment:

Quote :

"This is stupid. What about sports like soccer? If nobody has scored at the end of regulation are they just going to do away with offsides? I'm tired of seeing American sports corrupted to cater to the Olympics."

Are you fucking serious? They go to extra time then penalty kicks in soccer. That is even worse, penalty kicks aren't an assesment of the better team, at least this baseball rule you are watching each team's best vs. the other team having to play their best defense. They aren't saying "after 11 innings we are going to switch over to a home run derby." How can you be acceptable of the soccer overtime system, but critical of this?

7/30/2008 4:12:19 PM

ending the games in a tie in the lower rounds would be a better idea

7/30/2008 4:14:24 PM

Quote :

" well in fairness, half the best players in the league arent American"

Good call.

7/30/2008 4:56:33 PM

I'm surprised that this wasn't posted already, but the fucking Cubans beat the U.S. last night in 11 innings and this rule came in to play...

How fucking stupid...

8/15/2008 1:10:09 PM