Major League Baseball commissioner Rob Manfred downplayed the possibility of the "golden at-bat" rule becoming the law of the land anytime soon during an appearance on Thursday night at the Italian American Baseball Foundation's annual gala.
"For those of you who have 'golden at-bat' concerns, put your head on your pillow and sleep soundly tonight," Manfred said, according to Leif Skodnick of the World Baseball Network.
Manfred has helped reshape how the MLB game looks and plays in recent years by installing a pitch clock; limiting defensive alignments; and so on. Next spring training, MLB will even experiment with a strike-zone challenge system that has been used on the minor-league side of things. Even so, there's no indication that the "golden at-bat" rule will see the light of day at any level in the near future.
For those unaware, the so-called "golden at-bat" would give teams the one-time ability to send any player to the plate at any point in the game. If the Los Angeles Dodgers wanted Shohei Ohtani to bat instead of their ninth-place hitter with two outs and the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth of a tied game, they could make that choice without penalty. In essence, it would diverge from baseball's longstanding practice of having a definitive batting order -- and from allowing dramatic moments, like Ohtani coming to the plate in the highest of high-leverage situations, from developing organically and within the game's flow.
Manfred had previously disclosed that the idea came up during a competition committee meeting back in November at the owner's meetings. While he said that he encourages owners to have these kinds of conversations, he noted that he himself is not a fan of this particular suggestion.
"It has come out that I have spoken publicly about this kind of change years ago, that I was not particularly in favor of it," Manfred said Thursday, according to ESPN. "That remains the case."
