Mound prior to 1969

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Here's a short clip explaining what has been happening with the mounds...

From what I can tell this guy likes his mounds ashen.

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That's nothing. My son has played on half a dozen mounds that were 24 inches or higher this year. It was pretty nuts. Throwing to first was an adventure. Tall guys had quite an advantage once they got used to it.

Isn't this one of the reasons they suggest Bob Gibson was so dominant in his day?

The Rule was changed because of Gibson. After his crazy low ERA year of '69 (I think) They lowered the mound by 5". The strike zone also used to be to the letters and not the belly button. All those things happened in order to get more scoring into baseball.

Lowering the mound was the beginning of MLB manipulating the game to increase offense. Since:

- DH (half league)
- continuing smaller K zone
- Bandbox Parks (never saw Willie Mays rob a HR over the fence?, he had to run 1 mile to catch the fly ball)
- and on an entirely seperate issue: MLB's knowledge of PED's

Offense sells to the layman fan.

"Chicks dig the long ball"

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Gimme defense!



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quote:

Originally posted by Bighit15:
The Rule was changed because of Gibson. After his crazy low ERA year of '69 (I think) They lowered the mound by 5". The strike zone also used to be to the letters and not the belly button. All those things happened in order to get more scoring into baseball.

They tried to do the same thing with Tiger Woods in golf and it still didn't work. Gibson still would have been just as dominant but the numbers would change as everyone elses would have. Instead of an ERA in the low ones he now would have an era in the low two or threes. Whatever number Gibson's turned out to be would still be lower than any other pitcher at the time imho. Instead of winning games 2-0, the Cardinals would have won them 4-2. Pitching will always be the most precious commodity in the sport regardless of what setting they have for the mound.

You will encounter lots of illegal mounds in your travels through youth, HS and college baseball. There is no enforcement to speak of. It can be quite upsetting to the visiting pitcher who finds a surprise awaiting him when he goes out for his 8 warmup pitches prior to game action. This can be one explanation when you see a pitcher struggle with his command in his first inning, then settle in as the game moves along.

I have seen plenty of mounds in the 15-18" range. I'm hoping that 24" mention above was hyperbole. I know it can seem that way, though.

P.S.

I DID see Willie Mays rob a homer over a fence, and more than once. But it was in Candlestick, not the Polo Grounds.

CD,
I agree totally, Gibson was (in my era) the most feared pitcher in baseball.
My son and I argued about Gibson and Pedro Martinez just the other day. He quoted to me that Martinez had the same numbers as Gibson and will have better numbers when he retires. I told him you can't compare the two, because Gibson pitched more complete games and there was very little use of closers in his era.

Gibson is cited as an example of why the mound was lowered. But look at the bigger picture.

In 1968 Carl Yastrzemski was the only .300 hitter in the American League at .301. Frank Howard finished 10th at .274. The AL hit .230. The AL had five pitchers with ERA's under 2.00. Denny McLain won 31 games. Luis Tiant had a 1.60 ERA

Only five NL players hit .300. Pete Rose led at .335. Roberto Clemente was 10th at .291. The National League hit .243. Four pitchers had ERA's under 2.10.

There was another significant decision made after the '68 season in addition to the lowering of the mound.

Midlo, I wasn't joking about the mounds. But there were only 2 that high. One was Kearns HS in Salt Lake City. During the NTIS. It was the most amazing field I have ever seen for HS. Some businessman donated 3Million to the baseball field. Absolutely beautiful. The only thing we could figure out was that the put more dirt on the mound to protect it. There wasn't a rubber. Kids literally fell off trying to do a pick off.

The other was a Juniors field built by well meaning parents. They said they were going to reduce it after the season.

$3 million and they couldn't get a pitching rubber??? Nice. I've seen some high mounds in high school but there's nothing you can do about it. Early in my career before the game I asked the ump if the mound was too high and he said; "Yeah it probably is but my question to you is do you want to hang around a couple of hours extra so they can fix the mound or go home without playing or just play?" Made me realize there are some battles you need to fight and some you don't.

Best thing they can do with baseball to speed up the game with more scoring is call the letter strike zone and keep the fences where they are (or in just a little bit more).
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While everything reached a climax in 1968 with the high mound and equally higher strike zone, the whole 60's decade from 1963 on was a pitchers dream. Off the high mounds people like Koufax and Gibson with their high overhand fastballs and overhand curveballs were incredibly dominant. Kofax's fastball seemed to rise and with a chesthigh strike zone he was almost unhittable. I started closely following baseball in 1967 and I thought thats the way things had always been. The war between the balance of offense verses pitching goes back into the early part of the 20th century and in certain cases even into the 1880's and 1890's.

Besides lowering the mound and the smaller strike zone, baseballs have been 'juiced up' or wound tighter at various stages since '69.

MLB was looking for the next .400 hitter, but none have materialized.

We have seen more home runs at various times so it detracts from the home runs of today as compared to yesteryear.

I often wonder how many thousand home runs Ruth would have hit in the modern era.