[April 05, 2015] When my friends and I played little league baseball as young boys, our coach would tell us we had to have heart to play well. He was also adamant that we help move the game along briskly so our families would enjoy it more as spectators.
Today, decades later, Major League Baseball (MLB) has discovered that a slow game means the loss of fans and revenue. With its aging fans and falling ratings MLB is on a mission to fight slow play and to do so without sacrificing traditional play. This year in 2015 is a watershed year that baseball realized that it must appeal to a larger audience and to do so it must fundamentally change.
The MLB Commissioner has been charged with the task to get the game moving or else. What we are witnessing is a monumental transformation of a very traditional game – a move that will happen in a short amount of time. Senior leaders are often charged with the mission to lead their organizations in change but few are truly successful.
American professional football – baseball’s rival – has already made changes that speeds up the game and is quickly gaining fans and revenue. Professional baseball is experiencing a slide in a ratings and while this slide is recognized for what it is, the solutions are clear. Its main obstacles are also baseball’s key strengths.
As leaders we can gain important lessons if we pay attention to this transformation process. Will baseball leaders succeed? Will the transformation be accomplished in time to save it as America’s top sport? Will baseball remain a sport of strategy? These are questions that can only be answered several months from now and success will mean that traditions will be sacrificed and baseball traditionalists angered.
The impacts of any changes in the game will, of course, reach far beyond professional baseball into games for the youngest players. Our little league teams, young boys and girls, will play differently; different from the game my friends and I played decades ago.