Seven-inning games are nothing new. They've been a part of baseball forever. In fact, seven innings is the standard everywhere except the college and professional levels. And even in college and the Minors, doubleheaders usually include at least one seven-inning game. But Major League doubleheaders have always been two nine-inning games. Until this year.
Major League Baseball had no other choice in this unusual season. Trying to cram 60 games into 66 games was already going to be a challenge. Then you throw in the number of doubleheaders that teams will need to play for a variety of reasons, and it would've been virtually impossible for their pitching staffs to survive the season. Fourteen innings is going to be taxing enough (especially with multiple doubleheaders in a week), but 18? Forget about it! You thought there were a lot of pitching injuries already!
Some teams have obviously ended up with more doubleheaders on their schedule than others. The Miami Marlins, of course, drew some early attention for the COVID outbreak in their clubhouse that shut down both their and the Phillies' season for a week, resulting in makeup doubleheaders for both teams.
But that's nothing compared to the St. Louis Cardinals! The Cardinals had to sit out two weeks after their outbreak and they have to make up all of those games. As a result, their remaining schedule is a jumbled mess of seemingly every-other-day doubleheaders with the occasional single game mixed in. They don't have any off days, either, since they're also using those for makeups. I just hope they get good weather!
I don't envy the Cardinals and what they're gonna have to do. Their last of two remaining off days is on September 9, after which they play 22 games in 17 days to conclude the season (they also have two makeup games against the Tigers that haven't been rescheduled yet). It'll be a grind to be sure!
With the Cardinals playing so many doubleheaders, it almost guarantees that seven-inning games will have a direct bearing on who wins the NL Central. Again, it's something everybody agreed to, so it's not like that's an unfair advantage/disadvantage. But St. Louis will end up with significantly fewer innings played than some of their division rivals. More importantly, the two innings they won't play in each of those doubleheaders are the equivalent of two nine-inning games.
And who's to say that not having the eighth and ninth innings won't change the results of games? It's going to be impossible to get those stats, but I wonder how many games will end up with different winners because of it. What they can do, however, is look at the number of eighth- and ninth-inning runs that are scored in non-doubleheader games and come up with some sort of rough estimate based on those percentages. Although, that's a trade-off everyone is willing to accept this season.
The other thing about the seven-inning doubleheaders is that, in many ways, they really are a throwback. Most Major League doubleheaders are the day/night variety. This is done intentionally. A day/night doubleheader is two separate admissions, meaning owners don't lose the ticket revenue for the makeup game. They also give the players a little bit more of a break instead of just going right from one game to the other (which some might prefer).
Since there are no fans in the stands this year, there's no need to worry about gate receipts, so there's no reason to do the split doubleheader. That also makes things easier for the TV networks, which can just stay on the air straight through without having to come up with filler programming in between games. Likewise, playing the games back-to-back makes for a shorter day at the ballpark, which was also one of the objectives behind the switch for this season.
Another thing they're doing this season that would otherwise being unlikely is teams playing "home" games in their opponent's park. Again, when you have paid attendance, this would never happen (unless the last game in one city is rained out and they decide to make it up in the other for the sake of convenience). But nobody's losing ticket revenue this year, so the ballpark the game's in doesn't really matter. Who bats last does, though, and this way makes sure that teams will still have an equal number of 30 "home" games and 30 "road" games.
Now that MLB has moved to seven-inning doubleheaders, it has led to some speculation that this change will become permanent beyond this season. I think this, like the stupid extra-inning rule, is a 2020-only change, though. Because the factors that necessitated it this season won't exist when we go back to playing 162 games in front of fans.
During today's Mets-Yankees twinbill, Michael Kay opined that if there were more doubleheaders on the schedule, teams would have more off days. While that's technically true, teams would still be playing the same number of games in the same number of days. And I'm not sure how many would think that having more off days because they're playing doubleheaders is much of a trade off.
Off days also create schedule flexibility for make-up games. Sometimes teams don't have a common off day, so they have to schedule a doubleheader. It's also true that sometimes teams opt to play a doubleheader in order to keep an off day. But, for the most part, teams don't like playing twice in a day unless they need to.
For example, consider what a doubleheader does to a pitching staff. Teams have five-man rotations, which means starters pitch every fifth day. But if you play a doubleheader, you need two starters, which throws your entire rotation off. Plus, relievers aren't gonna pitch in both games, so you're limited there. And most of your position players won't play both games, either, so it impacts your lineup, too. Especially when they have that built-in buffer.
There's also no benefit to teams if they start seven-inning straight doubleheaders permanently. Owners don't like straight doubleheaders for a reason. They only have 81 home games, and they want to sell tickets to all 81. But a straight doubleheader is single admission. That might not make much of a difference for some teams, but for others it does. And if you've got the Yankees or Dodgers or Cubs in town for their only visit, you want to make sure you're selling tickets to each of those games separately.
So, do I think Major League Baseball should/will permanently adopt seven-inning doubleheaders? No. Because it's unnecessary. This season it is. It's the only way some teams are gonna get through the season. But things will be back to normal eventually. And seven-inning games aren't "normal" in the Majors.
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