Goldfinger

BY KEVIN KERNAN

Rob (Goldfinger) Manfred hates baseball.

There is no doubt about that anymore. The baseball commissioner who loves to practice his golf swing has fundamentally changed the game and his current preposterous proposal is the latest example.

The batting order is no more in Manfred’s warped baseball world. Strategy is out the window. It doesn’t matter if the No. 9 hitter is up, Manfred wants to create a new rule where the best hitter on either team can come to the plate whenever his manager wants him to come up in the most crucial of situations in the game, a one chance lineup change.

Essentially, a free at-bat for the best hitter in what the manager, or the Nerds, deem the most important moment of the game.

And that is the Golden At-Bat, essentially a direct steal from the entertainment-oriented Savannah Bananas.

It’s time for Goldfinger Manfred to take his ball and go home. He can’t continue to destroy the game, the history of the game, all the things that make baseball special for another gimmick rule in his landslide of changes to the game.

Enough is enough. Find someone to run baseball who actually loves baseball.

This is just another marketing and betting ploy, another gimmick in Manfred’s World of Gimmick Baseball. The only gold Manfred is concerned with is the gold that will be bet on games and the Golden At-Bat, just another sucker prop bet, another fake emotional, made-up moment. He does not allow the game to breathe in any way and now in his moves to always favor the offense, he has thrown lineups out the window.

Get the heck out of Fenway and the history books, Bucky Dent. Instead, Reggie Jackson was the Golden At-Bat and struck out in that 1978 American League classic.

Bill Mazeroski go grab some pine, you are not up leading off the bottom of the ninth in a 9-9 tie in Game 7 of the 1960 World Series at Forbes Field. Roberto Clemente hit for you and popped up.

You role players, you don’t deserve historical home run at-bats even though you put a lifetime into your craft, even though baseball is about team, not individuals, and you stepped up for your team making the most memorable of baseball moments countless times.

You don’t deserve your spot in baseball history. You are gone.

Why?

Because Rob Manfred and his minions said you are not worthy. Just like he concocted the Fake Runner, you know, Rob’s imaginary friend Mr. Snuffleupagus, he also came up with the pitch clock, fake stolen bases, limited throws to the bases, bigger bases and batter minimums for relief pitchers, he has now concocted the worst idea of them all, the Golden At-Bat.

An idea that former players have crushed and more than one called Manfred “a clown.’’

“This can’t be real,’’ Roger Clemens wrote on X.

“This is a beyond ridiculous proposition,’’ Andy Benes said. “What are we doing here? We have a great game, leave it alone.’’

Wondered Chipper Jones: “How about a ‘Rusty At Bat’ for the defense? Gotta be fair to both sides people!’’

John Rocker did not disappoint: “Dumbest. Shit. Ever.’’

Former catcher Gary Allenson sent along a text noting of Manfred: “He hates baseball.’’

Former infielder Ted Kubiak, who thinks the game through so thoroughly, noted on Facebook: “Manfred’s Golden At-Bat could be the last straw. Twenty-five or thirty years ago I saw MLB eventually adopting Little League rules. They may not be copying them exactly but what is happening is worse.’’

Rob Dibble rightfully points out that “even with all the rule changes there were 7 .300 hitters in 2024. Pitchers can only pitch 5 innings. Maybe we can have an in-season tournament like the NBA, oh wait the fans don’t watch that crap, their ratings are down 28 percent.’’

Above all, this latest move by Manfred shows he should not be the Commissioner of Baseball.

In Manfred’s new dream baseball world: Teams can swap out any hitter in their lineup for a “Golden’’ hitter. As for the team in the field that has earned the right to face the batter in the lineup who is due up at the plate, you’re out of luck. You now have to face Sam Superstar, who could be anyone from Shohei Ohtani to Aaron Judge to Bryce Harper to Juan Soto.

Hey, if Soto is going to hit more in more crucial situations, shouldn’t he get even more millions?

I can just hear Scott Boras making that Golden argument right now.

This is not baseball. This is Manfred Ball. There is a big difference.

Every team is allowed to have one former track star to use as a baserunner in a Golden scenario, except the Pirates, they don’t want to pay for the extra roster spot.

This is ludicrous and goes against everything baseball stands for and so much for fair play. So much for a pitcher earning an advantage in the lineup by working his way through the lineup and getting through the best hitters only to have to see the best hitter again in the Golden At-Bat. So much for the game being played the way it was for more than 100 years, a perfect mix of teamwork, timing, skill and execution.

None of that matters in Goldfinger’s world.

And why stop at the Golden At-Bat? Shouldn’t the team in the field get a Golden Fielder, one extra fielder? You know, that extra fielder can cover first base for the Yankees on a Mookie Betts ground ball to the left side.

And while you are at it, Goldfinger Manfred, when the Golden At-Bat comes to the plate, switch out the regular baseballs with Golden Baseballs, the same kind you use in the Home Run Derby. Bring in a Golden Baserunner too.

Every team is allowed to have one former track star to use as a baserunner in a Golden scenario, except the Pirates, they don’t want to pay for the extra roster spot.

And why limit this to players, Rob. Why not give the Rays and the A’s Golden Ballparks to be their home base for home games instead of their current minor league ballparks? The A’s can play at Petco. The Rays can play at Yankee Stadium.

Do whatever gimmick you have to do to get younger eyes on the game although Howie Rose, who evidently got his head out of his butt long enough to make a great point on X, after receiving friendly fire criticism from Michael Kay, saying: “Here I was minding my own business, three putting as usual, but here is the thing, MLB viewership among young fans has risen over the last couple of years.’’

Kay, of course, is a super successful talk show host and Yankee broadcaster and he was glad Manfred was thinking outside the box. I can just imagine the volume being turned up on YES if Aaron Judge took a Golden At-Bat in the box in the ninth inning of a tie game for Trent Grisham.

And, by the way, I do have some questions about the pure implementation of the “Golden At-Bat.’’

What if Ohtani comes to hit for that No. 9 hitter, and doubles in a tie game in the ninth inning. What happens when Ohtani the leadoff hitter is due up next? Does he hit back-to-back? Does he get a “Golden’’ pinch runner so he can go from second base to the plate again?

What about the integrity of the game? Hank Aaron, Mickey Mantle, Babe Ruth never got a free extra at-bat per game in a crucial situation.

What about all the records of the past being smashed because Golden At-Batters will get so many more Golden opportunities than star players in the past who actually had to bat in a batting order?

I guess that’s all over because Rob Manfred, the guy who once disrespectfully referred to the World Series trophy as a “piece of metal’’ has had enough with real baseball rules and is creating his own rules, time and time again, and for those in the media who have cheered this terrible idea on, are the clicks worth it?

Hey, this is a guy who ruined so many minor league franchises and cost so many minor league players their jobs, and people who work in the minor leagues, too, so there is not a lot of “sacred” in Goldfinger’s baseball world.

Yo, Rob, this is not the Savannah Bananas; this is Major League Baseball, but if you want to turn it into a circus, that’s on you, that is your legacy.

There once was a time when baseball was baseball. And it was great.

“I see great things in baseball,’’ poet Walt Whitman once wrote. “It’s our game – the American game. It will take our people out of doors, fill them with oxygen, give them a larger physical stoicism. Tend to relieve us from being a nervous, dyspeptic set. Repair these losses and be a blessing to us.’’

Old Walt didn’t add: “And you can change the batting order and bat whoever you want in the most crucial part of the game.’’

What about the Field of Dreams speech?

“The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It’s been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again, but baseball has marked the time. This field, this game, is a part of our past, Ray. It reminds us all of that once was good, and it could be again. People will come Ray; people will most definitely come.”

People have come to games forever without the Golden At-Bat.

The past means nothing to Goldfinger Manfred and to these new breed owners and those running teams. It’s all about the current buzz.

One of the great things about the NFL it is still the NFL. You don’t get an extra play for a star player to make a play to win – unless you are the Chiefs.

Here is another question. If it is the bottom of the 10th inning and the Fake Runner is at second base and the Fake Hitter is at the plate as the Golden At-Bat, if that hitter drives in the run did it really happen?

If a tree falls in the woods …

If a Fake Batter knocks in a Fake Runner, how does it go into the record books?

By the way, baseball has had the Golden At-Bat for years, it’s called a Simulated Game, and I remember being in Port St. Lucie when David Wright was coming back from injury and got at-bat after at-bat, even if he made an out in that simulated game.

Like all players fighting back from injury David Wright was trying to get himself ready and back to his rightful place in the lineup.

Each at-bat in MLB is earned, and that is what makes it a Golden At-Bat.