LOS ANGELES — MLBPA executive director Tony Clark expressed concerns Friday about how pitchers are being used in today's game, putting the onus on teams to keep them healthy. «The conversations that we've had with our players have suggested that unless or until you draw a line in the sand and force change, that the decision-makers on any one particular team are going to continue to make the decisions that they're making, which is have pitchers' — starting and relievers — max effort for the period of time that they can have them,» Clark said on the field at Dodger Stadium before Game 1 of the World Series. «As soon as they seem to run out of gas, as the data suggests that they're going to, recycle them out and to burn out another pitcher.» With the reduced prominence of starting pitchers and the increase in pitching injuries, the issue is a concern for the league as well.
MLB has been studying the issue all season and hopes to implement the results of its findings to help reduce the number of injuries.
Clark says he believes teams need to have a role in it as well. «Players are doing what it is they are being told they should do.» Clark said. «If players were told, as they were the first 150 years the league was in existence, that the value was a quality start and pitching six innings or pitching deep in the game… then that's what players are going to do.
Clubs are telling players that that's not the value proposition anymore, and thus players are doing what it is that's being requested of them.» More refined training habits have helped increase fastball velocity over the past decade, leading to higher strikeout totals and more injuries.