MAKE ME COMMISSIONER

Overhauling the national pastime.

Leavy captures the frustrations of fans everywhere in this charming, resourceful plea to reinvigorate a sport that “forgot how to be fun.” Current Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred has said he’ll leave his post in 2029, prompting the accomplished baseball biographer to launch this arch campaign for the job. Her diagnosis of the sport’s plight, sharpened by reporting trips to spring-training complexes, amateur tournaments, data-in-sports confabs, and numerous games, is boldly stated: “Analytics fucked baseball.” The game has been transformed by high-tech data collection systems in ballparks, MLB front offices run by quants, and specialized player-development centers. Today’s pitchers are instructed to put “max effort” into each delivery. Hitters are increasingly aware that teams “don’t pay for singles,” as a player tells Leavy. It’s no coincidence that strikeouts and injuries to young pitchers have spiked. The open-minded, comically profane ex–Baltimore Orioles beat writer is an ideal guide to this exasperating era, one that some of her sources trace to Rotisserie baseball, a fantasy sports forerunner invented by Daniel Okrent, an accomplished writer and Leavy’s friend. She travels the country, bouncing ideas off historians, managers, players, and executives. Her many common-sense proposals include higher outfield walls, which would reduce homers and increase basepath action, and “designated signer[s]” at MLB games—players who’d fulfill postgame autograph requests. Unlike fusty defenders of the sport’s traditions, she’s willing to reassess all aspects of the sport, from roster sizes to rules discouraging fastballs over 95 mph. Though some of her reporting is fruitless—she accomplishes little with a chapter about an independent pro team known for mediocre baseball and wacky promotions—Leavy’s blend of enthusiasm, knowledge, and iconoclasm prevails.

Irreverent analysis and fresh ideas from a baseball writer dismayed by the state of the modern game.