Baseball procedure question.

[FlashHarry]

In the NL, pitchers hit, right? What if a pitcher is relieved mid-game (like Wood tonight). He hit earlier. Is he out of the batting rotation too? Does the reliever enter the rotation?

Also, when did the DH rule enter the AL?

Thanks, in advance. :hi:

[youngred]

1. When the pitcher leaves

he can be replaced by a DH, and then a new pitcher (works if you're changing field players too). However, the pitcher who enters the game has to hit.

Dunno about the 2nd

[TSIAS]

2. Yep

The reliever would take the starting pitcher's place. There is a double switch where a batter goes into the pitchers slot and the pitcher hits somewhere else in the order.

On edit: The DH began in the AL in 1973.

[baby_bear]

3. 1973

http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/sports/7013971.htm

<snip>
Posted on Tue, Oct. 14, 2003

Designated hitter has outlived its usefulness
By PHILIP HERSH
Chicago Tribune

BOSTON - Thirty-five years ago, no one could hit a lick with a stick, and baseball was worried fans might not be as thrilled by Bob Gibson's 1.12 earned-run average as they would be bored by Carl Yastrzemski winning the American League batting title with a .301 average.

Baseball already was losing its position to pro football as the most popular sport in the country, at least as measured by the all-important TV ratings. In 1968 the entire American League batted .231 and averaged 5.9 earned runs per game - about the same as the Boston Red Sox' scoring average in 2003.

The sport's immediate reaction to 1968 was to lower the mound so pitchers like Gibson would be a little less imposing. In 1973 the American League took another step, partly to increase offense and partly as an attention-getting gimmick: the designated hitter.

The 30th anniversary of the DH would have passed unnoticed were it not for the incidents in Game 3 of the American League Championship Series between the Red Sox and the Yankees. The spotlight on this rivalry, especially in a TV world focused intently on its own East Coast navel, assured the issue of the DH would be linked to pitchers' not being accountable at the plate for behaving as provocateurs on the mound.

If pitchers like the Red Sox's Pedro Martinez and Yankees' Roger Clemens had to bat, that argument goes, they would be less likely to aim "purpose pitches" near the heads of opposing hitters, as both did in the fourth inning Saturday. Retaliation for such pitches, as happened in Game 3, generally turns a brushback into a bench-clearing brawl.
</snip>

Having no DH gives the game a chess-like quality, in my opinion, because the manager has to decide when to "sacrifice" his pitcher (at the plate).

I love baseball!!

s_m