1968: Cards-Tigers Series Marked End of Pitching Dominance

6:32 PM PDT, October 20, 2006 As the Detroit Tigers and St. Louis Cardinals prepared to meet in the 1968 World Series -- the anticipated duels between Denny McLain and Bob Gibson underscoring a historic "Year of the Pitcher" -- baseball's owners were planning equally historic changes that would help regenerate offense and restructure the game on and off the field. Now, in fact, preparing for a rematch 38 years later, the Tigers and Cardinals will have survived a far different route than in '68 and will be playing a different game, even if pitching is still the name of it.

"Those were radical changes, no question about it," Commissioner Bud Selig recalled by phone. "There was a feeling that the sport was experiencing stagnancy. The owners were looking for ways to rev it up.

" Responding to a season of record dominance by pitchers and a decade basically dominated from the hill -- "you only had to look at what (Sandy) Koufax and (Don) Drysdale did with a Maury Wills bunt and steal in Los Angeles," Selig said -- the owners lowered the mound from 15 inches to 10 (there were suspicions that it had been as high as 20 inches in some ballparks, including Dodger Stadium), altering the slope and angles from which pitches were delivered. In addition, umpires were quietly instructed to narrow the strike zone, basically depriving pitchers of the high or rule-book strike that has only recently been re-established by commissioner's office edict. beleaguered hitters in the aftermath of the '68 season and Series, in Gibson in Game 7, overall pitching was additionally weakened that winter when baseball expanded for a second time, going from 10 teams in each league to 12.

Kansas City and Seattle joined the American League, San Diego and Montreal the National, necessitating a For the first time, both leagues were divided into two divisions of six teams each, and a five-game pennant playoff was instituted as a qualifying round for the World Series, theroute that the New York Mets Selig was not the commissioner in 1968 (General William Eckert, the unknown soldier, was fired that December and replaced by Bowie Kuhn), trying to obtain a team, which he did in 1970 when the Seattle Pilots "Pitching had been so dominant in the '60s, and especially in '68, that the owners, quite properly, felt it was hurting the game," Selig said, speaking specifically of the decision to lower the mound. in popularity, looking at new cities. It was fast-paced and violent compared to the tone of baseball, and the owners were deeply concerned The tone was set in April, when Houston and the Mets were unable to score a run for six long hours before the Astros prevailed, 1-0, on an In midsummer, the National League won the All-Star game, 1-0, with September when Gaylord Perry of San Francisco and Ray Washburn of St.

.300 hitter, and Willie McCovey won the NL's runs-batted-in title with Major league hitters batted a cumulative .237, still the record low, and the per-game runs average of 6.

8 for two teams was the lowest In addition, both of the leagues had earned-run averages under 3.00 for the last time, and two pitchers, McLain of Detroit and Gibson of St. Louis, won their circuit's most-valuable-player awards, in McLain was 31-6, the last 30-game winner in the majors.

Gibson was 22-9, setting the NL's record for ERA at a phenomenal 1.12. The 339 major league shutouts.

He also won his last 15 regular-season "I don't know of any pitcher to have a more dominant season," Gibson and McLain met twice in the Series, with Gibson striking out Game 4 laugher at McLain's expense, 10-1. McLain rebounded to go the route in his own Game 6 laugher, 13-1, and the Tigers completed their third victory in the Series for Mickey Lolich, who was named the McLain would experience legal problems in future years, but he won 24 games on the lower mound of 1969 and Gibson won 20, and the pitching. Among starters, Roger Clemens, Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine and Randy Johnson, to cite a few, have produced potential Hall of Fame careers since then, and Nolan Ryan, among others, already has been Yet, the league ERAs soared as offensive statistics in virtually every category increased by about 20% in 1969, and the beat has continued amid adoption of the designated hitter by the AL in 1973, additional expansion, a wave of smaller, fan-friendly ballparks, the floating strike zone, force-fed pitching, tighter and harder baseballs, a swing-from-the-heels emphasis on home runs with reduced concern for strikeouts, technologically improved bats and, yes, bigger and stronger players, some chemically improved.

Said Steve Hirdt, executive vice president of the Elias Sports increase in offense that we're seeing today is at another level, born "Since 1993, the average of runs per game has been higher than nine every year -- and has been above 10 in three of those years. And since 1994, there has been an average of more than two home runs per "I'd hate to say that something will never happen, but I don't expect to see a return to 1968 (pitching) levels in my lifetime." It won't happen because owners won't let it happen.

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