The first four days of the 2018 MLB regular season are in the books. Only four teams remain undefeated (Chicago White Sox, Milwaukee Brewers, Pittsburgh Pirates, Washington Nationals) while four are still looking for their first win (Cincinnati Reds, Detroit Tigers, Kansas City Royals, San Diego Padres). The early batting average leader? Seattle Mariners outfielder Mitch Haniger. He is 5 for 8 (.625).  

April is simultaneously the best and worst time of the year for baseball analysis. It's the best because baseball is back! Spring training is fun in its own way, but there's nothing quite like meaningful baseball. It's also the worst because everything that has happened so far has happened in a small sample size. An extremely small sample size. Tough to know what is part of a trend and what is simple randomness. That's never stopped us before though, and there's no reason it should stop us now. 

Here is just one our 10 early season observations.  

The new mound visit rule is pretty great

We're all still getting used to counting mound visits, but overall, the new mound visit limitations have greatly improved the flow of the game, in my opinion. Catchers and infielders are making fewer random trips out to the mound, especially in the late innings. That downtime has been greatly reduced and the game is moving at a much better pace, which is the entire point.

Now, that said, the mound visit rule has yet to drop the average time of game. In fact, games this season have taken longer to play than the average game last year. Here are the early season time of game numbers:

  • 2017 average time of game: 3:05 (3:10 through first four days of the season)
  • 2018 average time of game: 3:12 (3:09 if you remove Chicago Cubs vs. Miami Marlins 17-inning game)

Improving pace of play and shortening the game are not necessarily the same thing. The goal should be reducing the amount of downtime within a game -- all that standing around when nothing is happening. If the average time of game stays the same but more action is happening on the field, that's a good thing. 

So far, it feels as though the new mound visit rule has improved the flow and pace of games, even if it has yet to show up in the average time of game. There are fewer stoppages for mound conferences, and that is a good thing.