After 35 years, designated hitter debate still heated: first used in the American League in 1973 on a trial basis, the rule continues to separate the two leagues

Baseball Digest, July, 2008 by Jack O'Connell

WITH THE ELIMINATION OF individual league offices, the consolidation of umpiring crews and the addition of interleague play over the past decade, there is not much left that distinguishes the American League from the National League.

Except, of course, the designated hitter, a subject of heated debate in the 35 years since the A.L. adopted and the N.L. rejected the idea of replacing a pitcher anywhere in the batting order with a ninth hitter. That the acknowledged greatest hirer in the game's history, Babe Ruth, had originally been a pitcher could not quiet altogether movements to rid fineups of the guy on the mound.

Although the practice has been in place in the A.L. since 1973 and was officially added to the Rule Book (section 6.10) in 1976, the origins of the proposal date back more than 100 years, and along the way the idea was championed at one point more by the N.L. than the A.L.

The A.L. owners, concerned in the early 1970s over incessantly low-scoring games and dwindling gate receipts, adopted the measure to improve offense and appeal to fans' desire for more offensive action.

As far back as 1906, the use of an extra hitter to bat instead of a pitcher was brought forth by none other than Connie Mack, the legendary owner and manager of the Philadelphia Athletics. Mack's concept was more of a designated pinch-hitter, so that the pitcher's spot in the order could have been taken by any one other hitter not already in the lineup. So, in effect, the DH was then known as the DPH.

Purists within the major leagues held firm to the notion that every position player, pitcher included, get a turn at the bat, and the measure wasn't brought up seriously again until 1928 at the suggestion of John Heydler, then president of the N.L.

Heydler pushed for a designated pinch-hitter as a way to speed up the game, although it was never clear how that would be accomplished. Since the DH has been in effect, A.L. games are usually longer than N.L. contests. The irony 80 years ago is that N.L. owners approved of it, but A.L. owners did not. Endorsement was required of both leagues, so it died.

The idea found favor in some amateur leagues in the early 1940s, but it was not used in the professional game until 1969, when it was put into use by the Triple-A International League but lasted for only one season. Former Cubs and Yankees manager Joe McCarthy, living in the International League city of Buffalo, New York, said he favored the rule.

Declining batting averages and attendance figures in the A.L. in the early 1970s brought the concept front and center in the majors, but it was not an easy sell because of its chief endorser of the time. No one stumped more for it than Charles O. Finley, the radical owner of the Oakland A's, whose other proposed schemes included multi-colored bases and orange baseballs with green stitching.

"The average fan comes to the park too see action, home runs," Finley said at the time. "He doesn't come to see a one-, two-, three- or four-hit game. I can't think of anything more boring than to see a pitcher come up to the plate when the average pitcher couldn't hit my grandmother. Let's have a permanent pinch-hitter for the pitcher."

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Offensive deterioration hit rock bottom in 1968, when Red Sox left fielder Carl Yastrzemski won the A.L. batting title with a .301 average and was the only player in the league with enough at-bats to qualify for the crown to hit over .290. The overall league average was .237.

"The Year of the Pitcher," as 1968 became known, prompted a rule change that lowered the mound from 15 to 10 inches. Three years later, however, the overall batting average in the A.L. had risen only two points, to .239. Despite consistently ignoring Finley's recommendations, A.L. owners were desperate to find some way to improve offense and voted 8-4 to establish what would be called the DH on a three-year trial basis.

It is not as well-known that the N.L. came close to accepting the measure at the same time. With 12 clubs in each league at the time, seven votes were required for passage. The N.L. vote was 6-4 with two abstentions, the Phillies and Pirates.

Years later, Phillies executive Bill Giles said that his inability to reach then-owner Ruly Carpenter, a proponent of the DH, on the telephone resulted in Philadelphia's abstention. Pittsburgh's representatives were instructed by Pirates owner John Galbraith to vote with the Phillies. Carpenter was on a fishing trip.

Think of how baseball might have been different all these years if there had been cellular phones back then. But as Giles remarked in the current book, "Change Up," an oral history of the modern game, "If (the rule) came up for a vote today, the result would be more likely the elimination of the DH in the American League."

That remains the time-honored N.L. position. One of the biggest critics of the DH has been Whitey Herzog, which is ironic considering that, when he was managing the Royals, he had one of the best in the business in Hal McRae, who in 1982 became the first DH to lead the league in runs batted in.