Rob Manfred has found himself in hot water with MLB fans once again.Since becomi

[seestyle]

Rob Manfred has found himself in hot water with MLB fans once again.Since becoming commi sioner in January 2015, Manfred has gone from one controversy to another, angering fans and players alike with his handling of different i sues that have popped up, comments he's made over the Brian Dawkins T Shirts years and attempts to change the game.His handling of the collective bargaining agreement discu sions has become the latest thorn for MLB fans and players as he's canceled games and attempted to pin blame on the players.MORE: The Sporting News is taking a look back at all Manfred's moments and controversies that have frustrated fans since he became commi sioner.Pace of playMLB fans had been hoping to see pace of play improved, and one of Manfred's promises when he became commi sioner was that he would help that aspect of the game. Heading into the 2015 season, his first as commi sioner, Manfred instituted several rule changes to try to help speed up the game:Batters must keep one foot in the box at all times (with exceptions).Timers will track non-game action, including breaks and pitching changes.Pitchers have 30 seconds for warmup pitches.Batters need to step in the box with 20 seconds left on the timer, and pitchers will throw the ball as soon as the batter is ready. Fines will be a se sed to those who violate the rules.Managers can call for instant replay from the dugout instead of walking out to the umpires.Some of those rule changes were aggre sive and caught fans by surprise. The biggest problem? They didn't work. , Davion Taylor Jersey the average time for a nine-inning game in 2015 was 2 hours and 56 minutes, an improvement from 2013 and 2014, but an increase over all but three previous seasons.And since 2015, pace of play has only grown, with every season since then having averaged at least three hours for nine-inning games. In 2021, MLB had its longest average yet of 3 hours and 10 minutes.Manfred has continued to institute new changes over the years, but nothing has seemed to work. The number of mound visits was cut down heading into 2018. In 2020, MLB announced each pitcher was mandated to face at least three batters unle s the inning ended before that to reduce the number of pitching changes.Despite Manfred's goal to speed up the game, it has not happened.Different baseballsAnd part of that can be attributed to a shared desire to both quicken the pace of the game and add extra offense at the same time.MLB experienced a ma sive surge in offense not long after Manfred became commi sioner, and over time reports have come out that the league has been seemingly constantly changing the baseball. found that the baseballs used in 2015 had more bounce and that the seams were lower in 2016, though MLB at the time had said there were no changes being made to the balls.However, confirmed that the baseballs had been changing, which helped contribute to a spike in home runs, though the league said it did not know what caused the change. In addition, many blamed the lower seams on an increase in pitcher blisters.MORE: , the baseballs continued to experience changes in 2018, when the ball was more even, then again in the 2019 regular season, when home runs spiked again. The baseballs were then different for the 2019 postseason, a fact MLB concluded in its report. Per that report, the baseballs were again changed in 2020 in a way that was deliberate, though MLB again denied that it used altered baseballs during the season.Then, in 2021, came out finding that MLB had used two different baseballs in 2021, starting the campaign with baseballs that were more designed to reduce the surge in offense and others in the second half that were meant to bring back some scoring. Players, coaches and other team personnel were unaware of the changes to the baseballs. MLB cited production delays from Rawlings.Before the findings of the report, Manfred had told Forbes that changes needed to be Jason Croom Jersey made to make the baseball more consistent."The only thing Im prepared to say at this point and time is I do think that we need to see if we can make some changes that gives us a more predictable, consistent performance from the baseball,".The seemingly constant changes to the baseball have led to uncertainty among fans about whether the product they will see on the field coming into a given season is going to be more pitcher- or hitter-friendly, and has added an aspect to the game they never thought they'd to need to know.Astros' cheating scandalThe first time Manfred had to deal with a major cheating scandal, he managed to make no one happy with the results.The Astros were found to have used video technology to steal signs and alert batters about incoming pitches throughout the 2017 season, in which the team advanced to and won the World Series.Fans expected some major penalties to be handed down after MLB's 2020 report concluded Houston had cheated. That was certainly A J Brown T Shirts not the case. Astros general manager Jeff Luhnow and manager AJ Hinch were suspended for the 2020 season, the team lost four draft picks and was hit with a $5 million fine.However, there were no player suspensions or fines. There were no punishments for players at all, in fact. The punishment they faced during the season came more from the response of fans on the road.Fellow MLB players were furious that the Astros did not receive a stricter punishment, with Dodgers' outfielder Cody Bellinger saying that he felt he was robbed of a ring, Angels' star Mike Trout saying that he felt the players should have been punished, and Braves' outfielder Nick Markakis saying that the players MORE: Even over the lack of punishment toward the players."Yeah, I understand. I understand people's desire to have the players pay a price for what went on here," . "I think if you watch the players, watch their faces when they have to deal with this i sue publicly, they have paid a price. To think they're skipping down the road into spring training, happy, that's just a mischaracterization of where we are. Having said that, the desire to have actual discipline imposed on them, I understand it and in a perfect world it would have happened. We ended up where we ended up in pursuit of really, I think, the most important goal of getting the facts and getting them out there for people to know it."'Piece of metal'That February 2020 interview with Ravech led to one of his most controversial comments, however. Manfred defended the idea of allowing the Astros to keep their World Series title even as fans and players called for it to be removed.Manfred said that no team had ever been stripped of a title and he didn't want to set any form of precedent for doing that over the Astros' cheating scandal. Then came this comment:"The idea of an asterisk or asking Michael Walker Jersey for a piece of metal back seems like a futile act," Manfred said. "People will always know that something was different about the 2017 season, and whether we made that decision right or wrong, we underto