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Why did it work? I was wrong about the players. I expected far more resistance from the players to the new rule set, to being rushed, and it never happened. Oh, there were occasional complaints, but by and large, the players, and especially the pitchers, just...played faster. Why they couldn’t have done it without the clock remains a mystery, but there is little question that putting them on the clock sped them up in a way that shaved close to a half-hour off game times.
The pitch clock worked. The games were shorter and fans were happy about it. The players accepted the change, and the ones who objected were...handled. I was wrong.
