Well, he did it.
Rob Manfred made a change and baseball has approved a dugout signal for an intentional walk instead of a pitcher tossing four “soft” pitches to the batter and will be effective this season.
How did social media react to it?
Well, we are glad you asked.
https://twitter.com/Kamper10/status/834217615879000064
New IBB signal: pic.twitter.com/0C15R03VJO
— Jessica Kleinschmidt (@KleinschmidtJD) February 22, 2017
https://twitter.com/Kristian_Ibarra/status/834212682337128448
Losing the intentional walk is the biggest non-story of the year.
— Mike 🌽 (@HuskerMike28) February 22, 2017
As d3 reliever I'm hoping the NCAA follows MLB and does away with the intentional walk… and hopefully the regular walk.
— Céspedes Family BBQ (@CespedesBBQ) February 22, 2017
As we say goodbye to the intentional walk(for now), I'd like to remind everyone of this absolute boss moment from Miggy. pic.twitter.com/KouH4Ixvew
— Jason Ochart (@JasonOchart) February 22, 2017
They should make this the intentional walk sign because intentional walks are bad and should be discouraged in any way possible. pic.twitter.com/1jdx8PrPn4
— Ryan Thibodaux (@NotMrTibbs) February 22, 2017
ESPN’s Jayson Stark reported a couple weeks ago this would be brought to the Major League Baseball Players Association to “eliminate dead time,” even though there were only 932 intentional walks thrown last year (one every 2.6 games according to Stark). That isn’t a lot.
It was nice knowing you, intentional walk. You will be missed.