 Major League Baseball is somewhat unique among sports leagues in that its teams are divided into two groups that actually play under different rules At least with regards to one position at least for now Although this may change in the very near future at which point I'll have to remake this video and convert everything to the past tense There are a lot of arguments over this topic which go back decades But I'm certain we'll be able to settle this debate by the end of this video The MLB is divided into the American League and the National League both of which have 15 teams teams in the American League or the AL have one player each game who they designate to hit for the pitcher in that game This guy is called the designated hitter or more commonly the DH because who has time to say two whole words as You may or may not know and I'll assume you don't know because you're watching this as pitchers make their way up to the major leagues They spend all of their time focused on pitching and not so much time focused on hitting so way back even in the early 1900s some people were tired of watching their pitchers suck so much at hitting that they figured that another player should just bat in his place and So in keeping in line with the pace at which baseball usually addresses their issues 70 years later in 1973 the DH was born the AL and the NL were much more independent of what another back then than they are now so it was only adopted in the AL which has kept it all this time and Despite coming close in the past the NL has held out and continues to make their pitchers continue to hit even though They are all still garbage Of course there are times now such as in early games where an NL and an AL team play each other Which they didn't do in the 70s and of course there's the baseballs championship the World Series and In all of these games whoever the home team is determines whether or not the pitcher hits If the game is at an NL park then he hits if it's at the AL teams field then he doesn't so what exactly is all the controversy here I mean does letting one guy hit instead of another guy like four times a game actually make that big of a difference And it kind of does So first let's actually look at the numbers. How bad are pitchers at hitting? We're gonna look here at the stats from 2019 instead of 2020 because it was all kind of messed up So as baseball reference tells us the average baseball player in the entire major leagues on base percentage was 323 and we'll use OVP here rather than batting average because we're not heathens. So the average DH Was at 328 while the average pitcher was a distant last among positions with just a 159 OVP Slugging was a similar story with 455 compared to a tiny 163 So DHS hit 474 home runs while pitchers hit just 25 and while pitchers had half the number of it bats throughout the season Even if you double those at bats to make things even DHs are still hitting nine times the number of homers That isn't to say that more home runs is inherently better or that there aren't pitchers who can't hit at an okay level But it's clear that there is a major gap in hitting between Pitchers and DHS are really pitchers and everybody else for that matter So let's actually look at the arguments for both sides here. Although full disclosure I am pro DH, but hopefully I can explain the reasons on both sides well enough There's an old saying that if you don't play in the field Then you don't hit in essence saying that everyone has to play both offense and defense as is the case for most sports After all it's not like James Harden just plays offense and then he doesn't After all it's it's not like LeBron James doesn't play offense and then not defense Perhaps the biggest anti-DH argument is that not having a DH will Also force a manager from time to time to make a tough decision This situation will arise when a team has a pitcher who is pitching well But then when they're on offense his team starts a rally and gets a few guys on base The manager will need to decide here when it's the pitchers time to bat Do you pinch hit for the pitcher and send a better hitter to the plate? Increasing your chances of getting a few runs or do you send your horrible hitting pitcher to the plate? So that no matter what happens at least he can stay in the game and pitch the next inning With the DH this never happens the manager never has to make this call Now my personal counter argument to this one is that in today's game Teams have so many pitchers and there are so many pitching changes that it's rare that you'll need to be so Conservative with pitchers that it's not worth it to pull a guy now late in an extra inning game where lots of guys have been used or Even early on when it's between sending a starter back out for the sixth inning or something then sure and perhaps in the lower Levels it would be a bigger deal, but I just don't see it happening enough in the majors for it to bother me Are also a couple arguments that could kind of go either way The first is that having or not having a DH makes a difference in the way that you might choose players and construct your lineup AL teams need to have an extra player beyond their typical starters who can hit well Whereas maybe NL teams are able to have Subs off the bench who are better at defense Obviously it would be nice to have someone who can do both, but typically you're gonna have to pick one or the other It is less likely nowadays than it used to be for teams to have one guy who is their everyday DH Instead they usually just opt to give guys a break from the field every few days and rotate the DH around from player to player The other one is that the DH will inevitably Lead to more runs being scored because they are better hitters, which you may or may not like Now personally my argument in support of having the DH comes down basically to one thing when I watch baseball I want to see the best pitchers face the best hitters by removing the DH. You are making a pitcher hit While you force someone else who you know is a better hitter to sit on the bench Like could you imagine the Red Sox sending Tim Wakefield up to bat while David Ortiz just stood there in the dugout During their World Series run in 2007 or 10 years later how many fewer runs with the Astros have scored if their pitcher had had to Never mind Now I understand that there is the occasional pitcher who can hit and in this case He should be able to hit for himself as I record this this actually just happened last week For the first time in 12 years, which just shows how rare that it is So hopefully if you didn't when this video started you now understand a little bit more about the DH and the controversy that follows it If you don't like the DH however I have some bad news because I feel that a universal DH that is having it across the whole league is likely inevitable But not for anything that we've actually talked about so far as with most things it basically comes down to money For players to have an extra position will increase the value of that one guy who is the obvious DH choice or Increase the value of a few guys who are on the edge between starter and bench warmer Who will now have an everyday DH roll to fill? It is a benefit when contract negotiations roll around to be able to point out that they deserve a bigger check Because teams now have an extra position to fill on the other hand The AL has had the DH since 1973 and people have been saying that the NL will adopt it any year now ever since and they never have Done it so who knows if it'll happen I'd say it's probably just about as predictable as whether or not a pitcher will get a hit