After chairing MLB’s competition committee for the past seven years, Mariners owner John Stanton will be moving to chair the league’s business board.
Giants owner Greg Johnson will succeed Stanton as competition committee chair, though Stanton will remain on the committee. Tuesday marks the start of committees at the MLB Owners’ Meetings in New York.
Stanton’s tenure will be defined by the implementation of several successful pace of play rules designed to speed up the game, most notably the pitch clock.
“It’s been an honor,” Stanton told SBJ.
Stanton was asked by MLB commissioner Rob Manfred if he would chair the competition committee in 2019 under the previous structure.
The Mariners owner also credited deputy commissioner Dan Halem for getting the joint committee approved in the last CBA negotiation in 2022. The 11-member committee, including six owners/management executives, four active players and one umpire is responsible for adopting and modifying the sport’s on-field rules.
Stanton also singled out former MLB exec Chris Marinak, now with Playfly Sports, as the original pioneer of a bulk of the rule changes.
Asked what he’s most proud of, Stanton responded:
“The pitch clock is clearly No. 1 because it addressed what I think was the biggest problem that we had. The game that I remember growing up was 2 hours, 30 minutes. When we got up 40 minutes higher than that I think it was hurting the industry. It’s harder to have a family come to the game, watch the game, and we were affecting the demographics of our fan support. We were disappointing our fans.
“The pitch clock was the most controversial thing we worked on and the most important thing that we got done.”
