Seoul, South Korea — The 2024 Major League Baseball season is officially underway.
Shohei Othani and the Los Angeles Dodgers opened up the year against Yu Darvish, and the San Diego Padres in Seoul, South Korea.
The teams playing each other at Seoul’s Gocheok Sky Dome.
The Dodgers picked up the win in the season opener defeating the Padres 5-2.
A new year in the MLB means new rule changes.
In 2023, the league debuted several new rule changes in an effort to speed up gameplay and improve competition amongst teams. This year is no exception.
MLB officials roll out several new rules changes for 2024, which include:
- Runner’s lanes are widened to include the dirt area between the foul line and infield grass.
- Time between pitches have shortened from 20 to 18 seconds with runners on base.
- Umpires no longer have to immediately reset the clock if a batter calls timeout.
- It will be up to the pitcher to receive two-minutes and 15 seconds of warm up time.
- Mound visits are reduced to four per game with one guaranteed in the ninth.
- After a dead ball, the clock will resume once the pitcher has the ball, not when he returns to the mound.
- Pitchers that enter the game and warm up, must play.
MLB officials said these changes are meant to improve safety, continue to speed up the pace of play and further increase competition.
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