UPDATE: Rob Neyer responds and distills the responses I’ve heard from others on this. The upshot: there may be a lot of low-level concussions that occur that are sort of flying under the radar, and that by having a short DL option, teams may be more willing to call a concussion a concussion and put the player on the shelf for a few days.
I guess I get this. My sense, though, is to still think that if concussions -- even minor ones -- are as dangerous as we’re starting to believe, that we should be erring on the side of more time off for players who suffer them, not less.
2:35 P.M. The Associated Press has learned that Major League Baseball is considering a 7-day disabled list for players with concussions, and that it could go into effect as early as next year.
There are really no details provided, but I’m not sure I get this. Are there any players who have been diagnosed with concussions who have not missed at least 15 days on the regular disabled list? Jason Bay and Justin Morneau each missed the remainder of the season after suffering concussions of their own.
What purpose does this serve? Wouldn’t a 15-day DL better protect players by making them, you know, sit out at least 15 days? At the end of the day, isn’t it the case that someone has to be healthy and cleared by medical staff in order to resume playing? How would a separate disabled list change this approach in any way?
This smells like PR to me. At a time when the NFL is getting killed -- perhaps righteously -- over concussions, this feels to me like baseball trying to get ahead of media scrutiny as opposed to addressing an actual need.