This isn’t your father’s Major League Baseball.

And that may not be a good thing.

While other sports have adapted to draw more interest (the NFL comes instantly to mind), baseball has been steadily losing its fan base over the years.

Several recent polls have made that painfully apparent.

A Harris poll reported in January that, while baseball is still the second most popular sport in the United States, nine percent fewer fans call baseball their favorite.

In 1985, the NFL barely had an edge over baseball. This year, the gap was wider than ever with the NBA and NHL creeping ever closer to the second spot.

Another poll recently showed that the NFL maintains its popularity year-round, while baseball drops significantly outside of its season.

Not good for America’s (Former) Pastime.

You don’t need to be Abner Doubleday to figure out the reasons why.

Baseball is a painfully slow game by current sports standards. The average game now lasts a shade over three hours and there is a lot of dead time as pitchers rub the ball, lick their fingers, spit and peer in for a sign between each pitch.

Hitters, of course, step out of the box, adjust their batting gloves, dig in and take a few practice swings.

That, folks, is pretty much two of the three hours right there. Fun.

Now, everyone is Mike Hargrove. Everyone is the “Human Rain Delay.”

Standing in line at the DMV is sometimes more exciting than sitting through a baseball game.

All is not lost, however. The game can be fixed and made more interesting without radical ideas like the one recently proposed by a high-ranking baseball executive who suggested games be shortened to seven innings to speed things up.

The best way to put a little pep into the pace is to speed up the pitcher-batter exchange.

Baseball tried to address this several years ago, but it didn’t do enough. Perhaps something like a “pitch clock” would work.

That, too, may be too radical a concept. But something needs to be done. The diminishing attention span of sports viewers is doing baseball no favors.

The new instant replay system doesn’t do the sport any favors, either.

The system is so preposterous it’s laughable. I didn’t pay $15 for a ticket and $7 for nachos to watch Clint Hurdle stroll out to the umpire and stand there while staring into the dugout to get the Roman-emperor-like thumbs up or thumbs down signal on a challenge.

Baseball games are starting to last longer than cricket matches.

Baseball will continue to see its fans dwindle if things do not improve.

Mike Kilroy is a staff writer for the Butler Eagle.