The homers are part of a grouping with strikeouts, walks and hit by pitches that the Commissioner’s Office has been obsessed with lessening to get more action within the field of play and on the bases to quicken the overall pace. So far in 2019, MLB is seeing its nightmare worsen.

In 2018 those four types of plays represented a record 34.8 percent of plate appearances. It was 37 percent in 2019 through Wednesday. The sport is on a per-game record pace for homers, strikeouts and hit by pitch, and walks are at a two-decade high.

Through the first 180 games this season, there have been 467 home runs. That projects to 6,318 for the season. The record is 6,105, set in 2017.

What has been lost? Essentially action plays that involve multiple players coordinating and base-to-base action. In the history of the modern game (since 1900), 2019 is on pace for the lowest per-game rate ever for triples, sacrifice bunts, and double plays, and the lowest for steals since 1958.

But there is a central problem that is much harder to address: 30 teams are devising ways to win with little care about the entertainment value. Throwing hard and swinging hard with the concept of getting the ball in the air have proven of great value, triggering a vicious cycle of homers, strikeouts, walks and hit by pitch.

In its most basic form: Velocity is hard to hit. So teams load their staffs with hard throwers. They ask starters for shorter full-throttle starts and parade one 97 mph-plus reliever after another (number of relievers used per game is up for a sixth straight year). Combine that with shifts and the ability to string together hits becomes harder and harder — MLB batting average is .244, tied for the lowest since 1972, the year that convinced the AL to adopt the DH the following season.

A site at Peel Basin, located just off the downtown area, is being considered as the location of a new Montreal MLB ballpark, as the city and potential owners quietly advance in their planning.

The area in the Pointe-Saint-Charles neighborhood has long been rumored as the preferred location of a new Montreal MLB ballpark, so the decision to move forward with talks is not a surprise. With cities like Portland moving forward with new-ballpark plans and potential ownership groups there and in Nashville talking about pitching MLB, it would be the time for a potential ownership group in Montreal to begin serious planning. Expansion, it seems, would be the most likely route for Montreal to land an MLB team. With the Oakland Athletics pursuing a new Howard Terminal ballpark and the Tampa Bay Rays looking like they may reopen talks to stay in St. Petersburg, MLB’s last two pressing ballpark issues may be addressed in the next 18 months — which would then lead to the inevitable expansion talk and planning.

In Montreal, a potential ownership group has been laying the groundwork for a return of MLB by commissioning economic studies and touting the city’s success as an international trade center. The ownership group, Montreal Group, has wealthy businesspeople in its ranks — a good thing, as it will certainly cost well over a billion dollars to acquire a franchise and build a new ballpark.

Which brings us back to the Peel Basin as the potential location for a new ballpark. The Montreal Group is eying a parcel controlled by the federal government and has registered as lobbyists in order to negotiate a sale or transfer for a new ballpark. The site will be served by a new light-rail line as well, fulfilling the vision for a new urban ballpark. And so far there’s general approval, per the CBC