Okay, it's offical, the 2006 Major League Baseball season is offically being renamed the year of the balk. Okay so mabye it's not actually offical but I've decided to name 2006 the year of the balk.

I may only be 22 years old, but I've been playing baseball or softball since I was 3 years old, and having been watching since before the Toronto Blue Jays won back-to-back World Series Chamionships, and until the 2006 baseball season I had never heard of a "balk". Sure the rule has been around since the invention of the game of baseball, but this is crazy.

Did the umpires get together in the offseason and decide to go through the Major League Baseball rulebook this offseason and pick out a rule that had been neglected (for 2006, the Balk) and say "hey, we never call balks anymore, lets crack down on it this year just to piss the pitchers and their managers off."

Or are today's pitchers just getting lazy and screwing up so umpires are forced to call a balk?

Whatever it is, before this year I had never heard of a balk, and now it's everywhere, it's letting teams win, and causing others to lose, never before has such an unknown rule caused managers such headaches, it's MADNESS, stop the INSANITY!!!

Whatever, I still love baseball and the 2006 season has really rekindled my love for the sport!