Some MLB teams extending beer sales due to shorter games

Major League Baseball's new pitch clock rules are having the desired impact when it comes to shortening the length of games. 

The downside to that for MLB financially is that shorter games means shorter time for concession sales. Specifically beer sales. 

The solution to that has been some teams extending how long they are actually selling alcohol at their games. 

The unofficial standard across the league for years has been that beer sales stop after the seventh inning, but with the shorter games some teams have decided to push that back to the eighth inning to help make up for lost sales. 

Among the teams that have already made the decision are the Arizona Diamondbacks, Milwaukee Brewers, Minnesota Twins and Texas Rangers. 

The league has no official rule on when beer sales should stop, so it is possible that more teams could also extend sales. Money, after all, is king for sports. 

The main reason sports teams cut off beer sales is to theoretically limit the amount of alcohol consumption fans have before they get in their cars and drive, and to cut them off probably about an hour before they would be driving. 

Brewers president of business operations Rick Schlesinger argued that even by extending sales into the eighth inning they are still probably selling beer for a shorter period of time than they did a year ago due to the shorter games.

Baseball's new pitch clock rules at the Major League level have so far shortened games by about 30 minutes per game through the first two weeks of the season.