I get the concept of a good, gritty at-bat. Work the count, foul off a couple of pitcher's strikes and either take a walk or get a pitch you can drive. I enjoy watching tough hitters make a pitcher work a little more than he'd like. It's part of the game. But when you have a healthy Rich Harden (who I don't own) at the top of his game, and Garrett Atkins fouls off eight pitches during a 14-pitch at-bat, it's too much.

Harden subsequently lost his composure, and though he had the stuff to record eight of his nine outs by strikeout, he walked four and lasted only three innings.

Now Harden needs to buckle down, and I'm not excusing his subsequent performance merely because Atkins was such an effective pest. But there should be a limit to how much damage a pest can do. Because you know what's better than having Albert Pujols, Barry Bonds on 'roids or Babe Ruth in his prime? A guy with a zero OPS who can foul off 100 pitches before striking out or weakly grounding out every time. A player like that will chew through pitching staffs like a termite.

Fortunately, no one's developed contact skills to that extent. But if I were running an organization, I'd experiment to see if my best contact guys couldn't average seven or eight pitches per at-bat in the minors.

Of course, the pitcher would have one remedy against the 100-foul guy - intentionally walk him every time, and attempt to pick him off first base 100 times before throwing a pitch.

There should be a limit on that, too.