Good deal and Bud

The word trickled out during the late innings of the Phillies-Braves game on Wednesday night that MLB and the cable companies had finally brokered a deal to keep the league’s Extra Innings package on cable as well as satellite TV. It’s a good deal for diehard baseball fans as well as MLB since they will now be able to sell its product to people who want to buy it.

That’s savvy business acumen there, folks.

“Our chief goal throughout the process was to ensure that fans would have access to as many baseball games and as much baseball coverage as possible,” baseball chief operating officer Bob DuPuy said. “With this agreement, the MLB Channel will launch with an unprecedented platform.”

Speaking of savvy, MLB commissioner Bud Selig made approximately $14.5 million in salary and bonuses in 2005. That puts him up there with the likes of Gil Meche and Ted Lilly. Be that as it is, Selig’s commissionership as been as interesting as any since Kennesaw Mountain Landis first held the post in the 1920s. For one thing, MLB has seen an unprecedented growth in terms of attendance, revenue, the value of the franchises, new infrastructure and television dollars. More people around the globe are watching the game than at any other time in history.

That’s all very good.

Yet at the same time, while the world tunes in fewer groups of Americans are watching than ever – namely kids and African-Americans. According to popular sentiment and columnist/talk-show fodder, Selig has reigned during a time in which MLB has “lost a generation” of fans. Kids, apparently, have tuned out in favor of the NFL, NBA and whatever other types of technology rules the day. They have chosen to play those sports, as well as lacrosse, hockey and soccer, instead of signing up for the baseball team.

At the prep school across from my house, the structure of the athletic fields has changed exponentially over the past decade. Several of the baseball diamonds have been re-configured and re-lined as lacrosse and soccer pitches as the game seems to have less of a grip on the kids coming up. At least in the exurbs, it appears as if baseball has become a bit of a fringe sport like hockey and the other so-called “extreme” sports.

Meanwhile, the latest statistics indicate that fewer than 10 percent of Major Leaguers are African-American, which is the lowest total in at least two decades.

Are these issues simply a matter of MLB being short-sighted and ignoring its future fans and players by televising World Series games at 9 p.m. on school nights? Or is it something deeper?

I don’t know.

Aside from those issues, Selig seemingly buried his head in the sand as performance-enhancing drugs issues went from a concern to a scourge rendering the league’s records meaningless and its history with little context.

Other than that, every day fans seem to enjoy the wild card and interleague play. So they have that going for them…

More from Opening Day

It was hard not to think about Cory Lidle yesterday after watching his son and wife throw out the first pitch in front of the sold out crowd at Yankee Stadium. According to The New York Times Lidle’s locker in the Stadium was directly across from Thurman Munson’s, the other Yankee who also died in a plane crash. And like Munson’s locker since August 1979, Lidle’s will remain unused for the rest of the year.

***
An interesting comment from Charlie Manuel regarding the 2007 Phillies during his pre-game meeting with the writers:

“I’ve been excited ever since Jimmy Rollins made that statement about being the team to beat. This is one of the best bunch of guys I’ve been around as far as tempo to play the game.”

We think that’s Charlie-speak for there isn’t a lot of extraneous tomfoolery from his team. They just go out and play and leave the other stuff for others.

***
So I went out and did it… I got the Extra Innings thing from MLB.com. Only this year –unlike last season – I just got the audio package. That way I won’t have to worry about the freeze frames or switching frames from work to watch the action. Better yet, I’m not fully enveloping myself in the corporate hegemony of MLB by giving them close to $100 per season for the video. Instead, I’m forking over about $15, which, in a sense means I’m selling out (or buying in) but at a cut rate I don’t feel so bad about it.

Apparently MLB decided to relax its “Go pound sand” stance and is continuing negotiations with the cable companies for the rights to broadcast the Extra Innings package.

Tonight I’m going to listen to Randy Wolf’s debut for the Dodgers against the Brewers. That is if I don’t get distracted by the music I’ll undoubtedly be listening to.

Say it ain't so, Joe

This morning’s drive to the drive to the coffee shop started out just like any other. Actually, the only thing different this morning was that it was very normal. Way too normal, even. Unlike yesterday, we didn’t get run off the road by a suburban mother racing in her Prius to the coffee joint, before watching her jump out of the car while it was still moving to its resting point, jog to the shop with the driver’s side door still ajar before elbowing her way to the front of the line to order a peppermint latte…

Then she picked up a copy of The New York Times, sat down on one of the overstuffed grey chairs and began reading.

I see that kind of stuff every day and this one was almost as funny as the time when I saw a neighbor move his trash cans to edge of the driveway, take the lids off, climb on top in attempt to push the garbage further down in the receptacle. But while standing on top and jumping up and down ever so slightly to really push the trash down, the can tipped to its side like a tall tree falling in the forest. The only thing missing was someone shouting, “TIM-BER!” And all of this occurred in the time it takes one to drive by someone’s house.

Fortunately in that case the only damage was a soiled Burberry scarf, which the trash jumper likes to wear as if he was the Red Baron.

But this morning there was no speeding Prius or flying ace taking out the trash. No, this was much more sinister and came packaged in the mellifluous baritone of one of America’s most beloved sports announcers… well, that’s pushing it a bit. It was Joe Buck, not Vin Scully, and Joe was definitely selling something, which he did earnestly and without irony.

Yep, Joe wants you to buy MLB’s Extra Innings package, and he wants you to buy DirecTV, too. It’s easy, he said in his spanking new radio ad. Easier than owning cable, in fact… at least that’s what he said.

Here’s the curious part: Buck’s ad for the new DirecTV Extra Innings package was on the radio not long after senators from the Commerce Committee held a two-hour meeting with MLB President Bob DuPuy. Based on that information and the alacrity for which the Buck ad was aired, I’d guess it was produced a while ago, and I’d wager that DuPuy and the gang had no interest in negotiating a better deal with cable companies in order to sell their product to people who really, really want it.

In fact, DuPuy treated the Senators in very much the same way he did the fans by telling them that he would not agree to continue negotiating a more fan-friendly deal into the season. In other words, we’re lucky MLB lets us watch at all. Hell, we’re probably lucky they let us buy tickets while we can still afford them.

In other words, thanks Mr. DuPuy. Thanks for the new way to watch a ballgame. It kind of goes like this:

Bases loaded, two outs in the bottom of the ninth with the Phillies trailing by three with the chance to go to the playoffs for the first time since ’93 riding on this 3-2 pitch to Ryan Howard. The pitcher winds, delivers… buffering, buffering, buffering… 47 percent… buffering, buffering… 77 percent… buffering, buffering, buffering… 93 percent… buffering…

More: Baseball holds its ground on TV plans

'If that ain't a crock'

Remember that Simpsons episode where Homer was going to enter the witness-protection program to escape the homicidal Sideshow Bob? Of course you do. That was the one where the feds were quizzing Homer on the intricacies of the program, but for the life of him, Homer couldn’t grasp the idea of becoming Homer Thompson instead of Homer Simpson.

Here, this should help:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OF-X0R8YnYc]

Anyway, lately it seems as if Major League Baseball has had as much trouble grasping what its fans want in much the same manner as Homer had in wrapping his head around the concept of a different surname. Actually, there is probably a laundry list of complaints that the regular baseball fan can levy against MLB, but for now we’ll just focus on a pair starting with the DirecTV/Extra Innings fiasco, which was enough to earn the league a spot on Keith Olbermann’s “Worst Person in the World” feature.

In the interest of full disclosure I should point out that after a few years of subscribing to the Extra Innings package on cable, I gave it up in favor of version offered on the Internets. The reason, of course, is that my laptop is typically within three feet of me at all times and if I can do a small part in making sure the revolution will be streamed instead of televised, then viva la revolucion!

By now most baseball fans who like to watch games on TV know the details of the DirecTV/Extra Innings flap and MLB’s so it should e understandable that the group who wanted to claim such public information as baseball statistics as intellectual property has no trouble taking out-of-town games away from the people who want to pay to watch them. As Olbermann said on Wednesday’s edition of Countdown with Keith Olbermann:

The bronze to Tim Brosnan, executive vice president of Major League Baseball, today rejecting the bid to keep the package of out-of-town games on cable television and satellite, rather than shifting it just to satellite. As we all know, no business strategy works quite as well as refusing to sell your products to the customers who want to buy it from you.

Indeed. But perhaps the best example of where MLB’s focus is comes from an item in Paul Hagen’s column in Friday’s Daily News. According to the story, the commissioner’s office noticed that Giants’ pitcher Barry Zito was photographed in Sports Illustrated using a burgundy-colored glove with laces of a different color…

Yeah, can you believe that? The laces are not burgundy!

Forget that Zito has used that glove for the past two seasons, MLB sent out an investigator who took pictures of the glove and forwarded them to the league office on Park Avenue in Manhattan for further investigation.

Said Zito: “I’m like, 'If that ain't a crock.'”

Here’s Hagen’s laugh-out-loud conclusion:

Watch it, Barry. You never know who might be listening.

You just can't be too careful these days. Why, if you aren't careful, next thing you know players might be trying to beat drug testing with HGH or other undetectable substances.

Yes, because we all know that using a multi-colored glove is a gateway to more self-destructive behavior. Maybe even anarchy.

***
Finally, I’d like to thank Ben Miller of the Wheatland Avenue Millers for pointing out an error in a previous post. It appears that I had claimed that Roger Waters and Syd Barrett were responsible for writing The Wall when in reality, as pointed out by Ben, Barrett had left Pink Floyd a decade before the opus had been composed.

Now if we could just get Ben to pick up on the grammatical errors in these posts.

Regardless, I regret the error and thank Ben for being both a diligent reader and a true arbiter of useless information. Thanks, Ben.

Odds and ends

For the past half dozen years I purchased the Major League Baseball Extra Innings package and enjoyed the fact that if I wanted to watch a game – even late at night – one was usually available. The problem was, however, that I was rarely home to enjoy a Dodgers game at 1 a.m. with Vin Scully painting portraits over the microphone. On most nights during the summer I was at the ballpark and the Extra Innings package didn’t get used as much as it should have.

That doesn’t mean I wasn’t going to get it. After all, I’m one of those people who is a baseball fan, but not necessarily a sports fan. Ever since I was a little kid I always thought that sports were for playing, not watching. To a large degree I still think that way. Nevertheless, last season I bought the online version of the Extra Innings package. Since I was never at home, but was always travelling with my laptop or within reach of a computer, it made sense to make baseball games portable. That way I could watch whatever games needed to be seen when I was at the ballpark, at the house in Colorado, on an Amtrak train, or even in a Starbucks.

As Jello Biafra said, “give me convenience or give me death.”

Rallying cries or the portability of baseball watching aside, I expect the online version of the Extra Innings package to increase its sales this season. Needless to say, any cable subscriber who is also a big baseball fan is going to agree with me after MLB told their fans, essentially, to “go to hell.” Perhaps since MLB couldn’t take away the statistics (they called it “intellectual property” and were laughed out of court) from the rotisserie leagues and online fantasy games, the league decided to take their games to Direct TV.

Now I have nothing against Direct TV, because I have never seen it nor do I know anyone who has it. As a Comcast subscriber (and shareholder), I’m very happy with what choices I have, the various offerings and the so-called on Demand features. Yes, it’s probably overpriced, but to me television is kind of like Trans fats. Sure, it tastes good, but you really don’t want to ingest too much of it. As far as cable goes, most people’s complaints lie with the local stations and affiliates.

Jayson Stark and Buster Olney wrote very eloquently about MLB’s move to the satellite company, while The New York Times thoroughly broke down the ins and outs of the deal though they left out the answer to one really big question:

What is MLB thinking?

I think MLB is attempting to enhance its web presence and believe that the era of pay-per-view sports is here and here to stay. I also believe that the Direct TV deal will be the big push to turn sports on television into something as archaic as games on the radio with the World Wide Web reaping all the benefits.

Time to increase your bandwidth, folks.

On another note… Here in Lancaster – just a little more than an hour from the Philadelphia city limits – Phillies games will not be available on “free” TV in 2007. To watch the “hometown” team, fans need Comcast SportsNet or a nationally broadcast FOX or ESPN offering. Additionally, WLPA, the long-time home of the Phillies on the radio, will broadcast Lancaster Barnstormers (an independent league team) for a second straight year.

Needless to say, most people are a little peeved. Who wants to listen to a glorified sandlot team on the radio when the Major League team that everyone has followed for their entire lives is making a run for the playoffs?

Freddy Sanchez? I remember a time during the latter portion of the 2000 season when Phillies' pitcher Chris Brock gave up a home run to Mike Piazza that hugged the right-field line before clanging off the façade at the Vet. Afterwards I asked Brock about the home run he surrendered and he not-so subtly insinuated that in order to hit a ball the way Piazza had, the player had to be dabbling with performance-enhancing substances.

So with Brock’s quote in tow, I marched over to the Mets’ clubhouse and told Piazza what the Phillies’ pitcher had said about his home run (the second of that game, I should add).

“Who,” Piazza deadpanned, “is Chris Brock?”

That’s kind of what I thought when I read the story from Pittsburgh about Pirates’ second baseman Freddy Sanchez not being jealous of Chase Utley’s new contract with the Phillies.

Freddy who?

To be fair, Sanchez is a nice ballplayer who probably never gave Utley’s contract a second thought. What probably happened was a writer or two were sitting around and saw that Sanchez won the batting title last season and had some statistics that were a bit better than Utley’s. So rather than think the subject through they went with the notion that Sanchez is OK with the fact that Utley is getting $85 million even though he hit .344 and the Phillies’ All-Star only hit .309.

Never mind that Utley is one of the best 10 to 15 players in the game and not simply one of the better infielders in the National League. Plus, Sanchez plays for a dreadful team that will probably be equally as bad for another generation. That means he doesn’t have the pressure of pennant races or little things like situational hitting or winning games to worry about. In Pittsburgh, Sanchez and Jason Bay can go out there and play any kind of game they want as long as they get their statistics. That way a few writers will look at them and think, “Look, he hit .344. He’s gotta be as good as Chase Utley… ”

Meanwhile, people outside of the Three Rivers area wonder just who is this Freddy Sanchez dude.