Green: How to fix the World Series
Baseball’s reigning pundits are distraught. The Rays-Phillies World Series was the least-watched Fall Classic in the history of television ratings. In response, many have called for more promotional gimmicks, a shorter baseball season (154 or even 130 games, rather than 162) or even a championship played in a “neutral” ballpark — preferably one in a sunny climate.
Certainly, there are a few small things MLB could improve; it’s lame, for one, to have off-days in the middle of a series. But there’s no need for drastic fixes for the simple reason that baseball is not broken. Baseball coverage, however, is.
No wonder the ratings were so low, when seemingly 75 percent of the stories published during the playoffs were about how the two New York teams didn’t make it in. Why should fans of the other 28 teams care? The Red Sox, too, get more than their fair share of national coverage, leaving only a small piece of the media pie for fans outside the Boston-New York heat shield. And all too often, that remaining slice is filled with an endless loop of “human interest” stories — the interminable iterations of the Josh Hamilton Story or the Curse of the Billy Goat that have long been sucked dry of any actual interest.
So to regain America’s interest in baseball, writers and talking heads should stop looking to MLB for a fix and execute a bold, new strategy of their own: write articles featuring insightful reporting and produce shows displaying knowledgeable analysis. I know, it sounds insane — almost unlike anything we’ve ever witnessed in baseball journalism. But hear me out.
Right now, too much baseball coverage revolves around the player profile, which, whether it’s a hagiographic puff piece or the worst tabloid hatchet job, is not generally a good instrument for deepening anyone’s understanding of (or interest in) the game. The ubiquity of the player profile is even felt in the broadcast booth, where too many announcers rely on biography — rather than analysis. But fundamentally, the primary reason we watch baseball is not because of the personalities who play it but because we’re interested in the game’s unique shape and strategies. This is why we watch baseball instead of croquet — not because croquet has yet to produce a mercurial star with dreadlocks.
Think baseball doesn’t have the kind of strategic depth that can support the level of intelligent, insightful commentary we expect from, say, football analysis? I hate to tell you, but you’ve been endumbened by years of reading drivel and listening to Fox announcers. Look on the web — there are scores of blogs providing more genuine baseball insight than you can find in just about any mainstream media channel.
If these bloggers can do it, so can the mainstream media. And that way, no matter who ended up in the World Series, we’d still watch.
Sarah Green also writes for UmpBump.com and mlbtraderumors.com, and can be reached at sarah@umpbump.com.
