Colorado Rockies advance to their first World Series; Outside the state of Colorado does anyone care?

 



I suppose that congratulations are in order to the Colorado Rockies who last night closed out their NL championship series by sweeping the Arizona Diamondbacks. Too bad most of America citizens, living east of the Mississippi River, were unable to watch the entire game because of the late start time.


Let me perfectly blunt, the start times of these playoff games indicates that major league baseball doesn't give a hoot about fans who love the sport. And the people who run the sport are either completely blind or just plain stupid in realizing that fans of baseball are rapidly losing interest in what used to be "America's pastime". So far this playoff season, we have had a game that ended at around 2:45 am. on the East Coast and another game that ended shortly after 1:30 am. That is pathetically inexcusable.


Major League baseball years ago sold its soul to the devil in exchange for the ton of money that it adds to its bankroll annually. The devil in this case is network television. Baseball, for the past 20 years or so, has negotiated contracts with networks which agreed to pay the sport billions of dollars for the privilege in showcasing the sport. In return, these networks were allowed to dictate when playoff games would start. Except for a few opening round AL and NL division series games, all competition between teams are now night games. The World Series probably has not had one afternoon game since the early 1980's, to my recollection. These night games begin later and later each season, as dictated by the networks. The second game of the Colorado-Arizona NL championship series began at 10:35 pm. on the East Coast, (that was the game which ended at 2:45 in the morning). That is borderline criminal to allow these games to start so late in the evening. Of course if there was a commissioner who cared somewhat about the sport, and who did not have his hands out waiting for that fat network check to appear, baseball would be better off.


Bud Selig, the current baseball commissioner, (and who is set to retire in 2009, thankfully) along with Gary Bettman the National Hockey League commissioner, (do they still play hockey in this country?); is the most ineffective leader of a major sport in North America. Selig is a spineless, blundering excuse of a leader. It is under his watch that playoff ratings on television have essentially gone into the toilet. Last year's World Series between St. Louis and Detroit set a record for the lowest television ratings in history. It broke a record set the previous year in the World Series between Houston and the Chicago White Sox. I read where this past weekend's game between the New England Patriots and Dallas Cowboys drew a national rating of 18.5. It was the highest rated game in five years. It is projected that the World Series will be lucky to draw half of that (9.0 max) for any one game. Would you be proud of that Bud? Too bad that Bowie Kuhn, the deceased former commissioner of baseball in the 1970's and 80's is not around today, running the sport. I am sure that Kuhn would use his "best interests of the sport" clause that he used to invoke back in the day when baseball, and interest in the sport, was on a higher plateau in the consciousness of fans who loved the sport. The late Mr. Kuhn would rationalize that it is not in the best interests of the sport to have playoff games end well past midnight, when millions of fans are asleep. Bud Selig does not have the guts to implement such a decision. He would be incapable of standing up to the networks and state that the sport of baseball is suffering irreparable harm by having their showcase games occur at a time in which most of America is not watching the competition.


The National Football League has long captured the title of "America's Pastime", a slogan which for many years belonged to baseball. Don't be surprised if baseball loses its grip on second place as NASCAR is fast coming into the rear view mirror of Major League Baseball.

What is really tragic is that the leaders of baseball, (that means you Bud Selig) don't seem to understand that it is losing a generation of people who might never bond to the sport as people of my age, (50) once did. I am speaking about the youth of America. Back when I was 10-12 years old, I would run home after school in the fall and be able to watch the playoffs and World Series on television. All of the playoff games were in the afternoon. Sometimes, our school teachers would even allow us to listen to the games on the radio during class. There is an entire generation that is not going to be attracted to the sport when all World Series games end late at night, long after they have gone to bed. Even going back to the mid 1980's there were thrilling playoff games that were played during the day. The sixth game of the 1986 NL championship game between the NY Mets and the Houston Astros went 16 innings before the Mets were able to win, clinching the pennant. I remember after work coming home and watching the game, (it was either on a Wed. or Thurs) which started at around 4:00 in the afternoon EDT, and went on for over 5 hours. Imagine if that game took place this year. It would not have started probably before 9:00 pm; and instead would have ended around 2 in the morning on the East Coast. Mets fans looking back then could probably be thankful that Bud Selig were not around back then as commissioner, (he was at the time owner of the Milwaukee Brewers). No way that game would have been allowed to start in the afternoon if the sport were under Selig's watch then, and he had to kneel down and kiss the feet of network television as he does today. Do you think that many 11 year old kids living in the East Coast were up at 2:30 in the morning to watch that extra inning game between the Diamondbacks and the Rockies the other night? What about the number of kids, (even Red Sox fans) who were able to stay up well past midnight to watch game #2 of the Boston-Cleveland extra inning game? I know that personally I turned the game off at exactly 1:02 morning, and the game would not be over for another f0rty minutes, (with Cleveland scoring seven runs in the top of the 11th inning to seal victory).


The sport of major league baseball has turned its back to what is the essential ideal that they should be following - marketing the sport to the American public. Instead, baseball has become blind to the almighty dollar and has chosen to sell itself as if it were a "young lady of the night". Network television took up the sport on its offer and now has achieved complete control and dictatorship over how baseball is shown to the American public. Basically, what has happened over the last 15-20 years is a tragedy. I guess we can all look back and thank the greedy billionaire owners of the sport, and a commissioner who didn't have the cajones to take a stand for what is good for baseball.

Anyway, congratulations are in order to the Colorado franchise. Don't expect many people to actually watch you on television, should you go on and win the 2007 World Series. I know that most of those games would end well past my bed time, so I probably will not be watching the conclusion of them. And, I'm not a 12 year old kid who has to get up early and go to school the next day, either!

I welcome any comments to this post.