Posted on 10/27/2005 1:24:38 PM PDT by raccoonradio
I was trying to keep my eyes open in the ninth inning of the Astros/White Sox' Game 3 Tuesday night when I came to a conclusion.
Major League Baseball is eating its seed corn.
How can baseball grow new generations of fans when The World Series – the culmination of the entire season – is televised too late for any young kid to watch?
This is not exactly a novel thought. It's been a topic of discussion all week during the morning drive, on WEEI Sports Radio. I side with Gerry Callahan, who argues that starting the games an hour earlier, say 7 p.m., might at least allow kids to watch a few innings.
Major League Baseball and Fox Sports scoff at the idea.
The argument for games that start after 8 p.m. is an obvious one. That's prime time on the East Coast, and starting earlier would result in fewer viewers on the West Coast, where it would still be afternoon.
Start earlier? ``Only if you want to reduce the size of the audience,'' says Lou D'Ermilio, Fox Sports Networks' spokesman. And Fox doesn't.
But isn't it also true that audiences would be larger in the populated cities on the East Coast if games started earlier and people could actually watch them and still make it to work on time the next morning?
Actually no, D'Ermilio says.
``That's a myth,'' he says. ``The ratings increase after 11 o'clock.''
Game 3, which started around 8:30 because of pre-game introductions and other MLB activities, clocked in at five hours, 41 minutes, the longest game in World Series history.
The game scored a 13.1 rating and peaked at 15.9 from 11-11:15 p.m, and hit a 15.7 from 12-12:15 a.m. For the first three games of the series, the total audience rating was 10.8 after 11 p.m. and 10.5 before 11 p.m. D'Ermilio says. (That's much lower than last year, when the Red Sox were playing, I might add.)
The explanation: As prime time ends, people who were watching other programs switch over to the game, and the ratings rise.
But what about those future generations who miss the games and will never become fans? D'Ermilio argues this too is a myth. For the 12-17 demographic, ratings before 11 p.m. through three games were 2.3. They dipped slightly after 11 p.m. to 2.2, though Fox says Tuesday's 14-inning marathon skewed the numbers.
Still, those numbers don't take into account the real youngsters. The 8-year-olds who never saw a pitch. I'm still angry for being sent to bed before Carlton Fisk hit the foul pole in Game 6 of the '75 series. But at least I got to watch some of that series, including Luis Tiant pitching in a weekend day game.
But MLB doesn't sound worried about losing the next generation.
``Clearly, where we broadcast the games now is where we think we can reach the most viewers,'' says MLB spokesman Carmine Tiso.
Eight-year-olds aren't driving the train. Advertising, ``that's what drives the train,'' D'Ermilio said.
As for the possibility that future World Series games might start earlier – perhaps on a weekend, like, say, the Super Bowl does? Don't wait up for it.
>> I'm still angry for being sent to bed before Carlton Fisk hit the foul pole in Game 6 of the '75 series.
Well, I was 13 and a half at the time and was able to stay up and see it.
WHY WON'T THEY JUST TAPE DELAY FOR EACH TIME ZONE. I am getting so tired of all the games starting later and later for all sports. I never get to see the conclusion of anything.....
It is a simple technology, lets use it.
Did it ever occur to the people making these decisions that many people might deliberately tune in later in the game because most games are more interesting in the later innings when pitcher fatigue comes into play?
All things of the past.
I remember having little transistor radios at grade school to catch the games ... times change, and there aint no going back
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