Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, October 23, 1993 TAG: 9310230042
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Jack Bogaczyk
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
David Letterman could list the top 10 reasons for baseball's problems, and CBS wouldn't be one of them. In baseball, CBS has had big problems, like a loss of about $500 million, but baseball's woes don't include CBS.
There's a popular notion that baseball's popularity plummeted about the time CBS started its $1.06 billion deal with the national pastime in 1990. Sure, CBS trimmed 10 weeks from the Saturday "Game of the Week" schedule, and ratings for recent postseasons have been disappointing. Where would the sport be, though, without CBS' overpayment for rights?
By next year at this time, those same purists who were screaming about the loss of some summer Saturday games will be yelling louder about "The Baseball Network," that three-headed venture among the major leagues, ABC and NBC. Not only will there be no Saturday afternoon games, the first five games of both league championship series and all of the four new first-round league playoff series will be televised only on a regional basis.
That means no one will be able to see every pitch of every postseason game. The owners will be losers, too, because the advertising sales for those games will be based on this year's ratings. Only the 1989 earthquake-interrupted World Series, on ABC, has had lower Nielsen ratings than this Toronto-Philadelphia matchup.
However, baseball's decline as a televised sport can't be blamed on television. World Series ratings are lower, but the number of total viewers hasn't dropped that dramatically. Remember, the last two Series have included Toronto. Because Canadian viewers don't count in the Nielsens, CBS loses one of the two home markets.
Baseball has compounded its problems. First, it sold control of the game to television, and the networks began scheduling LCS and World Series games around "The Cosby Show" and "60 Minutes." This year, CBS moved up the weeknight first-pitch times slightly in an attempt to keep "The Late Show with David Letterman" in its time slot.
However, the finishing time for games has become more of a problem than the starting time. Of the 17 postseason games entering tonight's Game 6 (8:12 p.m., WDBJ), only three have been played in less than 3 hours, and only one - Atlanta's Game 3 victory in the NLCS - has been played in less than 2:50.
The average regular-season game was played in 2:48. The NLCS average was 3:15, two minutes shorter than the ALCS. The five-game World Series average is 3:29. That was ballooned by the 4:14 for Game 4, but the 3:16 for Game 3 came after a 72-minute rain delay.
Should the World Series be the Breakfast of Champions?
Besides, Game 4, played in what was at least a drizzle through its 29 runs, never should have started because of weather conditions.
Baseball is a game lovingly bathed in statistics. How about this one - including the rain delay, Games 3 and 4 took a combined 8 hours, 42 minutes. That's longer than the 1963 Series, in which Los Angeles swept the Yankees in 2:09, 2:13, 2:05 and 1:50. That's 8:17.
Baseball isn't losing fans. Just check the record attendance at ballparks. It is losing viewers, because the leisurely pace of the game has become a distraction instead of an attraction. At the start of the season, the leagues directed the public address announcers to get hitters to the plate quicker.
That's typical of baseball and its inability to see its problems, much less deal with them. Baseball needs a change of pace on the field. The leagues and the umpires, it's their call.
Keep hitters in the batter's box. Put a stopwatch on pitchers. When a pitch isn't delivered in 20 seconds, call a ball. A couple of 3-0 counts will speed up the game. Most importantly, the umpires should call the real strike zone - from letters to knees - and not the one they've arbitrarily installed.
Some umpires seem to call a strike zone that's wider than it is high. All of them call a zone that would have fit Eddie Gaedel, the 3-foot-7 pinch hitter Bill Veeck sent to the plate for the St. Louis Browns in 1951. The phrase "called high strike" has become as passe as "scheduled doubleheader."
The belt-to-knee strike zone contributes to the game time through another shortcoming - pitching staffs bloated by expansion. Check the middle relievers for just about any club. Where's the quality control?
The strike zone shrinks top to bottom, then too many pitchers don't know how to pitch inside after being "chinked" in high school and college by aluminum bats. Because most hitters can't catch up to a high fastball, the belt-high strike zone takes away a valuable weapon.
CBS, however, is calling a great Series in the booth and in the production truck. Through five games, the Series ratings are down 13 percent from last year's numbers. Still, in its last Series, CBS has been very strong, led by its decision to continue using a telecast-enhancing overhead camera despite the wailing of umpires.
Sean McDonough's game calls have been compelling, partly because his commentary has strayed into the analyst's field at times. He's dropped in opinion. Viewers should enjoy that. It shows he knows the game.
Tim McCarver has been crisp and concise in his analysis. The only replays used have been those that are telling, which means McCarver isn't belaboring his pointed remarks. From the truck, producer Bob Dekas and director Bob Fishman have replaced replays with wonderful reaction shots, pictures of emotion-engulfed faces, informative graphics and an obvious feel for the game.
It isn't CBS that's putting us to sleep. It's baseball.
by CNB