So in this year's Lindy's Sports Baseball Preview, Bob Klapisch tells us, "Baseball clearly has to evolve in a way that mirrors an attention-challenged society."
What follows are the usual quick-fix suspects, some good—"Keep 'em in the batter's box"—and some awful—limit between-inning commercials to a total of one minute, while making up the money by selling "space on players' helmets and jerseys."
We're bringing in Betty White now to say, "Oh, Bob, Bob, Bob, dear, sweet, naive Bob! Do you really not understand that, once MLB has turned every uni and helmet into billboards, it will ALSO go back to 3 (or 5) minutes of ads between innings?"
A better "fix" to baseball would involve fewer rules and more common sense. Yes, we know your stats show that hitting into the shift still produces more runs in the short run. But in the LONG run, hitting to the opposite field and bunting will eliminate shifts, and make the game more entertaining.
But beyond that, I take exception to the whole idea that we need to aid and abet "an attention-challenged society."
No.
Look at what is still widely considered one of the most cherished, productive periods of American creativity, the years between the world wars. Throughout that time, almost nothing got shorter; everything got LONGER.
Vaudeville sketches turned into great Broadway plays. One reelers became some of our most beloved movies. And yes, the ballgames got longer, and starred men who became legends.
The idea shouldn't be to cater to idiots who can't sit still for a moment, or do anything but talk, tweet, or take pictures of their dear old selves.
The other day, somebody I went to grammar school with posted a picture of his removed, inflamed colon on my Facebook page. I still can't get it out of my head.
This has got to stop. Hang tough, baseball! Speeding up games won't get young fans rushing to the park any faster than blaring heavy metal and hip-hop between innings has done so. Hold out for longer attention spans!
Oh—and the Yanks got off to a fine start against Soccer in March, thanks to Red Thunder's bean. That makes the yearly total Soccer 27, Yankees 16. Don't look back, Soccer. Something might be gaining on you.
Right on, Horace! Old people have been accusing young people of having no attention span for 50 years that I know of, when they clucked over the lightning pace of Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In, and certainly much longer. Pronouncing the young stupid is the cheapest way to feel smart, and by a certain age cheap ways are all we have left.
ReplyDeleteSlow the game down!
I am always willing to take a cheap shot, provided I can get away with it.
ReplyDelete.... Its only spring training and I'm already qishing we had Mr Binders. At least he had the unction to not always be a Cashman pushover. Kumbaya Boone looks/sounds like Cashman prop up. :(
ReplyDelete1, Right on, Hoss. You're absolutely correct about selfies, attention span, and the other atrocities of modern "life," as we know it in this digital,interconnected "social" media and "sharing" age. You hit it on the head. Unfortunately, we're doomed either way. Our rantings might be dug up one day by future archaeologists who are studying how we could have let this happen, but they will probably all disappear with the first EMP blast or will simply die out when the next global extinction event - GEE (Trademarked by me right now).
ReplyDelete2. Mustang, you are also correct. This time, though, it's hard not to think that we'll get the LAST cheap shot in. Nothing to be proud of, just being realistic. I'm not feeling apocalyptic. At least, that's what I tell myself.
3. I really do love numbered lists.
4. There is nothing dishonorable about cheap shots, especially when you are over 50 and have seen how the world works.
5. I'm going to have to bite the bullet and pay for TV again, at least on a limited, seasonal basis. My little experiment may have failed. I *think* DirectTV has YES. Maybe I'll make some phone calls now.
Thanks, 13bit!
ReplyDeleteI kinda love the idea of us being dug up by some archaeologist thousands of years hence. I'd love to see the befuddled look on his face:
"I can only conclude that, even as their civilization spiraled into chaos, they remained obsessed with a certain "baseball" team, called the "Yan-kees."
Boos and jeers pour down upon our poor friend, who can barely believe it himself.
Our stadiums are just huge billboards and our players are one step away from walking advertisements. It's all about branding and advertising and getting those extra commercials on in between innings. Batter steps out of the batter's box? No problem, we see the advert behind home plate. We see the advert appear, switching from the YES box score in the left hand corner to some dreadful movie that sucks that opens on Friday because they know the movie sucks, but it has to be over-hyped as a desperation to get more paid viewers in the theaters. So it's the illusion to shorten the games not the actual effort of shortening the games. From someone who actually watched Mel Allen and Red Barber call games on TV while Mel had a Ballantine every inning.
ReplyDeleteA Ballantine Blast, Mel called it.
ReplyDeleteStick banner ads on the bottom of the screen where the news crawl usually goes. Let them run through the whole game. Use shorter between-inning breaks to catch up on scores and MLB news, sponsored by the guys whose logo is up there the whole time. Put in a "half time" break that allows for 5 or 6 minutes of actual commercials plus short snippets reviewing the game so far. Throw in a couple announcer plugs like the Ballantine Blast. Money in the bank. Shorter games. Sponsors you can't hate because they are actually SPONSORING the game, not interrupting it with terrible commercials running over and over.
ReplyDeleteThis isn't hard. But MLB will never do it. Of course.
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