Tag: MLB broadcasting

Notes: Jackie Robinson, Pirates debt, MLB broadcasts

A response to the federal government trying to erase Jackie Robinson, another responding to claim the Pirates are in debt, actually, and Rob Manfred’s latest on MLB’s broadcast plans.

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I had no inside knowledge that Steven Goldman would have a reaction to the Department of Defense briefly taking down Jackie Robinson’s military history to relabel it as “DEI,” but I knew he was good for it, and that it would appear if I would only be patient.

The reward for that patience was significant: Goldman wrote a wonderful rebuttal, explanation, whatever you want to call it to what went into the decision to remove Robinson, the history behind what made his being there in the first place such a significant deal, and some strong jabs at Thomas Jefferson’s trying-to-have-it-both-ways routine, for good measure.

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Time skip

More teams are spending the resources they have even as others run in place, the next CBA is Manfred’s last, with his final major act likely being a landscape-altering broadcasting deal. Pieces are starting to come together that will still be in play at the end of the decade.

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The Juan Soto deal has me thinking about the future a bit. Not Soto’s future, but what’s going on in MLB. You’ll have to excuse me for using this space to get some thoughts down and further organize them, but it’ll end up resulting in another piece or two down the line once that’s all done.

Event: The Dodgers spend and spend some more, deferring even more money, and are projected for a $279 million Opening Day payroll after kicking off 2024 at $267 million — please recall that Shohei Ohtani was paid just $2 million in 2024, with the other $68 million in the deal deferred until the playing time portion of the contract expires for 2034. The Dodgers ranked third in payroll, but second for luxury tax implications, as more of Ohtani’s deal counts towards that figure in the present than in the figure calculated with actual dollars.

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Notes: Rays roof, Twins owners, ESPN’s broadcasting deal

A shredded roof, the Twins are exploring a sale, and ESPN involves themselves in the future of MLB’s local broadcasts.

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It’s kind of incredible that no one inside of Tropicana Field was injured when Hurricane Milton ripped the stadium’s roof to shreds, but thankfully, that’s how things played out. It’s unclear how long it’s going to take to repair the roof — it simply does not exist anymore, an entirely new roof is needed — or what it’s going to cost to do so. There are some educated guesses out there, however, given similar work once done to the Metrodome.

According to the Rays themselves, the roof was designed to hold up against 115 mph winds; Milton blew harder than that, and the roof is no more. While it will take time to fully assess the damage, and opening day is a little over five months away, this process also can’t be rushed — hurricane season isn’t even over yet, after all, and we’re in an era of much larger, and more frequent, major hurricanes, as well.

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Thom Brennaman is not owed an MLB broadcasting job

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​Thom Brennaman doesn’t inherently deserve to be a broadcaster for a Major League Baseball team. That is both the long and short of the matter, but I guess we can go longer than that, too. If he is truly putting in work to make up for his hot mic usage of a homophobic slur last summer by joining the board of a children’s home that specializes in taking in kids thrown out of their home for being gay, then that’s great! I’m certainly not going to argue that point, and I’ll grant him at least a little benefit of the doubt here, that he feels some remorse about the whole situation beyond “it cost me my job and that’s bad.” Actually embedding himself a bit here in the community he offended is a good way to change the mindset Brennaman had that allowed him to so casually — and with obvious familiarity — throw out an anti-gay slur when he thought his mic was off.

However, none of this means he deserves to go back to being an MLB broadcaster. There are just 30 full-time play-by-play and color commentator jobs each, plus a handful of national broadcasting gigs. Why does Brennaman deserve one of those slots? He didn’t necessarily deserve one even before he got himself in trouble with his actions: the Brennaman broadcasting pipeline isn’t like the Buck one, in that Thom isn’t his dad nor is he Joe Buck, and yet, he was an announcer in multiple sports, with a grip on one of the few full-time jobs that exist in the market at the highest level.

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