Welcome to The Commish, a series of posts where I try to save baseball.
Today’s idea is to Red Zone the ALDS and NLDS.
Let’s start simply for Year One.
The first night of the playoffs, start all the games at 7:30pm Eastern (where the population of the USA lives). Let’s create a really buzzy night of television on a Tuesday night when there’s little sports competition.
The games can be on FOX, FS1, TBS and TNT in their normal fashion.
Over on MLB I want to Red Zone this. We’ll have Bob Costas or someone sit in the studio and act like the Scott Hanson of baseball. Unlike Red Zone, we’ll have all the games up on the screen at the same time….kinda like this….
In the big screen, the most interesting game with sound. In the smaller boxes, the other three games.
So what about the commercials and all the complaining from TBS and FOX. I dunno, figure it out. Red Zone figured it out and FOX and CBS have stayed in business. I’m trying to save the damn sport here.
I will point out I have left screen space for banner ads, and there is probably a way to show some ads in the big box.
My guess is this would go over really well and create a great night of television which is what baseball needs.
What about the poor folks the West Coast and the fans of the West Coast teams?
A valid point, but I am trying to save the sport here. Again, let’s look at this graph that you glossed over the first time.
14%. As Spock says, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. Or the 14%. I am trying to save the sport here.
Let’s take a look at what would have happened in 2017 with the actual matchups.
Houston vs. Boston. Central vs. East. 6:30 playoff game, you’ll live. Surely better than the 3:30pm local time start Astros fans had on October 5th….AT HOME.
Cleveland vs. New York (AL). East. Win.
Chicago vs Washington. Central vs. East. Fine. In fact these two teams played at 7:31pm ET on October 6th
Dodgers vs. Arizona. LA gets hosed with a 4:30 start….and I can’t keep track of what Arizona does with time zones or not. I think in October this would be a 4:30 start. Not pretty but for one night, let’s do it.
Let’s take a look at 2016….
ALDS: Toronto vs Texas. East vs Central again. Discussed.
ALDS: Cleveland vs Boston. East. Nice.
NLDS: Dodgers vs Nats. Sorry LA.
NLDS: Cubs vs Giants. 6:30 and 4:30. Not ideal, but again for one night, deal with it.
