World Baseball Classic first pitch
So it's just about time for the first pitch of the inaugural World Baseball Classic.
Korea takes on Chinese Taipei in the very first game. Gotta assume that calling it "Chinese Taipei" is a concession to the Chinese government which the US government, which tried hard enough to keep the Cubans from playing, has been strangely silent about.
The official website is exceedingly slow, and out of date as well. Here's the "updated" roster for the Dominican team, for example. Still shows the provisional 60 man roster. But 30 man rosters were due today. (Other teams, like the US, have their final rosters posted.) Fully 1/3 of the front page screen is devoted to selling shit. Try to find info about where and when any of the games will be televised. (For ten bucks you can subscribe to the internet feed and wathc the first two round games, then listen to the semis and the finals.) To their credit, ESPN is carrying all of the games on their Spanish language station, ESPN Deportes, and good for you if you get it on your system. I don't. And good luck trying to find out when, or if, ESPN is carrying any of the games on their English language stations.
I guess that selling the WBC to Americans is just not part of the marketing plan. We already know about baseball. We're not a growth market like China, South Africa, the Netherlands, or Italy.
I watched the international friendly between England and Uruguay last night on Fox Soccer Channel. A tune-up match to help Sven pick his side for the upcoming World Cup, meaningless in almost every sense of the word. But Peter Crouch scored his first international goal at his home club stadium in Liverpool, in front of sellout crowd, and it was the big news in the English sports pages this morning. Can baseball do anywhere near this kind of job marketing the WBC, not only to countries where the fan base is so small that any increase can legitimately be called double digit growth, but here in the US as well? We know it'll be big in Puerto Rico & Dominicana, both of which have excellent chances to make it to the semifinals. Cuba will probably shut down to watch if their team should advance out of pool play.
In the US, will we even know what channel the games are on?
I hope so.
Play ball.
Korea takes on Chinese Taipei in the very first game. Gotta assume that calling it "Chinese Taipei" is a concession to the Chinese government which the US government, which tried hard enough to keep the Cubans from playing, has been strangely silent about.
The official website is exceedingly slow, and out of date as well. Here's the "updated" roster for the Dominican team, for example. Still shows the provisional 60 man roster. But 30 man rosters were due today. (Other teams, like the US, have their final rosters posted.) Fully 1/3 of the front page screen is devoted to selling shit. Try to find info about where and when any of the games will be televised. (For ten bucks you can subscribe to the internet feed and wathc the first two round games, then listen to the semis and the finals.) To their credit, ESPN is carrying all of the games on their Spanish language station, ESPN Deportes, and good for you if you get it on your system. I don't. And good luck trying to find out when, or if, ESPN is carrying any of the games on their English language stations.
I guess that selling the WBC to Americans is just not part of the marketing plan. We already know about baseball. We're not a growth market like China, South Africa, the Netherlands, or Italy.
I watched the international friendly between England and Uruguay last night on Fox Soccer Channel. A tune-up match to help Sven pick his side for the upcoming World Cup, meaningless in almost every sense of the word. But Peter Crouch scored his first international goal at his home club stadium in Liverpool, in front of sellout crowd, and it was the big news in the English sports pages this morning. Can baseball do anywhere near this kind of job marketing the WBC, not only to countries where the fan base is so small that any increase can legitimately be called double digit growth, but here in the US as well? We know it'll be big in Puerto Rico & Dominicana, both of which have excellent chances to make it to the semifinals. Cuba will probably shut down to watch if their team should advance out of pool play.
In the US, will we even know what channel the games are on?
I hope so.
Play ball.
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