The First Time In World Series History A Sunday Night 5th Game Resulted In...
A 3-2 Home Team Win Started By A Left-Hander Born In Tacoma, WA

Any one else getting niggled by World Series announcers hyping ridiculously qualified Series factoids?

These (admittedly exaggerated) fictional examples illustrate what I mean:

"This is only the fourth time in World Series history a right-handed pitcher has thrown more than two scoreless innings of relief on a Thursday when the gametime temperature started above 50 degrees but dipped below it during the game."

"This has NEVER happened before! A left-hander named Chapman facing a switch-hitter registers a pitch over 100 mph in a Wrigely Field Series game between 9 pm and 9:30 pm CST."

Just because someone can data mine an obscure fact doesn't mean they should share it with the TV audience.

Comments

1
Electrokrakenjr's picture

My favorite factoid from this world series is that Michael Martinez was the first black man to score a run in Wrigley in the world series

2

That actually is a cool factoid, since it underlines the Cubbies' drought.  It's almost perfectly stretched, right, since their last WS was about 1945 and the color line was about 1948?

Great to have you hear Kraken.  :- )  Sorry it took me a couple of days to get to the moderation.  If you're not logged in then the comments have to be hand-posted; apologies.  +1

3

While for the most part I am enjoying these games, these World Series games really are taking a long time for no real good reason... which is giving just way too much time for these announcers how are so ill-equipped to fill the dead air time with useful facts. I have no idea how Vin did it, but just about every game I listened to him, I always seemed to learn a few facts that I thought were IMPORTANT. You have to wonder why others have such a hard time finding these types of facts.

4

These statements are tedious in the extreme.  As Rain said, something to say when you can't think of anything else.  A true baseball annnouncer would have stories.  Instead, we get something texted to his laptop.  

I actually think Smoltz is doing a pretty good job.  But overall, this is the result of having one marginal intellect (Buck) trying to act as the oracle for the World Series, Super Bowl, U.S. Open, etc.  He's not up to the job...because probably no one is.

And what, I ask, have I done in my life to result in being presented both Pete Rose AND A-Rod on the same pre/post game set?  Is Fox deliberately trying to drive me away?

5
Arne's picture

Apparently Buck, who never comes across as enthused about these games, doesn't have the time and/or interest in baseball to be really knowledgable about it, and the resulting gap is filled in by factoids the statisticians feed him. And, all the crowd shots and replays and quick cuts that the Fox producers use.

6

He did games for about 10 years after he had zero interest whatsoever...

I always enjoyed him anyway for some reason, and his book was hilarious... 'course that's about the 12-year-old Jeffy remembering things that probably aren't true :- )

7
Arne's picture

Cosell's before my time, although I did read his book way back when as well. I think he, Scully, Harry Carey-they had presence, and force of personality, which do a lot to make a broadcaster memorable. Niehaus, too-their words shape your memory of an event, whereas Buck is just there, droning on.

8

Think it was the Seahawk telecast and they said something in the 2nd quarter like "this is the first time Russell Wilson completed his first 5 passes from the pocket," or something like that.  

It's definitely an epidemic.  It would be okay if the stat was RELEVANT, like Kraken's, or even if the "5-for-5" meant something different than it would have if it had been "4-for-4."  But they don't worry about that.  They just use all the new sites like Pro Football Focus, Fangraphs,* etc. to shotgun the stats whether they mean anything or not.

Will edit to say that Blowers has a good feel for taking a rather weak stat and translating it to the field view, sometimes politely indicating that it doesn't mean much.

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