Dr. Leather,drleather2001 said:
I love your MMQB stuff, but sometimes you need to just chill with all of your bashing of what seems like every single media personality. Is there ANYONE out there that you like?
Grantland
- Thread starter Leather
- Start date
I love your MMQB stuff, but sometimes you need to just chill with all of your bashing of what seems like every single media personality. Is there ANYONE out there that you like?
I'm just being obtuse because it's McCarver.
Yes, the A's don't really cover themselves in glory, do they? The Giants stay home (even the guy who's wife's mom just died and has a new kid) while the A's keep tuning up in AZ.
What a bunch of assholes. LaRussa, McGwire, Canseco...
Yes, the A's don't really cover themselves in glory, do they? The Giants stay home (even the guy who's wife's mom just died and has a new kid) while the A's keep tuning up in AZ.
What a bunch of assholes. LaRussa, McGwire, Canseco...
I think what McCarver was saying was that people who blindly follow pitch counts will find themselves in rush hour traffic due to....Hrrrrmmph... OH REAL MAN, DEION! REAL MAN!
I like, nay, LOVE the fact that Eckersley threw at Canseco in an intra-squad scrimmage in the middle of the World Series.
Their job is to win baseball games. Going to Arizona likely allowed them to do better at their jobs.drleather2001 said:
Though Jose Canseco did quite well in saving a lady from a burning house once. Even got all her furniture out and everything.
They're athletes. Most of them are assholes, especially given the makeup of that A's team. They missed out a few photo ops and canned media quotes about how sad they are and all that. That said, screw LaRussa just because.drleather2001 said:
Thank god they were able to close the files on all those unsolved murders. And I guess the radiation exposure explains a lot about Scioscia.johnmd20 said:
That was a great read. The Eck quotes were great. Also enjoyed Steinbrenner bitching out Vincent and the DiMaggio anecdote.
I'm a sucker for those histories. Looks like I missed a couple from the side bar.
I'm a sucker for those histories. Looks like I missed a couple from the side bar.
Rook05 said:
If memory serves, Richard Ben Cramer's book stated that the items DiMaggio retrieved from the house were a couple of huge sacks of cash.
Despite being a certified "Murder, She Wrote" hater, I continue to be enamored with Rembert Browne's writing.
http://www.grantland.com/blog/hollywood-prospectus/post/_/id/90730/the-octavia-spencer-murder-she-wrote-reboot-is-going-to-be-flawless
Honestly, it drags when he describes his fantasy opening but the first part is just fantastic writing.
http://www.grantland.com/blog/hollywood-prospectus/post/_/id/90730/the-octavia-spencer-murder-she-wrote-reboot-is-going-to-be-flawless
Honestly, it drags when he describes his fantasy opening but the first part is just fantastic writing.
I'm not sure if we necessarily need something from Simmons, but it seems kind of insane to me that we just had a weekend that included two unique WS endings and an exciting Game 5, and the front page of Grantland is an NCAA Basketball Preview, Bad NFL Coaching, the ramifications of the huge Boston trade (the Celtics that is, not the Sox), Arcade Fire's new album, a Heat article, an NFL recap, and Lou Reed. It looks like a Games 3 & 4 recap made the front page Monday.
Even if you go to the Triangle, Monday only had two baseball specific posts (Keri's podcast being the other one)) and one multi-sport (About Last Weekend) and Tuesday had the same (Keri on Game 5, About Last Weekend). In comparison, we're up to five dedicated NBA posts (Bills Preview, Spurs/Heat, B.S. Report with House, Deandre Jordan, NBA Guide 2013-2014) today alone.
I know, it's Grantland. It's just odd that a site that seemed pretty even handed on the sports to start off has pretty much shoved baseball to the side when we have a competitive WS with two ridiculous endings. It's been relegated to hockey/soccer territory, but even then, the NHL's early season has gotten comparable coverage to the MLB playoffs.
Edit: Looks like there was a Games 3-4 article, just poorly titled and difficult to find because it was pushed off the front page.
Even if you go to the Triangle, Monday only had two baseball specific posts (Keri's podcast being the other one)) and one multi-sport (About Last Weekend) and Tuesday had the same (Keri on Game 5, About Last Weekend). In comparison, we're up to five dedicated NBA posts (Bills Preview, Spurs/Heat, B.S. Report with House, Deandre Jordan, NBA Guide 2013-2014) today alone.
I know, it's Grantland. It's just odd that a site that seemed pretty even handed on the sports to start off has pretty much shoved baseball to the side when we have a competitive WS with two ridiculous endings. It's been relegated to hockey/soccer territory, but even then, the NHL's early season has gotten comparable coverage to the MLB playoffs.
Edit: Looks like there was a Games 3-4 article, just poorly titled and difficult to find because it was pushed off the front page.
Fishercat said:
I've been bitching about this for a while now. The site is a perfect mirror of Simmons's actual fandom and each sport gets covered proportionally to match his interest. The NBA and NFL get the vast majority of the coverage, MLB, EPL, and hockey get just enough so that we know Bill hasn't forgotten about them.
Well, aren't the NFL and the NBA the two most popular sports? Why wouldn't they have more to do with them than MLB and the NHL?Orel Miraculous said:
OM, that's a cool poll. I always assumed that the NFL/college football/NBA were a solid 1-2-3.
Interesting.
Interesting.
That is an interesting poll. TV ratings tell a different story...
http://www.sportsmediawatch.com/2013/01/2012-numbers-game-the-most-watched-sporting-events-of-the-year/
http://www.sportsmediawatch.com/2013/01/2012-numbers-game-the-most-watched-sporting-events-of-the-year/
That is an interesting poll. TV ratings tell a different story...
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They do and they don't. If you check local regular season ratings baseball beats basketball in most areas that have both. There are an awful lot of baseball fans out there that pack it in once their team is eliminated.
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They do and they don't. If you check local regular season ratings baseball beats basketball in most areas that have both. There are an awful lot of baseball fans out there that pack it in once their team is eliminated.
Sure, some sports play better on TV, are on at a better time, receive better promotion, etc. but people do vote with their clickers and the NFL is an overwhelming force over all others by a wide margin. More so than that poll indicates.Dehere said:
I can see where the NBA has more appeal as an out-of-market viewing experience, just based on the nature of the game and the way it lends itself to viewing its stars. For an average guy watching a team that isn't his, in most cases I'm guessing individuals are the draw.
If you want to see Lebron play, I can put a Heat game on and watch him play 40 minutes or 80% of the game. If I want to see that Puig guy everyone is talking about, am I really going to sit through a 3 1/2 hour game to see him bat for 1 or 2 minutes 4 times over that span? Diehards, sure, but your average casual fan isn't going to invest that sort of time for such a minor payoff.
If you want to see Lebron play, I can put a Heat game on and watch him play 40 minutes or 80% of the game. If I want to see that Puig guy everyone is talking about, am I really going to sit through a 3 1/2 hour game to see him bat for 1 or 2 minutes 4 times over that span? Diehards, sure, but your average casual fan isn't going to invest that sort of time for such a minor payoff.
Game 5 of Red Sox - Cards drew a 3.5 in the 18-49 demographic in primetime hours. Game 5 of Spurs/Heat drew a 6.3.
Last Sunday-- SNF, a blowout game between Packers and Vikings rated 6.3. World Series Game 4 rated 4.6.
Ratings are like box office numbers, they don't reflect the quality of the movie but they do reflect popularity. For a useless regular season game, with one of the league's worst teams playing, to out-rate a World Series game, with two of the most popular franchises in the sport involved no less, says a lot.
http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/2013/10/29/tv-ratings-broadcast-top-25-sunday-night-football-tops-week-5-with-adults-18-49-ncis-number-one-with-total-viewers/211922/
Ratings are like box office numbers, they don't reflect the quality of the movie but they do reflect popularity. For a useless regular season game, with one of the league's worst teams playing, to out-rate a World Series game, with two of the most popular franchises in the sport involved no less, says a lot.
http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/2013/10/29/tv-ratings-broadcast-top-25-sunday-night-football-tops-week-5-with-adults-18-49-ncis-number-one-with-total-viewers/211922/
ifmanis5 said:
National TV ratings tell a story. They don't tell the whole story, or even the most important story, especially when you only look at one season, as your link does. For instance, here's a broader look at the national ratings for the World Series and the NBA finals:
So generally over the past 12 years the World Series has drawn a larger audience (and sometimes a much larger audience) than the NBA finals. The chart doesn't show the last 3 years, but I believe the NBA Finals has out-performed the World Series there, thanks to the pull of Lebron. Regardless, this hardly tells the whole story.
What about local TV ratings? Here are the top five local TV draws for the 2012-13 NBA season:
1. Oklahoma City 8.65
2. Miami 7.07
3. San Antonio 6.44
4. La Lakers 4.64
5. Utah Jazz 4.40
And here are the top five local TV draws for the 2013 MLB season:
1. Detroit 9.60
2. St. Lous 8.72
3. Pittsburgh 7.99
4. Cincinnati 7.70
5. Boston 7.30
So MLB stomps the NBA in local regular season ratings. The top 5 MLB audiences are all bigger than the audience for the Miami Heat, the defending champions and the team with the most famous athlete in America.
Those are good points. I wasn't arguing NBA vs. MLB. My argument is that the NFL has a larger % of the pie.
ifmanis5 said:
ifmanis5 said:
Of course. The NFL is the most popular TV show in America. But that doesn't mean that the Harris Poll's 34% number is incorrect, it just means that the NFL has created the perfect TV storm:
- It's on only once a week.
- It has an incredibly short season making every game incredibly meaningful.
- They rig the schedule to create false parity.
- They constantly tinker with the rules to make the game more visually appealing.
Oh christ. Can you see us from that high up on your horse?
Edit: Oh and you forgot gambling, which is probably one of the biggest draws of football.
Edit: Oh and you forgot gambling, which is probably one of the biggest draws of football.
kenneycb said:
I like the NFL just fine. It's not my favorite sport, or even my second favorite sport, but I watch it. I just can't stand the now annual storm of articles about how much more popular the NFL is than MLB each October, all of which are based purely on national TV ratings and fail to take into account the inherent structural differences of the sports and how that affects those ratings.
Edit: you were probably talking about my "lazy country" comment. Maybe that was a sidetrack, but come on, we're pretty fucking fat and lazy. That's reflected in the TV shows we chose to watch, the movies we go to, the books we read, and the music we listen to. Why wouldn't that also be reflected in the sports we watch? Americans as a whole always chose quick and easy entertainment over more involved options. What's wrong with pointing out the the biggest reason why football is our most popular sport to follow is simply that it's the easiest sport to follow?
kenneycb said:
He's not wrong. The national TV ratings have always been a pretty ridiculous component of the NFL Is America's Sport thesis because it flat-out ignores almost every variable in the content-medium relationship. You've got to untangle that shit if you want to use TV ratings as as a valid popularity index and no one ever bothers. Data that basically says people are more likely to be watching a football game they have no interest in than a baseball game they have no interest in was barely interesting ten years ago, let alone now.
I don't think football is inherently lazier than baseball. It's all about the amount of effort you want to put into watching it so calling one sport lazier than another is, well, lazy.
Edit: This is in terms of entertainment preferences.
Edit: This is in terms of entertainment preferences.
kenneycb said:
If I want to watch all of my team's football games, I takes me ~48 hours to do so. If I want to watch all of my team's baseball games, it takes me ~486, and almost all of those hours are spent watching a much lower leverage game. That's all I'm saying about which sport is easier/lazier to follow.
Orel Miraculous said:
Which is why you took the time to lump the NFL in with NCIS and The Big Bang Theory. Obviously those shows are shorter than great TV shows like Arrested Development or Mad Men, which is why lazy people like them, right? Because it takes less time to watch them?
But wouldn't lazy people just love an excuse to sit on their couches and watch 486 hours of tv instead of only 48?
Ralphwiggum said:
Football is easier than other sports to watch and NCIS is easier than other TV shows to watch, but they are easier relative to their competition for different reasons.
For TV shows, America chooses NCIS and The Big Bang Theory over The Wire and Arrested Development because the former are simpler, more conventional, and don't demand as much effort by the viewer than the latter. The viewer doesn't need to watch every episode in order to get self-referential jokes or remember dozens of different characters in order to understand how a seemingly disparate plot fits together.
For sports, America chooses football over everything else because it doesn't require as much of a time commitment and the short seasons magnify each game, thus demanding less effort by the viewer. They don't have to watch every night to keep up with the narrative of a season, and a smaller investment of time returns a larger emotional thrill.
Either way, what is popular on TV generally equals what is easiest to watch on TV. That's how TV shows work, and that's how TV sports works. Which is why (getting back to what started this debate) merely pointing to national TV ratings to judge a sport's overall health and popularity is flawed methodology. You have to consider a number of different factors including local TV ratings, attendance, the number of people who play the sports, the number of opportunities people have to watch/attend the sports, the regional vs. national character of a sport, and the various other media used to consume sports including books, derivative hobbies (fantasy sports), and online discussion to name a few. Taking all of that into account explains why the Harris Poll numbers show that the gap between MLB and the NFL is closer than it seems based on national TV ratings and the gap between MLB and the NBA is further apart than it seems base on national TV ratings.
Which is why (really getting back to what started this debate) I think Grantland does a terrible job balancing it's sports coverage, which has never been more evident than today. You would never know that a hugely important baseball game is being played today based on Grantland's homepage.
It's all about revenue. NFL is at 9.5 bill, MLB in the 8s, and the NBA is something like a 5.
National TV ratings make the NBA look good because interest is disproportionately in a handful of elite teams. Meanwhile teams like the T-Wolves or Bucks are irrelevant in their local markets, far more so than their equally bad local baseball teams.
Gallup has a poll on sports interest which is much better than the stupid Harris poll that comes out every year, and it's here (sorry, am on a tablet): http://www.gallup.com/poll/4735/sports.aspx it's better because it takes into account that most people are into more than one sport, and measures accordingly. There's some fascinating historical data too.
53% of people consider themselves baseball fans or somewhat baseball fans, compared to 37% for pro basketball. Which matches up well with those revenue numbers I mentioned above. Pro football is at 67%.
National TV ratings make the NBA look good because interest is disproportionately in a handful of elite teams. Meanwhile teams like the T-Wolves or Bucks are irrelevant in their local markets, far more so than their equally bad local baseball teams.
Gallup has a poll on sports interest which is much better than the stupid Harris poll that comes out every year, and it's here (sorry, am on a tablet): http://www.gallup.com/poll/4735/sports.aspx it's better because it takes into account that most people are into more than one sport, and measures accordingly. There's some fascinating historical data too.
53% of people consider themselves baseball fans or somewhat baseball fans, compared to 37% for pro basketball. Which matches up well with those revenue numbers I mentioned above. Pro football is at 67%.
Orel Miraculous said:
Do Grantland's readers care all that much about baseball? I'll bet (but don't know) that they slant coverage in favor of the sports that get them readers. For a Bill Simmons driven product it's not surprising that his fanbase likes the NFL, NBA, and reality television.
Shelterdog said:
Not only that but Grantland is owned by ESPN and this time of year they are pimping the NBA and NFL games they broadcast, and they do not have MLB post-season games.
Shelterdog said:
They may think they slant coverage in favor of sports that get them readers, but I think it's just as much about slanting coverage in favor of what Bill Simmons himself is interested in.
Spacemans Bong said:
That is a much better poll and, again, it shows that the gap between football and baseball isn't nearly as big as the national media tirelessly tells us each October.
It is a good poll and supports my point. People prefer watching Football roughly 3x to 4x as much as baseball.Orel Miraculous said:
I'm a baseball fan first but those numbers say it all. As do the ratings. When a regular season baseball game out-rates an NFL playoff game, let me know.
ifmanis5 said:
Yes. I know that people prefer watching football more than baseball. That is undisputed. But the debate was about whether Grantland covers each sport in a manner somewhat proportionate to actual interest in the sport, and my whole point was that national TV ratings, for a number of reasons, are far from perfect barometers of actual interest in a sport.
Funnily enough, I was daydreaming yesterday about a world in which baseball was scheduled like the NFL: one game a week, every weekend from April through September (something like 26 games in total), followed by single-game playoffs every weekend through October and a Super Bowl of Baseball at a warm-weather neutral site in November. Would baseball rival the NFL's popularity if it were played like that? The on-field product would probably look somewhat different...
(By the way, you can try a similar thought exercise in which you an impose an NBA- or NHL-like schedule on baseball instead of an NFL-like one - 82 games instead of 162, followed by playoffs in which the champion has to win four best-of-seven series along the way. What would that kind of baseball season look like?)
- Each team would use the same starting pitcher in every game, more or less, and those pitchers would be venerated like NFL quarterbacks
- Your best players would start every game, subject to possible platoon advantages and the like
- I suspect rosters would be smaller, because fewer pitchers would be needed
- I also suspect rules changes would be required to help batters (e.g., a lowering of the mound), insofar as the overall quality of pitching would surely skyrocket as only the best pitchers would find jobs in the league
(By the way, you can try a similar thought exercise in which you an impose an NBA- or NHL-like schedule on baseball instead of an NFL-like one - 82 games instead of 162, followed by playoffs in which the champion has to win four best-of-seven series along the way. What would that kind of baseball season look like?)
Grantland rules. Big fan.
Inexcusable that they couldn't put anything World Series related up tonight. Nothing?!
Inexcusable that they couldn't put anything World Series related up tonight. Nothing?!
It's 9:30 am eastern time and they still don't have anything posted on the front page about the World Series. Their coverage, with the exception of Jonah Keri -- who seemed to peter out after game 4 -- has been nonexistent. Sports on Earth kicked their butts on post-season baseball.
Spud said:
They have a Jonah Keri piece up, and I'd be surprised if Charles Pierce and/or Simmons didn't post something soon as well. But regardless, they really did a lousy job with baseball coverage this year on the whole, especially when you compare it to the treatment the NBA gets--there were more articles written about the NBA preseason than the entire MLB playoffs.
Is there any data that shows the age demographic of Grantland? Is baseball's popularity waning with the 18-24 (or whatever) demographic?
Meh. It's been a long time since I've considered Grantland anything more than an NBA site, with occasional forays into other areas.
Linky goodness to Keri piece: http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/9906306/jonah-keri-red-sox-world-series