Overseas baseball is back!

DonBuddinE6

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Jul 25, 2005
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Much more convenient to be watching the 3:00pm replay on ESPN2. Other than what's in this thread, not much chance of having inadvertently seen a final score.
 

Humphrey

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Given my dog is named Dino (pronounced like the Flintstones' Dino), you know who I'm rooting for:eyeroll:
 

Sin Duda

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With the bats noticeably quieter, the Kawoom Heroes’ pitching stepped to the fore and outlasted the Kia Tigers in Game 2 of their season-opening series, winning 3-2. Former MLB Cub Eric Jokisch got the starting nod and pitched 5 strong innings of one-run ball, striking out 4 along the way. Four relievers pitched an inning each and paved the way to victory. Young-joon Lee was the winning pitcher despite yielding an 8th inning home run to Hyung-woo Choi to close the gap to 3-2. In the Heroes' pivotal 8th inning, Byeong-wuk Lim walked and Keon-chang Seo tripled to score him to break a 1-1 tie. Jung-hoo Lee later singled to plate an insurance run. The Heroes move to 2-0 on the young season while the Tigers, managed by former MLBer Matt Williams, are still winless.
 

Orel Miraculous

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Well, looks like at least some of the CPBL games are now pay-per-view, with today's Guardians-Monkeys game costing $2.49 on something called Live Now. It's hard to overstate what a massive error in judgment this is on the part of the league and its broadcasters, coming just as the KBO gets going on ESPN, too. Oh well, it was fun while it lasted, Taiwanese baseball.
 

Awesome Fossum

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So frustrating. Hopefully the Brothers' home games will still be available? (Edit: As of now, it appears that Guardians and Brothers home games will be available.)

Looking forward to the first KBO game that goes long enough that I'm awake for the end.
 

B H Kim

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Tried to watch the ESPN coverage this morning and it was just the announcers and Jeff Passan talking about MLB and completely ignoring the game. If they're going to broadcast the game, broadcast the game.
 

Red(s)HawksFan

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Tried to watch the ESPN coverage this morning and it was just the announcers and Jeff Passan talking about MLB and completely ignoring the game. If they're going to broadcast the game, broadcast the game.
I watched the game yesterday morning and kinda felt the same way. Seemed like every inning there was a new guest with Ravech and Perez, and rarely did the two of them just call the game. A couple of the guests were interesting, like the guy who was the KBO MVP last year and signed with the Brewers this winter. He had some good insights about the league and how it differs from MLB. And they had one of the US player's wife on to talk about being separated and what she was going to have to do to join him in Korea. But it all distracted from the game itself, especially when they'd put the announcers and their guests each in individual boxes on the screen and reduce the game picture to less than half the screen.

I'd just as soon have audio from the Korean announcers. I might not understand it but at least they're watching the game.
 

Manuel Aristides

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Apr 7, 2009
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I watched the game yesterday morning and kinda felt the same way. Seemed like every inning there was a new guest with Ravech and Perez, and rarely did the two of them just call the game. A couple of the guests were interesting, like the guy who was the KBO MVP last year and signed with the Brewers this winter. He had some good insights about the league and how it differs from MLB. And they had one of the US player's wife on to talk about being separated and what she was going to have to do to join him in Korea. But it all distracted from the game itself, especially when they'd put the announcers and their guests each in individual boxes on the screen and reduce the game picture to less than half the screen.

I'd just as soon have audio from the Korean announcers. I might not understand it but at least they're watching the game.
Totally agreed. The initial game had so much "WOW HOW WEIRD IS THIS HUH" commentary that I ended up muting it. I think what most of us are hoping for out of these foreign games is the promise or normalcy they can deliver—the green fields, the crack of the bat, the familiar motions and rhythms of the game, etc.— and by focusing on how "not normal" this event was, because it isn't MLB, was not only weirdly dismissive of the game being played, but also detracted from that return to normalcy I was hoping to find.
 

Red(s)HawksFan

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Totally agreed. The initial game had so much "WOW HOW WEIRD IS THIS HUH" commentary that I ended up muting it. I think what most of us are hoping for out of these foreign games is the promise or normalcy they can deliver—the green fields, the crack of the bat, the familiar motions and rhythms of the game, etc.— and by focusing on how "not normal" this event was, because it isn't MLB, was not only weirdly dismissive of the game being played, but also detracted from that return to normalcy I was hoping to find.
It occurs to me that the worst part of the broadcasts is that the natural sounds of the game were so muted. If Ravech and Perez fell silent, it was silent. I know there are no fans so you don't have that typical ballpark murmur but there had to be some noise on the field that wasn't coming through.
 

The Gray Eagle

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The ESPN announcing is terrible. They make it clear that they don't give a damn about the game, which ruins it.

It's like a lot of spring training games, where the announcers don't care about the games so they try to talk about other stuff, and the producers don't care about the game so they think "no one wants to watch this, so we need to bring in a bunch of guests and line up other stuff to talk about." It sends the message to the viewer that this game is unimportant and you should not care about what's going on. That is bad TV.

Hey if I care enough about this game to watch it, then you should respect me and the game enough to at least pretend to care too. I did not tune in to hear you blab about a bunch of other junk or to see your ugly mug taking up a quarter of the screen while you talk about how tired you are, or about who you think will do well in MLB this year.

There are so many people around the world trying to break into sports broadcasting who would kill for the chance to cover a game like this on ESPN, and their excitement would make the whole thing far more interesting.

The guys doing the Taiwan games actually cared about them and that made a big difference in the experience of watching them.
 

Remagellan

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The listlessness that Boog Scambi and Jessica Mendoza are bringing to this early morning broadcast of the KIA Tigers and Samsung Lions game is great if you're looking to fall back asleep. It's like a game is called by two Colin Robinsons.
 

OCST

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The listlessness that Boog Scambi and Jessica Mendoza are bringing to this early morning broadcast of the KIA Tigers and Samsung Lions game is great if you're looking to fall back asleep. It's like a game is called by two Colin Robinsons.
but at least they’re talking about the game and the players in front of them and not about Bryce Harper.

I’m enjoying this. I would watch it OATIO*

*Once All This Is Over
 

Remagellan

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I can't say that I would. I would probably watch MiLB over KBO if there was no MLB game scheduled on a given day since there's a much greater chance that I'd get a peek at a future MLB player. It hasn't helped that none of the KBO games I've watched so far have been competitive.
 

OCST

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I can't say that I would. I would probably watch MiLB over KBO if there was no MLB game scheduled on a given day since there's a much greater chance that I'd get a peek at a future MLB player. It hasn't helped that none of the KBO games I've watched so far have been competitive.
Re the quality of baseball, yes. Kia’s pitching and defense in this inning (now 9-2 Samsung, bottom 8) have been awful. it’s just rnjoyable.
 

Orel Miraculous

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Casey Kelly throws batting practice to the Dinos, who bat around and rough him up for six runs in the first. Not staying up for another KBO blowout.
You missed one crazy game. LG scored 7 in the eighth to come back and win.

In other news, the Lotte Giants moved to a league-best 5-0 on the season, thanks to Dixon Machado's third homer. Machado hit 17 in just 102 games at AAA last year and sported an .850 OPS.

The most fun I've ever had at a ballpark was at a Lotte Giants game in Busan. The experience was one part picnic (you can bring in your own food and booze), one part dance party, and one part Karim Garcia. I went by myself and was immediately offered a shot of soju and some dried squid upon sitting down next to a group of 20-somethings. They didn't speak any English and I didn't speak any Korean but we had an absolute blast (and yes, Karim Garcia homered).
 

The Gray Eagle

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Speaking of Lotte Giants, I was shocked to see who pitches for them: old friend Seung Song. He signed with the Red Sox in the 90's, and I had no idea he was still pitching, but apparently he is, at age 39.

Song was on the 1999 Gulf Coast team with fellow Sox prospects Donnie Sadler and Dernell Stenson. He was on the Sarasota team in 2001-- that season, Red Sox players Carl Everett, David Cone and Bret Saberhagen played there on rehab.

And Song is still playing.

Song was signed in 1999 out of South Korea for what was then a robust $800,000. He progressed to Double A by 2002 then was traded to Montreal along with countryman Sun-Woo Kim for Cliff Floyd.

Song, 39, never made the majors. But he has pitched 21 years in pro ball. Song is 107-83 with a 4.46 ERA for Lotte since 2007.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/05/09/sports/local-man-hopes-land-stuffy-mcinnis-hall-fame/
Some guys can hang around forever, even if they never make the majors.
Seung Song blue, everybody knows one.
 
Jul 5, 2018
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Why would anyone expect ESPN to be anything but terrible?
Just an awful organization.
I'm surprised people take these games so seriously. The level of play is comparable to Double A, I don't know any of the South Korean players and I have to Google the foreigners to check out their backgrounds.

I'm on my phone during the game and hear about 10% of whatever the commentators are talking about. Whenever I hear the roar of 20 fans cheering, I look up to see what happened. When I do listen, the discussion is often about bat flips which I find really irritating. It takes skill to hit a home run, but anyone with arms can flip a bat.
 

Red(s)HawksFan

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I'm saying that I have to be interested in the game to be irritated by the announcing. I agree that that the ESPN commentary for MLB games usually sucks.
The issue I have with the announcing is that they're not paying enough attention to the game, particularly when they have guests. If I wanted a talk show, I'd put on a talk show. The fact that I'm watching the game means I'm interested in it. Problem is, I don't know who I'm watching and I'd like to learn about them. I want the announcers to give me the details I can't glean from just watching the game. They're not doing that when they're talking to Jeff Passan about Blake Snell wanting full pay to play for the Rays this year.
 

oumbi

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Jun 15, 2006
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Boy, the Monkeys really have trouble with their pitching and fielding don't they? But they sure can hit.
 

Awesome Fossum

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Fair enough. And in fact, it seemed like the other broadcast, with the Monkeys on the road, had a viewership more in line with what I remember pre-geo lock. So maybe it's more a Monkey following rather than an Eleven Sports or general CPBL following.
 
Jul 5, 2018
430
The issue I have with the announcing is that they're not paying enough attention to the game, particularly when they have guests. If I wanted a talk show, I'd put on a talk show. The fact that I'm watching the game means I'm interested in it. Problem is, I don't know who I'm watching and I'd like to learn about them. I want the announcers to give me the details I can't glean from just watching the game. They're not doing that when they're talking to Jeff Passan about Blake Snell wanting full pay to play for the Rays this year.
For the KBO games I've seen, the 2019 stats were visible and I could google the foreign players names to see which MLB teams they had a cup of coffee with, so I don't really need any more information from the commentators.

I lived in Tokyo, where there was a button on the remote that eliminated commentary and I wish I had that option for MLB. I like some of the team announcers like Kruko and Keiper and especially liked Vin Skully, but I would definitely use it for any of the network commentators.
 
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Tokyo Sox

Baka Gaijin
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NPB is now aiming to start the season on June 19th with no fans, though the hope is fans will be allowed at some point. It sounds like the plan is to eliminate inter-league play, and reduce the # of regular season games played from 143 down to 120. The first two rounds of playoffs are likely to be eliminated, with the pennant winners facing off in the Japan Series in late November. Fingers crossed.
 

moretsyndrome

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Jan 24, 2006
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Big Brothers rally in the 7th, up 6-4! Followed by one of the most 'WTF was that?' cheerleader routines I've ever seen. Add in the random dancing fans and I may keep watching this if/when MLB comes back.
 

Red(s)HawksFan

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I've enjoyed everything I've seen of the KBO. The bowing thing is great. The bat flipping is great. There seems to be a lot less ego involved and a lot more joy on the field.