BASEBALL’S NEXT STEP
As Mookie Betts, above, and the Dodgers begin training, The Times’ sports staff offers some fanfriendly suggestions for the season.
Baseball is less than three weeks away from beginning a 60-game regular season. Fans won’t be allowed to attend games, at least at the outset, making television and perhaps online streaming the only ways to watch. Teams and networks have an opportunity to enhance the viewing experience in ways never done before.
Here are nine ideas:
Hear, hear
Baseball is a sport of sounds — the crack of the bat, the thump of a glove, scream of an umpire, the rolling resonance of an organ. In order to connect with fans who in 2020 can only watch on TV, baseball needs to transform this remote season into one of simple, joyous noise.
Put a microphone on every ballpark sound. Let us hear the organist’s pregame melody, the crooning national anthem singer, the players’ walk-up music, even the between-innings techno pop. Put a microphone on every base, tuck one into every glove, let us listen to the eternal summer soundtrack. This would not require pestering players to do in-game interviews or begging a reluctant pitching coach to wear a mic during mound visits. This is about letting the game speak for itself.
Let us feel the two thumps of a double play grounder. Let us marvel at the thwack of a fastball strike. Let us cringe at a screaming called third strike. Let us be startled by the crack of a bat that is so loud, we know it’s a home run before it clears the fence. And after Dodgers victories, let us stand up and dance to “I Love L.A.”
Let us hear the game as if we were actually at the game. In a summer and a season desperate for normality, it would be music to our ears.
Drive in, tune in
How about a good, old-fashioned drive-in? Transforming a parking lot into an outdoor cinema would be easy enough. The endeavor would require a projector, a screen and security officers in charge of enforcing local health and safety regulations.
Fans would park, turn off their engines and listen on the radio as the action unfolds on a canvas in front of them. They can even celebrate with a neighboring carload of fans — at an appropriate distance, of course.
If hosting an outdoor gathering isn’t possible, teams could host virtual viewing parties. They can broadcast games on their Facebook or YouTube pages; those platforms allow fans to interact in written comments.