Tag Archives: New York Yankees

Fox Sux, Part 2

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They did it again: Fox Sports screwed up yet again and chose to broadcast the Tampa Bay Rays game here in the Boston area.  Why?  I have no idea.  Perhaps it’s because I live near Boston, and since the Rays are in the Red Sox’s division, the coverage up here was tuned in to that team.  That’s the ONLY explanation I can think of.  But even that argument doesn’t hold water because apparently Fox broadcast the Cubs in Washington, D.C. area, which is very close to Baltimore, home of AL East team and division rival of said Sox.

Look, I’m happy for the Rays.  Theirs is a feel-good, improbable worst-to-first story that’s great for baseball.  But we’re talking about the Cubs here: one of the charter franchises of the National League, one with a storied past, with tradition, with a rabid, dedicated national fanbase.  Tampa?  They can’t even sell out their own stadium.  The way I see it, if the Rays’ OWN fans don’t care about the team (except when it’s for some wonky promotion for national TV), what makes the bigwigs at Fox Sports think that anyone else around the country cares about them?  If it’s truly about the numbers, then why didn’t Fox go with the Cubs broadcast nationwide?  They do it for overblown, overhyped Yankees/Red Sox regular-season matchups, so why not do it for a division-clinching game for another marquee MLB franchise?  Oh, that’s right: because FOX SUX.  It’s not like the 100-year thing for the Cubs hasn’t been covered tad nauseum this season.  There’s not a baseball fan (or perhaps even casual sports fan) who doesn’t know about the Cubs’ “curse” or World Series drought.  THAT is reason enough to broadcast the Cubs game over the Rays game.  If that’s not drama, I have no idea what is.

The Cubs are in the playoffs again, winning the NL Central title for the second time year in a row and third time in six years.  Thankfully, TBS has broadcast rights to the NLDS.  They’ll have their hands full covering all four series simultaneously, but I’m just glad it’s not Fox.  Unfortunately, Fox has rights to the LCS and WS coverage.  I can only hope that if when the Cubs make it to those rounds, Fox will send their “A” team to cover the games, even though I can’t stand Tim McCarver.  Joe Buck is an excellent play-by-play announcer, however, and because there’s no other playoff story bigger than the Cubs this year, Fox needs to wake up and smell the ivy.  Stop disrespecting Cub Country and give some other major market franchises NOT named the Red Sox and Yankees their proper due.

Fox Sux

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I used to respect Fox Sports and their coverage.  I had no trouble separating Fox Sports from its overtly biased and woefully inaccurate sister network, Fox “News.”  I like their football pre-game show more than CBS’, and I like the fact that there are multiple regional networks that cover specific events for particular parts of country.  But after Fox blew their baseball coverage last weekend and today, I’ll have a tough time giving the Sports division of the network viewing time in the future.  Here’s how they blew it:

Last weekend was the final weekend for interleague play, the merits of which (or lack thereof) I’ll save for another entry.  It was “proximity rival” weekend, so the Cubs were playing the White Sox, the Yankees played the Mets, the Angels played the Dodgers, etc.  Fox was broadcasting the Cubs/Sox game, and I thought everything was fine and dandy (except for the fact that the Sox were winning the series).  All of a sudden, Fox decides to switch the coverage to the Mets/Yankees game.  I sat there on my couch in disbelief at what just transpired.  First of all, they didn’t even wait ’til the inning was over; they just went to the Joe Buck (whom I like) and Tim McCarver (whom I can’t stand…more about him later) pre-game hoopla over the overrated “Subway Series.”  Secondly, the Mets were a second place team and the Yankees a third place team, while the Cubs and Sox both held the top spots in their respective divisions.  I was appalled that Fox would switch to the New York game just because it’s The Big Apple, in order to broadcast the game between two middle-of-the-pack teams when they were in the middle of covering a drama-filled contest between two first-place teams in The Windy City.

Then, today at 4PM, the second game of the Cubs/Cardinals series started, a battle between the top two teams in the NL Central.  It just so happened that the Yankees/Red Sox game started at the that time, too.  I was hoping Fox wouldn’t do it to me again, but they did.  They chose to showcase the fourth-place Yankees and second-place Red Sox, while there was a nail-biter going on in St. Louis.  WHAT?!?  The Cubs/Cards game today actually affects the standings in a meaningful way, with only 2.5 games now separating the first-place Cubs from the second-place Cardinals.  The Yankees won day, cutting their deficit in the division to a scant NINE games.  Again: WHAT?!?  Thanks Fox Sports, for perpetuating the no longer so-called “East Coast” bias.  No one cares about Yankees/Red Sox any more: it’s overdone.  Plus, the Yankees stink right now.  The way I see it, had it been a game between top two teams in the AL East, then it would have been more understandable.  But that was not the case.  Wake up, Fox.  The Cubs and Cardinals have just as intense a rivalry as New York and Boston, and the rest of the country just might be able to appreciate that if your choice of game coverage wasn’t so poor.

Oh, and speaking of poor, please let Tim McCarver go.  He’s a terrible broadcaster whose glaring lack of analytical talent only brings down Joe Buck.  McCarver’s analyses are wrong more times than they’re right, especially when it comes to replays, commentating as if he’s blind.  I’m reminded of Joe Morgan of ESPN’s “Sunday Night Baseball.”  They’re both know-it-alls who really don’t know much, or at least can’t express what they know on TV.  They talk way too much and often either say the wrong thing or dwell on the obvious.  Steve Stone’s a know-it-all, but I can tolerate him because he, indeed, does know it all.  McCarver and Morgan may have been great players, but they’re awful announcers.  They should take notes from the “Smartest Man in Baseball.”