Sloppy

Tonight's game/telecast between the Colorado Rockies and the Cardinals was the perfect sort of game to deliver a crisp, clean show.

The game was played at the wonderful pace of 2:27.

Good pitching contributed to this well-played game. The only blip on the pitching radar for the Rockies occurred in the 6th inning when the Redbirds plated 5 runs.

This was the type of game that all TV baseball crews look forward to on their way to the ballpark.

It's too bad that the St. Louis Cardinals telecast of this game did not deliver for the viewers.

This telecast was as totally sloppy affair.

My game cut was the most glaring reason for this ugly, sloppy telecast.

The Rockies scored their only run with a 4th inning homerun. As you may know from my book Cutting The Game, Inside Television Baseball From the Director's Chair (now available on the Amazon Kindle and the Barnes and Noble Nook) cutting the homerun is great fun for every TV baseball director. My cut on the Rockies homerun tonight, however, was terrible. There was no flow to the cut, the shots didn't work at all together, and I was embarrassed by this absolutely boring homerun cut.

Near the end of every inning, I plan my shot to break. Sometimes we roll out with video of a particular play from the inning and I don't have to plan my shot. Three times tonight I planned my shot to break and three times the shot didn't work. Once the Rockies manager moved out of the shot just after I took it and an ugly shot was the result.

The most effective shots to break are the ones that revisit, if you will, an important play of the inning. The other two times my shot to break did not work was because I did not adjust to a better shot that would have "revisited" the inning with a higher quality shot.

I was horrible tonight.

I was off a beat all game long and could never develop a flow of the show.

Very, very sloppy and very, very frustrating.