Most Difficult

What is the most difficult game to televise? The poorly pitched and poorly played game? The blowout game? No, the most difficult game to televise is the meaningless game. Tonight, the St. Louis Cardinals TV crew televised it's first meaningless game in two years. Last year the Cardinals clinched the playoffs on the final game of the season. Every game of the 2011 season was meaningful to the St. Louis Cardinals. With the Cardinals clinching the playoffs in game 161 last night that left only 1 game this season that was meaningless. 1 meaningless game in two seasons! The St. Louis Cardinals TV crew is very grateful and very blessed. This is my final blog of the 2012 season. Thanks to all who read this blog, thank you very much.

Just In The Nick Of Time

When our production team walked into the TV truck today, we were met with some bad news. The switcher was completely and utterly dead. The control card was completely fried. The nearest replacement control card was in Kansas City. The engineers tried to get the replacement card on a plane to St. Louis but were unable to do so. So, one of our engineers left Busch Stadium at 3:15 to drive to Columbia Missouri which is half way to Kansas City. An engineer from the truck in Kansas City was going to take the replacement card to Columbia from Kansas City to meet up with our EIC. Columbia is about 200 miles from Busch Stadium. We figured our switcher would be up and running about 8:00 at the earliest. We built our 4 segment open on a router in which we could only use cuts. Pretty ugly but it worked. Then, to everyone's amazement, our engineer showed up at the truck with the replacement control card at 6:40 and our switcher was up and running at 6:58. Just in the nick of time.

Blessed And Grateful

The Reds/Cardinals game tonight at Busch Stadium was one of the few remaining games in the big leagues that meant something. I am very thankful for that fact. The Reds, who are already in the postseason, are trying to have homefield advantage throughout the playoffs and the Cardinals are just trying to get into the playoffs. The players on the field and the fans in the stands knew the importance of this game and the electricity in the ballpark was very infectious for the TV crews broadcasting the game. For most teams there aren't meaningful games in October. The Cardinals are not one of those clubs. This organization always seems to be in the hunt come postseason and for that I am blessed and I am very grateful. By the way, the Cardinals won this meaningful game 4 - 2.