Lose, Tie, Lose

After 12 pitches, 6 balls and 6 strikes, the Reds led the Cardinals 5 - 0 in the first inning.
This game is over - Cardinals lose.
Later in the game Reds lead 8 - 0,
The game is over - Cards lose.
Bottom of the ninth inning, John Jay homers and the Cardinals tie the game 8 - 8.
Extra innings.
Reds score in the top of the 13th inning to take the lead 9 - 8.
This time Cards really lose.
Down....way down...up....up....up....way up....down....stay down.
How is that for a summary of tonight's game/telecast?
12:30 AM
Going to bed

Patience

I had a nice conversation with my good friend, Roy, who is the Cincinnati Reds TV director.

I have known Roy for over 25 years and have a great respect for him and his talent.

The theme of our conversation was patience.

Roy stated, and I agreed with him, that many of the younger TV baseball directors today are not patient enough when cutting the game. Because of their lack of patience they let the speed of the game control the speed of the telecast.

They don't want to miss anything so they overcut.

Tonight's game telecast featured back to back homeruns in the first inning by the Cardinals. This game also featured a two homerun game by Matt Holliday of the Cardinals. The Redbirds also scored 3 runs in the 5th and the 6th innings.

All of these instances brought me back to our conversation.

I found myself wanting to be aggressive during these moments of the game and thus overcutting. Our conversation relaxed me and I found myself being patient as I cut the game.

I did not let the speed of the game dictate the speed of the telecast.

As Sister Ruth Ella, my 5th grade teacher at St. Pioux X catholic grade school used to say "Patience makes prudence".

Great Fun

The Cardinals beat the Reds at Busch Stadium today by the score of 1 - 0.

This 2:25 game was a classic pitchers duel which featured great defense from both clubs.

Both right fielders made sensational plays in back to back half-innings. In the bottom of the third inning, the Red's Jay Bruce threw out a Cardinals baserunner at the plate to keep the shutout intact. Not to outdone, Cardinals rightfielder John Jay robbed the aforementioned Jay Bruce of a homerun with a sensational catch over the fence.

Both starting pitchers threw 8 innings and both allowed 6 hits.

The Cardinals scored the only run of the game in the bottom of the 8th inning. A leadoff single, a sacrifice bunt with two strikes, a fly ball to centerfield moved the runner to third base, and then the strangest play of the game.

With the runner at third base, the Cardinals batter literally squibbed a ball off the end of the bat. The ball, with a super amount of english on it, spun around the third base bag into foul territory. The Reds third baseman made an unbelievable play fielding the ball. From his knees he spun and fired it to first base. The Cardinals batter barely beat the throw with a head-first slide and the run scored.

Busch Stadium exploded and the fans went crazy all through the one-two-three top of the ninth inning.

Well pitched, well played, and well paced games with exciting finishes are the cream of the crop for any TV baseball director.

Great Fun!

A Good Day

My day started at 8:30 AM eastern time in St. Petersburg Florida.

I had slept well and was looking forward to today's final interleague telecast between the Cardinals and the Rays. I am not a fan of interleague play and I was elated that this would be the final game/telecast of this sort this season.

I was drinking coffee and perusing my Facebook page when I discovered that one of my best friends from high school was asking me to "Friend" him on my page.

What a great surprise!

I hadn't heard from Gordon in over 30 years and I can hardly wait to chat with him.

This day was starting out great!

The Cardinals lost and this was about the only thing that went wrong today. We had a clean telecast and our interleague schedule for 2011 was over.

Our charter flight went smoothly and I was in my door at 9:00 PM central time.

I cannot describe how wonderful it is to see my wife, Jane, after a week on the road.

Our dog, Kirby, met me in the driveway as I got out of the car and went nuts.

The three of us went on a nice long walk and now it is 10:00 and I feel great.

I hope this was not too boring for everyone but I decided to write about this great day instead of another blog about an interleague telecast.

Interleague play - now that is boring.

Comfort Levels

There is always a different feeling between home and road telecasts.

Obviously, there is a certain comfort level when televising at home.

But, as I discovered tonight, there are three different comfort levels where road telecasts are concerned.

The highest comfort level for road telecasts occurs with games between teams in our division - the NL Central. We televise more games at these venues than other National League cities so, naturally, we know the crew members and recognize their abilities better than the TV crews from other National League cities.

The comfort level in other National League cities when we are televising is fairly high as well because even though we are only televising in those towns once a season, we go there every year and are somewhat familiar with the crew.

Certainly, there are crew changes occasionally in every city, but the comfort level when televising is just a little less than our telecasts with our divisional rivals.

The lowest comfort level for visiting TV baseball crews occurs when we televise from an unfamiliar American League city during Interleague play.

This is not because these crews are not talented because they are. Some of the crews in these towns are very talented.

Take Baltimore for instance.

But, I believe, a huge factor in developing a comfort level with visiting TV crews is personality.

Some crews, while respecting the abilities of visiting TV baseball production teams, have a difficult time understanding the personalities of each individual involved in the production.

We have some very unique personalities on our St. Louis Cardinals TV baseball travelling production team.

Sometimes our personalities affect the comfort level with the TV baseball production team in the city we are televising from.

I know this is the case here in Tampa/St. Petersburg.

Never Seen Before - Heard It Before

The top of the eighth inning in tonight's Cardinals/Rays game was a strange inning indeed.

The Rays manager and three players were ejected in the inning. Two of the players were ejected by the home plate umpire and two players were ejected by the second base umpire.

We have all seen ejections before. Some ejections are even predictable. But one of the ejections occurred in a manner that I had never seen before.

A relief pitcher, who was already upset by some non-strike calls from the homeplate umpire, was ejected after giving up a three-run homerun.

And he was ejected before the homerun hitter had reached third base!

It is true that some of the calls could have gone either way. These calls were not blatant misses by any means by the homeplate umpire.

After the ball sailed out of the park, the pitcher violently tossed his glove to the ground. And when the umpire, who didn't see the glove tossing, threw a new ball to the pitcher, he violently threw the ball to the ground as well thus causing his ejection.

All this going on as the homerun hitter was circling the bases!

Great TV!

Something I had never seen before.

There were, however, some things on our telecast that I had heard before.

Excuses.

There is no room for excuses on a live television sporting event.

This is a difficult business and mistakes will be made.

Own up to your mistake.

Don't compound the situation by making an excuse.

I have heard it too many times before.

Appreciation

The time is 3:14 AM and I have arrived at my room in St Petersburg after our three game series in Baltimore.

I can't tell you what a pleasure it was for everyone on the Cardinals TV crew to work in Camden Yards with the great Baltimore crew.

The Orioles TV director was so very accommodating. Before each game of the series he made sure that we were comfortable and we were in a side by side situation and not a dual feed!

All three telecasts were smooth and had great flows to them.

The crew worked hard and were a pleasure to work with.

A great aspect of our business is that we learn something each and every telecast.

I learned that I can be more accommodating to the visiting feeds that come into Busch Stadium.

I really appreciate all that the Baltimore TV crew taught me the past three days.

Thank you!