6 ms·

Very well written article in that even for someone with zero knowledge of baseball I could follow along and be interested

by A_Duck 3y ago

moate 3y ago
As someone who is extremely tuned into the sport and is also very familiar with the discussions around “why isn’t baseball fun to watch” this makes a lot of assumptions (namely what will or won’t cause humans from the world population to become either interested or disinterested in the sport) that might not be true. It could be that “the type of baseball being played now isn’t as popular” it could be “the sport of baseball isn’t as popular with today’s demographics” or simply “other sports have eaten baseball’s lunch” but as the stat nerds love to say, we have no idea if there is correlation or causation between team play optimization and decreased viewership/attendance across the league. Lots of sloppy, but visually interesting play may or may not bring in more fans than three true outcome optimization but there’s no way to isolate that factor from all the other noise of general cultural interest. Maybe there was nothing MLB could do, and humans today just don’t like baseball as much, the same way American kids today are more inclined to play a video game than with a hoop and stick.
- Gordonjcp 3y ago
  I've no idea about baseball - it doesn't exist outside the US - but the article seems to boil down to "minmaxing all your character stats makes for hella OP players and boring as fuck gameplay". Does that pretty much narrow it down?
  - didgeoridoo 3y ago
    > it doesn't exist outside the US It is utterly massive in Japan, South Korea, Venezuela, Cuba, and the Dominican Republic. It is literally the national sport of Taiwan, and is so popular they put it on their currency. In terms of percentage of population that cares about baseball, the US is barely middle of the pack.
    - Pigalowda 3y ago
      You forgot Canada (23 active MLB players) and the Jays! Also there’s plenty of Mexican (33) born MLB players and a professional Mexican league. Anyways I don’t know why that guy was so dismissive of baseball, I don’t care about baseball at all but this stuff is pretty common knowledge. Sounds like he plays a lot of video games.
      - Gordonjcp 3y ago
        Zero interest in video games. Sounds like baseball is a thing in the US, and countries that the US had a large military presence in, then?
        Pigalowda 3y ago
        And clearly zero interest in challenging your bias. Just let it go, you were wrong. Jesus Christ, I don't even like baseball.
        didgeoridoo 3y ago
        Exactly, hence the famous German, Afghan, and Iraqi baseball teams.
        deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
        dghlsakjg 3y ago
        Don't forget the famous US occupation of Manitoba, Alberta and BC.
        jghn 3y ago
        Baseball found its way to Asia long, long, long before any US military presence. It first showed up in Japan during the Meiji Restoration. Good grief.
  - dghlsakjg 3y ago
    The same is said about soccer, and it comes down to not understanding the subtleties. A 0-0 soccer game that goes to penalties can be very interesting if you know what you are watching in the same way that any baseball game can be interesting. I think the problem is that most sports announcers, and especially baseball talk on the level of the superfans that understand all of the subtlety, instead of explaining what is going on to the casual viewer.
    - Gordonjcp 3y ago
      Zero interest in football. Can't understand how anyone can watch it.
      - dghlsakjg 3y ago
        You have no interest or knowledge in baseball or soccer or video games, yet you comment in bad faith on in depth conversations about them. Please disclose your lack of knowledge or interest in the topic at the start so that people can avoid taking your opinion in good faith.
        Gordonjcp 3y ago
        Did you read the second part of the sentence, after the bit where I said that I had never really heard of baseball? When you comment on something, it's important to read all the words. If you find that difficult, get someone to help you with the tricky ones.
- nobody9999 3y ago
  >It could be that “the type of baseball being played now isn’t as popular” it could be “the sport of baseball isn’t as popular with today’s demographics” or simply “other sports have eaten baseball’s lunch” but as the stat nerds love to say, we have no idea Given that more than 40,000,000 people attended an MLB game in person[0] last season and millions more attended minor league[1] games (not to mention the independent leagues), I think reports of baseball's imminent doom are greatly exaggerated. It is true that TV viewership of MLB games has dropped significantly[2], but that's more a function of cord cutting rather than lack of interest, IMHO. And there are big problems[3] with broadcasting/streaming MLB games. There is MLB.tv, but most teams force MLB.tv to black out games played by area, (e.g. NY Yankee games are unavailable on that streaming service in the NY Metro area, etc.), as they get most of their revenue from media deals and that cuts into the teams' profits. In fact, I've resisted cutting the cord (and it pisses me off to no end!) because I can't even pay to see my team on a streaming service. 130 (of 162 per season) of their games are only on local cable in my area. I'd happily pay $200 a season to stream all my team's games -- and end up saving money by cutting the cord. [0] https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/majors/2022-misc.shtml https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/majors/2022-misc.... [1] https://www.milb.com/ https://www.milb.com/ [2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/maurybrown/2021/08/06/mlb-seeing-local-tv-households-decline-dramatically-compared-to-last-full-season/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/maurybrown/2021/08/06/mlb-seein... [3] https://theathletic.com/4409306/2023/04/14/mlb-streaming-tv-blackouts/ https://theathletic.com/4409306/2023/04/14/mlb-streaming-tv-... Edit: Fixed prose to actually make sense.

Very well written article in that even for someone with zero knowledge of baseball I could follow along and be interested

by A_Duck 3y ago

Very well written article in that even for someone with zero knowledge of baseball I could follow along and be interested

moate 3y ago

As someone who is extremely tuned into the sport and is also very familiar with the discussions around “why isn’t baseball fun to watch” this makes a lot of assumptions (namely what will or won’t cause humans from the world population to become either interested or disinterested in the sport) that might not be true. It could be that “the type of baseball being played now isn’t as popular” it could be “the sport of baseball isn’t as popular with today’s demographics” or simply “other sports have eaten baseball’s lunch” but as the stat nerds love to say, we have no idea if there is correlation or causation between team play optimization and decreased viewership/attendance across the league. Lots of sloppy, but visually interesting play may or may not bring in more fans than three true outcome optimization but there’s no way to isolate that factor from all the other noise of general cultural interest. Maybe there was nothing MLB could do, and humans today just don’t like baseball as much, the same way American kids today are more inclined to play a video game than with a hoop and stick.

Gordonjcp 3y ago
I've no idea about baseball - it doesn't exist outside the US - but the article seems to boil down to "minmaxing all your character stats makes for hella OP players and boring as fuck gameplay". Does that pretty much narrow it down?
- didgeoridoo 3y ago
  > it doesn't exist outside the US It is utterly massive in Japan, South Korea, Venezuela, Cuba, and the Dominican Republic. It is literally the national sport of Taiwan, and is so popular they put it on their currency. In terms of percentage of population that cares about baseball, the US is barely middle of the pack.
  - Pigalowda 3y ago
    You forgot Canada (23 active MLB players) and the Jays! Also there’s plenty of Mexican (33) born MLB players and a professional Mexican league. Anyways I don’t know why that guy was so dismissive of baseball, I don’t care about baseball at all but this stuff is pretty common knowledge. Sounds like he plays a lot of video games.
    - Gordonjcp 3y ago
      Zero interest in video games. Sounds like baseball is a thing in the US, and countries that the US had a large military presence in, then?
      - Pigalowda 3y ago
        And clearly zero interest in challenging your bias. Just let it go, you were wrong. Jesus Christ, I don't even like baseball.
      - didgeoridoo 3y ago
        Exactly, hence the famous German, Afghan, and Iraqi baseball teams.
        deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
        dghlsakjg 3y ago
        Don't forget the famous US occupation of Manitoba, Alberta and BC.
      - jghn 3y ago
        Baseball found its way to Asia long, long, long before any US military presence. It first showed up in Japan during the Meiji Restoration. Good grief.
- dghlsakjg 3y ago
  The same is said about soccer, and it comes down to not understanding the subtleties. A 0-0 soccer game that goes to penalties can be very interesting if you know what you are watching in the same way that any baseball game can be interesting. I think the problem is that most sports announcers, and especially baseball talk on the level of the superfans that understand all of the subtlety, instead of explaining what is going on to the casual viewer.
  - Gordonjcp 3y ago
    Zero interest in football. Can't understand how anyone can watch it.
    - dghlsakjg 3y ago
      You have no interest or knowledge in baseball or soccer or video games, yet you comment in bad faith on in depth conversations about them. Please disclose your lack of knowledge or interest in the topic at the start so that people can avoid taking your opinion in good faith.
      - Gordonjcp 3y ago
        Did you read the second part of the sentence, after the bit where I said that I had never really heard of baseball? When you comment on something, it's important to read all the words. If you find that difficult, get someone to help you with the tricky ones.
nobody9999 3y ago
>It could be that “the type of baseball being played now isn’t as popular” it could be “the sport of baseball isn’t as popular with today’s demographics” or simply “other sports have eaten baseball’s lunch” but as the stat nerds love to say, we have no idea Given that more than 40,000,000 people attended an MLB game in person[0] last season and millions more attended minor league[1] games (not to mention the independent leagues), I think reports of baseball's imminent doom are greatly exaggerated. It is true that TV viewership of MLB games has dropped significantly[2], but that's more a function of cord cutting rather than lack of interest, IMHO. And there are big problems[3] with broadcasting/streaming MLB games. There is MLB.tv, but most teams force MLB.tv to black out games played by area, (e.g. NY Yankee games are unavailable on that streaming service in the NY Metro area, etc.), as they get most of their revenue from media deals and that cuts into the teams' profits. In fact, I've resisted cutting the cord (and it pisses me off to no end!) because I can't even pay to see my team on a streaming service. 130 (of 162 per season) of their games are only on local cable in my area. I'd happily pay $200 a season to stream all my team's games -- and end up saving money by cutting the cord. [0] https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/majors/2022-misc.shtml https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/majors/2022-misc.... [1] https://www.milb.com/ https://www.milb.com/ [2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/maurybrown/2021/08/06/mlb-seeing-local-tv-households-decline-dramatically-compared-to-last-full-season/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/maurybrown/2021/08/06/mlb-seein... [3] https://theathletic.com/4409306/2023/04/14/mlb-streaming-tv-blackouts/ https://theathletic.com/4409306/2023/04/14/mlb-streaming-tv-... Edit: Fixed prose to actually make sense.