More information please
With the baseball playoffs upon us, I was chatting with my friend Chris and he is beyond angry at the stupidity of baseball announcers. What they pass off as wisdom leaves a lot to be desired. Not only do they rely on clichés, but they basically lie. “That pitch was high and inside” (actually, it was low and outside) or “
And the onscreen graphics aren’t making up for them. Being able to see the game in the first place is fantastic, but beyond that, there’s really not much being offered in the way of information. The broadcast is so devoid of intelligent analysis that I find that I watch the game with my laptop pointed to ESPN or Baseball Reference for my statistics needs. For commentary I rely on a site like Baseball Primer. Of course, you have a bunch of idiots there too, but at least you sometimes get something valuable.
It seems like the real opportunity is onscreen information design. A great first step was showing the status of the game at the times. Every broadcast of baseball now shows the score, runners on base, number of outs, inning, count, and the speed of the last pitch, all on the top of each screen. Some are better than others (Fox’s is best), but at least the information is there. Unfortunately, it means that where the old announcers had to relay that information to you, now that don’t, so instead of dead air they instead spout nonsense. Oh well, such is the price of progress.
Getting status is great, but what we really need is insight.
For instance, Chris pointed me to a bit of analysis about the Red Sox/Yankees series (go Yanks!) and wanted this level of insight from the broadcasters. I don’t see that happening anytime soon, broadcasters being what they are. I want this information onscreen, so I can get my own insight. Let the broadcasters continue to tell their “jokes”, my TV will be on mute.
The real advance is when top-notch information design, like this example from the Boston Globe, can be incorporated into broadcasts. Actually, as a first step, I’d be thrilled with this level of information design in newspapers and on ESPN.com. For a sport absolutely drowning in statistics and numbers, no one presents them well.
Of course, long term, being able to interact with the broadcast itself will be even better. For example, mute the broadcasters, listen to the crowd, and be able to selectively call up information for the current batter. For example, how has he hit on the road? What is the scouting report on him? Has he faced this pitcher?
But you have to walk before you can run. Announcers? Shut up.
