For baseball fans, next week should be an exciting time with the Major League Baseball playoffs starting on October 3rd. MLBbro.com is in the final planning stages to cover what should be a fast and furious sprint from 12 teams representing the American League and National League to win a World Series championship.
But according to ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith, despite the network that he works for having exclusive rights to the Wild Card Rounds, baseball will not be a top priority on his show First Take. With NFL football dominating the sports headlines (Anyone heard about Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce lately?) along with MLBbro icon, Deion Sanders coaching the Colorado Buffaloes to must see TV college football, Smith says based on the ratings, no one cares…
But what is getting lost in all of the ratings debates and Stephen A. Smith’s take on baseball is MLB’s commitment to bring diversity to the game with a concentration on African Americans. One of the things done that is evident of that is the partnership MLB has with this website MLBbro.com founded by Rob Parker who laid out the plans in the mission statement for this movement back in April of 2021…
“MLBbro.com will cover Black and brown Major Leaguers. We will chronicle the paths of both present and past Black players, highlight their achievements in the game right now and from a historical standpoint.
We will give Black players a voice and put a context to their presence in the game. In the process, we will display the culture and flair Black players bring to the table.
If done right, MLBbro.com will reinvigorate the interest of baseball to the Black community, reconnect a sport that is deep-rooted in our culture.
Best of all, MLBbro.com will also nurture and develop the next generation of Black writers.”
Plus this is not the first time Smith has spoken out recklessly when it comes to baseball. There were the Shohei Ohtani comments that received backlash…
But Is Smith Correct About the Ratings By the Numbers?
So now that it is established that there are some out in the sports world that care deeply for the game of baseball, the next thing to look at is the numbers of viewers this season according to Sports Business Journal…
ESPN averaged 1.45 million viewers for Sunday Night Baseball which is on pace from last season.
These ratings include ESPN2’s KayRod Cast shows starring Alex Rodriguez and Michael Kay. With a 30 percent decline and an average of 138,000 viewers, the KayRod cast ends this year.
On the surge of the start of the season which was as high as 41 percent, TBS had a drop significantly as of late to finish at four percent. At the peak TBS averaged 338,000 viewers.
Fox/FS1’s numbers were mixed due to low individual numbers of games but with an increase of more games broadcasted, viewership numbers increased. FS1 had record lows (278,000) while Fox dropped 10 percent with an average of 1,89 million viewers.
The Reality of What’s Happening With Television Ratings
Nationally Known Teams Aren’t That Good:
No matter how fun the game has been overall, nationally certain teams have to perform well for the type of ratings Stephen A. Smith is talking about. The St. Louis Cardinals had a down year, the New York teams (Anyone forget Smith is a Yankees fan?) dove off a cliff after the All-Star break. Don’t forget the Boston Red Sox have been on a slow decline since MLBbro superstar Mookie Betts left for the West Coast Dodgers. Traditional teams like these count ratings wise no matter what the sport with the majority of the fanbase.
Major League Baseball Has Been Besieged With Blackouts Of Games:
One of the biggest problems on MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred’s to-do list is ending blackouts. The words used concerning this problem were “top priority”, “massive undertaking” and “fundamental reordering” when it pertained to media rights in baseball.
“I believe that one of the fundamental goals that we have as the media landscape is reworked is that whatever exclusivity we give to a particular cable provider, we oughta have the ability to go side-by-side with a digital product so that people are not blacked out,” Manfred said. “That is business objective number one at Major League Baseball right now.”
“The reason it has taken a long time to get at this blackout issue is that when clubs make long-term RSN (Regional Sports Networks) agreements, they historically grant exclusivity that covers both sides of the house to that cable provider. If that cable provider doesn’t get distribution in a particular area, you have a blackout right? And that’s beyond our control.”
For next week, blackouts won’t be as big of an issue to fans during the Wild Card Rounds unless ESPN is not a part of the TV package. But Stephen A. Smith is wrong about fans not caring based on TV ratings.
The Cincinnati Reds put out a tweet this week looking back to May 1, 2001, when Deion Sanders returned to baseball after a three-year absence. It didn’t take long for me to notice and put in my two cents’ worth.
Prime Time was special ⚾️⚾️ We need more of these type of athletes in MLB https://t.co/bIFXq1ENJt
What a day he had too. On this day alone, just look at what he accomplished…
Sanders drove a pitch into center field for a single.
Then he turned on a pitch and knocked a three-run homer over the right field wall extending the Reds lead to 5-1.
Then he fooled the Dodgers with a sneak bunt for a single. What was amazing was the fact that he was basically on the bag before the second baseman could field the ball.
After he got on base, he stole third base standing up! The catcher did not even raise up to make a throw.
You want iconic?
Deion Sanders would spend a month in the minor leagues with no guarantees from the organization that he would be called up to the parent club. The thing is, no matter if you are a sports icon or an unknown, a batting average of .460 in a minor league stint will get anyone into the major leagues.
Overall, Deion Sanders, aka “Primetime,” was one of the most unique MLBbro icons ever to play the game of baseball. He was one of the few in the history of sports to officially be on the field to play football and baseball on the same day! To put this honor in perspective, Deion played three games (Two baseball, and one football) in 24 hours in 1992.
In that time, on September 5, 1992, Sanders became the first professional athlete to score a touchdown in the NFL and a home run in an MLB game.
Want to talk about a World Series performance? Sanders left planet Earth hitting .533 with eight hits, four runs and an RBI in four games. If the Braves would have won, this man would have been a landslide World Series MVP.
Over Primetime’s career, he hit .263 with 39 homers and 168 RBI. But it’s not the stats that he brought to the Braves, San Francisco Giants, Cincinnati Reds and Yankees. He brought interest to the casual baseball fan, something that baseball is sorely lacking today.
With Shohei Ohtani being celebrated as the “Unicorn” of Major League Baseball being able to dominate not only the mound as a pitcher but at the plate as a hitter, why hasn’t the same love and adulation gone to the three players who have played two sports simultaneously, including baseball? Deion Sanders is one of them, who’s the other?
Bo Jackson
Like Deion Sanders, football will always be the legacy that Jackson is attached to because of the superhuman efforts on the field. But while at Auburn, Bo played the game of football and baseball at absurd levels. Then when he turned pro, the world began to understand that BO KNOWS the game of football and baseball…
The game of baseball owes a debt of gratitude to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers for getting the services of Bo before the NFL. When the Buccaneers called Jackson’s bluff of foregoing the NFL for baseball and drafted him in 1986, Bo was off to play with the Kansas City Royals.
His first at bat ended up as a home run off Hall of Fame pitcher, Steve Carlton. His combination of speed and power was never seen before…or since. Even his frustrations with strikeouts were a sight to behold. How many YouTube video clips can you find Bo breaking a bat over his head? Just insane.
While being known as a powerful hitter, his outfield antics were just as amazing. Plus…that arm!
If you look at the video, his first throw, nailing fellow MLBbro Harold Reynolds at the plate basically shut the game down for 10-15 minutes (Think about how long it would have been today with instant replay!). The second throw was when Bo was with the Chicago White Sox after having hip replacement surgery.
Like Deion, Bo Jackson’s stats aren’t mind-blowing, with a batting average of .250 with 141 homers and 415 RBI, but rather his ability to make plays that no one at that time or even today could make. Even the game Deion and Bo Jackson played together in 1990 was a memory!
Mental Toughness Defines Bo Jackson & Deion Sanders
What made it amazing for these two MLBbro icons playing two sports at the same time was the mindset. To deal with the physical aspect is one thing. But the mental and disciplinary aspect is another. Sanders even admitted on the Club Shay Shay podcast that baseball was much more difficult.
“That ball does some things to you,” Sanders said when asked which sport was harder at the professional level. “Any sport that you can fail seven out of ten times and become great and make $200-300 million it, that’s a hard sport.”
“I love challenges and I could not master it. And it frustrated me because I hate to lose and I hate I’m not mastering something that I know, if I just had more time I could,” Sanders added.
We always discuss Bo and Deion as the premiere two-sport athletes in history, but there’s a third athlete who also played two pro sports and was an All-Star in both.
Brian Jordan
The former NFL and MLB player has become the forgotten two-sport star:
Jordan was drafted by the St. Louis Cardinals in the first round of the 1988 MLB draft out of the University of Richmond. He made his MLB debut on April 8, 1992
Jordan played lasted 15 seasons in the big leagues, playing for four different teams. His first seven years were with the Cardinals and the next five were with the Atlanta Braves. In 1998, his last season in St. Louis, he was elite, hitting a career-high .316 and scoring 100 runs and a career-high with 25 home runs. After signing a $21M deal with the Braves. Jordan Bro bombed 23 times and drove in a career-high 115 runs. He was named a National League All-Star in 1999.
For his career, Jordan hit .282, smacked 184 homers, and drove in 821 runs. While Brian Jordan was in the minor leagues, he was selected by the Buffalo Bills in the seventh round of the 1989 NFL draft, before catching on with the Atlanta Falcons and played professional football while he was also playing minor league baseball for the Cardinals.
In 36 NFL games, spanning three seasons, Jordan finished with five interceptions and recovered four fumbles. He played all 16 games for the Falcons in the 90 and 91 season. Jordan actually played just two fewer NFL games than Jackson, yet Jackson gets more notoriety. In 1991, Jordan was named an alternate for the Pro Bowl.
Brian Jordan Against Specialization
Jordan is another former two-sport star who is against today’s specialization of athletes at a young age.
“Personally I don’t like it, I think it limits a kid’s options and to me, that’s the most important thing,” he said. “You’re taking an athlete’s abilities away from them, I feel like if you play different sports, you become a better athlete. You could have a kid with great potential and all the ability in the world, and you limit him? I’m totally against it.
“Everyone asks me the question, will we see another two-sport professional athlete, and my answer is no: simply because of coaches not allowing these kids to grow up and have fun and utilize all their options and abilities.”
That athleticism that Jordan speaks of is hard to find in today’s MLB. there are some uber-athletic guys in the league, but none of the iconic ilk of the aforementioned two-sport legends.
As Colorado Football’s first Spring game of the Coach Prime Era approaches and MLB season gets underway, let’s not forget about Deion Sanders AKA Primetime — the only player in history to play in an NFL and MLB playoff game in a span of 24 hours.
MLBbro.com’s Mark Gray set off the baseball season with a quick conversation with Deion Sanders AKA Coach Prime, who was preparing for an historic season as head coach of the Jackson State Football Team. Jackson State went 11-1 and won the school’s first SWAC title since 2007. Sanders also led them to the Celebration Bowl for the first time in school history, where the Tigers will meet MEAC Champ South Carolina State on Dec. 18, 2021.
In his prime, Deion was one of the greatest two-way athletes in sports history, simultaneously starring for the Atlanta Braves and Atlanta Falcons at one point. Mark Gray asked the NFL Hall of Famer some Black baseball questions.
Rob Parker reminisces on the time when Deion Sanders was making an impact on the MLB playoffs — slapping hits in the gap and swiping bases — and locking down receivers and running back TDs on an NFL field. Prime was truly something special.
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