When Baseball Commissioner Fay Vincent had to decide if and when to resume the World Series amid the aftermath of the Loma Prieta earthquake, a lot of folks whispered: Well, what’s best for television?
In the cynical, big-moneyed worlds of professional sports and network TV, it seemed a logical question.
But in the sensitized aftermath of the Bay Area disaster, Major League Baseball and ABC say that, for once, television’s needs not only were superseded by other factors, they were not even considered.
ABC, in the final stages of its six-year, $575 million contract with baseball, has been clobbered financially by the agreement. The World Series— with its ratings power and revenue boon— is easily the biggest benefit of the contract to ABC. Despite recording the lowest ratings ever for prime-time World Series telecasts in Games 1 and 2 last weekend, the numbers were still strong enough to allow ABC to end NBC’s 68-week winning streak in the prime-time race. ABC is charging about $300,000 per 30-second commercial in the Series, meaning the 50 to 55 spots per game that are sold out result in $15 million advertising revenue. And ABC’s prime-time strategy for the entire season is designed around the World Series to promote the network’s entertainment lineup.
So if Vincent had decided to scratch the rest of the Series—a viable alternative—the impact on ABC would have been considerable.
But ABC, we are being told, just sat back and waited on the commissioner.
Bryan Burns, Major League Baseball’s senior vice president for broadcasting, said several factors determined Vincent’s decision. “First of all, the structural integrity of Candlestick Park and what we had to do to make sure the building could be repaired,” Burns said. “A second consideration was the ability of the San Francisco police department to handle a game of this type when they had more pressing matters at hand…. The third factor was the emotional nature of the community—when is it the right thing to play the World Series again in this community? We want to wait and see this community recover psychologically first.”
Burns was sitting with ABC Sports President Dennis Swanson at Candlestick Park Tuesday night when the earthquake hit. “As time progressed that night,” Burns said, “he came to see both me and the commissioner on the field. He took the initiative to say, ‘Don’t worry about us. Do what you have to do.’ He gave us comfort that we didn’t have to worry about that [TV] situation at that moment.”
Then Wednesday Vincent met with all the principals to decide the fate of the Series.
“Dennis came to that meeting and basically told the group, ‘Whatever you do is fine with us,’” Burns said. “There was never any question that ABC would do whatever we wanted to do. They were marvelous in the whole process.”
“Whatever was best for baseball, we would abide by,” said ABC Sports spokesman Bob Wheeler. “That’s exactly the way we felt.”
Swanson was upset Wednesday when a reporter suggested to Vincent that ABC wanted the World Series to resume quickly.
“We think the safety of the citizens of the Bay Area should come first,” Swanson told USA Today…. There are much greater problems here than rescheduling of games. Other than Monday night, when we have a [Bears-Browns] football game, any playing date would be okay with us.”
Avoiding conflict with ABC’s “Monday Night Football,” apparently was ABC’s only request of Vincent. Even then, Burns said, “television—it wasn’t even discussed” in the meeting to decide how to revise the Series schedule. Then again, the Monday night factor could be left unsaid without being left unconsidered.
With ABC contractually committed Monday night to the NFL, a Monday World Series game would’ve had to have been played in the afternoon. That would result in a decreased audience for baseball’s showcase and possible advertiser problems for ABC. As well, in many people’s minds Monday may seem too soon to restart the Series. And by resuming on Tuesday, baseball returns to its exact schedule of a week earlier, with three games in San Francisco, Friday as an off day and back to Oakland Saturday and Sunday for Games 6 and 7, if needed.
ABC, thus, seemingly made a wise choice in staying on the sidelines at a sensitive time. For once TV did not appear to be the tail wagging the dog.
