I could have made my first blog post about a variety of topics: Tampa Bay possibly splitting time with Montreal, the catastrophe that is the New York Mets, or even the new All-Star selection process. Don't you worry, I will get to these topics in the next couple of days. But for the first post of this blog, I have chosen a topic that has really bothered me for several years now: the loss of regular season games to overseas venues.
This weekend, the legendary rivalry between the Boston Red Sox and the New York Yankees is renewed. This brief two game series isn't being played at Fenway Park in Boston, or in Yankee Stadium in the Bronx. No. This series is being played in what is now called London Stadium, you may know it as Olympic Stadium, the site of the 2012 Olympics.
Let me start by saying that I am all for Major League Baseball expanding the following of such a great game. However, I am not a fan of doing it at the expense of regular season games being played somewhere other than the home ballparks.
Now that we have that disclaimer out of the way, buckle your seat belts because I'm taking you on a ride.
When Major League Baseball announced that there were going to be games played in London, I was all for it. I love them expanding the game that I have loved since I was 8 years old. When they announced the first two teams to play in London were the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees, I thought that was a great move because it is one of the best rivalries in all of sports and they want to put it on display. When I found out that the games were going to be played in June and they were taking two regular season home games from Boston, that was where I drew the line. Then in February, it was announced while Boston will be the home team for both games, MLB has said the Yankees will wear their iconic, pinstripe home uniforms for both games. At this point is when I lost my mind.
Both teams wearing home uniforms? How freaking stupid can you be? You want to put the Yankee pinstripes on display for the Brits? That is fine, but then make them the home team in one of the games! Not even in soccer do you have both teams wearing all white uniforms! Do they have any idea how stupid this will look?
If that doesn't turn your stomach, a picture of the London Stadium field was released yesterday:
I'm sure your eyes went straight to the same place mine did, the size of foul territory. That is bigger than the foul territory at RingCentral Coliseum (or as I still call it the Oakland Coliseum), which is the last of the dual purpose (baseball and football) stadiums left in Major League Baseball. Basically, what is happened is any pop foul will now become an out.
This doesn’t have the look and probably won’t have the feel of not only a Yankees/Red Sox game, but it won’t have the feel of a baseball game.
Let’s move on to the real problem I have with this whole thing: the fact Major League Baseball is taking two home games away from Fenway Park. Not only is it two regular season games, but it is two home games against the hated New York Yankees!
This series is not the first time this season Major League Baseball has put regular season games not only on neutral sites, but out of the country! The Oakland Athletics and Seattle Mariners opened the season not only in Tokyo, Japan, but while the rest of the teams were two weeks away from opening the season. Then, the St. Louis Cardinals and Cincinnati Reds played two games in Monterrey, Mexico in April. The very next month, the Los Angeles Angels and Houston Astros played two more games in Monterrey.
If these were spring training games, I would have no problem with them playing the games at these sites, but these are regular season games. Games that mean something to each team. Games that can decide whether a team does or does not make the playoffs.
If you are wondering, yes I am not a fan of the game the Detroit Tigers and the Kansas City Royals played in Omaha, Nebraska to kick off the start of the College World Series. The only game I have been ok with not being played at the home ballparks has been the game played in Williamsport, Pennsylvania to coincide with the Little League World Series. This game, while it does take a home game away from a team, does provide a reward for the kids, who might not ever get the opportunity to see an MLB game.
If Major League Baseball wants to grow the game of baseball, they need to look no further than their own backyard. They need to do more about the kids in the United States and Canada wanting to play the game, rather than playing games in Japan, Mexico and England just for the sake of ratings.
