The “National Pastime” may become a thing of the past on radio. The news this week out of Oakland that the A’s will not be on local radio this season has started speculation about a possible divorce between radio and baseball.
The Oakland A’s announced that the games will be available via streaming during the 2020 season. An article in The Washington Post says the move is more likely to lose fans than gain new ones. A’s President Dave Kaval told the Mercury News that “the team’s primary motivation for this endeavor is around fan development, marketing, and really understanding how that can acquire new fans.”
Maybe it’s time to move the franchise back to Philadelphia?
Hey Gil Gross: Great observation about the REALITY of the situation. It’s all about ratings and revenues. I recently did a lecture that spawned class discussion about the media increase of what we label “fake news”, and how it often innocently gets started and then grows. Perhaps this is an excellent example? In Canada, the “dropping” of hockey play-by-play broadcasts has happened many, many, many times over the years in various markets large and small due to lower ratings, and therefore insufficient advertising revenues, all associated with poor team seasons. But when the team starts winning … voila … they’re back on-the-air.
The A’s have been a very good team the last few years.
The headline and the Washington Post article miss the point. The A’s ratings are so lousy no station in the Bay Area wanted them. This wasn’t a choice. The A’s are still on the radio elsewhere in Northern California, but there wasn’t a single stick in their ADI that wanted any part of them.