well, Not a ****ing idiot so don't talk to me like one - it wouldn't take a "7 hour Astros game" to mess up the 7:05 start of the rays/red sox game. for instance: the astros and cubs, on september 2, played an 11-inning, 4-hour and 17-minute game. that was 15 days ago. with a 12:05 start, that would have led to 4 teams trying to use two locker rooms at the same time in that scenario, potentially delaying the start of the other, previously scheduled game. meanwhile, in milwaukee - not an ideal location, sure - you had an empty stadium WITH ZERO COMPLICATIONS. and for the record: i don't think you're an idiot; i've never thought you were an idiot; and i've never shown you or your posts that degree of disrepsect. there's been a sharp division of opinion on this subject. but amid 7-8 pages worth of generally civil dialogue, you're the only one to lose their temper, and it was on, like, your 5th post. and it was in response to a well-reasoned post of mine that tried to explicitly detail why a game in tampa bay on monday wasn't viable. so, no - not an idiot. a dick, on the other hand.....
it's not an option. not only has fox built its entire fall schedule (and tens of millions of dollars) around locked-in postseason and world series dates, but you also have a decent chance of several cities with harsh winters hosting world series games in novemeber - can you imagine chicago and boston trying to play a WS the second or third week of november? it's take until spring.... i realize those things pale next to the events in houston this past weekend, and i'm NOT trying to minimize what happened. but you have to look at this from a strictly baseball-only perspective. and delaying the season is simply not an option. that's why i throw this on drayton mclane's shoulders: you have to be proactive in a situation like this. he was not. i have no idea what was said behind closed doors, but the results bear that out. they should have moved up their thursday game and gotten out of town friday morning. that's FAR more reasonable than scheduling games at stadiums that already had games scheduled.
Sorry I disagree, it's very much an option. You're talking about the lives of living, breathing, human beings here. The decent thing to do is to push the start of the playoffs back a couple days; that's all you need. I doubt that messes with their schedule that much...especially when you consider that the teams going to the WS could very well have open stadiums (Fox may have to shuffle their schedule around if games are postponed). I doubt pushing the playoffs back a few days is gonna make the weather any more harsh than it already would be. Plus, there is precedent for this...Sept 11. You are right about one thing though; MLB is looking at this strictly from a baseball and business perspective; but it shouldn't be.
this is nothing like 9/11; it's one of your teams in one of your markets having 3 games disrupted. you just can't reconfigure your entire set in stone schedule for that. i hate that i have to argue this side; i don't like it one bit. i agree with everyone's sentiments: i wish they could postpone the season and let the astro players have... however long to dig themselves out of ike's rubble. believe me. i live in houston. i went through this, too. but that's simply not viable. from a baseball perspective only (which does not mean i don't appreciate/respect the human perspective), it's simply horribly-timed: to come in the middle of a hot streak, to wipe out three big home games, to send the players on the road in the shadow of its aftermath.... it's just all-around unfortunate. and yet, they're STILL only 3 games back and now chasing two teams in free-fall. the dream is still alive...
hehe.. They would just move it over to a neutral site like NY. I can only imagine what they would say if that happened.
Clearly the two events are not equal...but they are comparable in that they are both disasters that cost large amounts of destruction as well as lives. And while all of baseball was postponed for a few days because of the event (since Sept 11 was more national in scope than Ike), the point is that MLB did do just that...they stopped thinking about money for a second and that's what they should have done here. And as I said, at the very least they could have let the Astros play on Monday at MMP where they could still be close to their families.
Putting aside the Wrigley North deal, the fact that MLB made the Astros travel/play baseball less than 24 hours after a hurricane hit was the most central mistake. It was a cold, unsympathetic, inhumane, money-first decision that may have ultimately cost the Astros, fans of the Astros and the city of Houston a playoff berth. As far as I'm concerned, McLane didn't fight back hard enough, either. He should have publicly chastised Selig and MLB for the decision. I still haven't heard a single significant statement come out of his mouth regarding that whole debacle. Maybe, he's still adding up his gate receipts. At the least (the very least), he could have pushed for a Monday double-header if he wasn't going to firmly protest being forced to travel under those conditions. I am guessing he saw more money to be made at a Sunday night game even if it very well could have cost the Astros a win or two due to fatigue and its carryover effect.
OK...firstly...I HAVE read the entire thread. I have been responding throughout this thread. You might want to fact check just a little before you chastise somebody. Just a thought. Now for some clarity. Anybody who believes that you can make decisions from "a baseball perspective on;y" ignoring the humans that play the game either has their priorities out of whack or is functionally r****ded.
ok, then: read the entire thread more carefully, please. i've stated throughout that no one is dismissing that on a purely human scale, MLB made a mistake; i'm sure selig would admit that as well. anything you say, in defense of baseball, pales next to the human toll. no one is going to shed a tear because fox's fall schedule gets turned upside down, etc. it's ultimately silly. that's why selig was in a no-win situation. because here's a freezing cold fact: hurricane ike didn't impact 29 other organizations; it didn't disrupt fox or tbs' programming; it didn't threaten national security... how do you properly balance that with the human aspect: what's fair? what's right? i didn't personally like the decision but i understood it. i'm guessing selig didn't like it, either but likely felt handcuffed - damned if he did, damned if he didn't. this is truly unprecedented, especially this late in the season when off-days are scarce. i think it's easy to react emotionally - postpone the season! - but that's easier said than done. and the way the astros are playing... i'm not sure ANY amount of time would have been enough. they look spent.
i haven't read this thread, but i'll adopt this post. there has to be a better solution than what was found. there has to be. because what was found means one team is playing 2 more road games than everyone else...and the fact that it was in milawaukee was just nuts.
And I'm calling bulls**t on that. It's this lack for the human element that got MLB into hot water with the fans and media in the first place. You cannot separate that from the baseball side. Tell me how many people went to work on Sunday?...on Monday?. Is it too much to allow the players time to tend to their families and assess the damage to their homes? The NFL was prepared to have the Texans play on Monday and would have had Reliant not been damaged. So why was it ok for the Texans to play in Houston but not the Astros? And when Reliant was no longer an option, did the NFL move them to another stadium so they still play? No, they rearranged the schedule to fit it in later in the season. Now granted, they had more time to work with since the NFL season just began, but the Astros could have easily played a DH Monday in Houston...I wanna know why that wasn't option? But I probably know the answer...money. They could have tacked those games on at the end of the season and it may not have even affected the start of the playoffs (the Astros might have been eliminated by that time or could theoretically have clinched as well). If it did, again, I doubt it would mess with the networks programming all that much, especially considering they'd have to deal with weather postponements anyways. And if you wanna talk strictly about baseball, well what if the Astros and Cubs series was pushed back to the end of the season and it had playoffs implications. You hold it in Houston and Drayton probably gets to bask in the happiness of sellouts...and as for Fox they could probably bank off of it by billing it as some kind of playoff preview.
i did. i worked saturday, too. and every other day this week. the nfl's schedule had infinitely more flexibility. uhm, no - downtown houston was closed until wednesday. and as i said in response to RM95 when he brought this up - even if it wasn't, where were the cubs going to stay and which hotel employees would have had to leave THEIR families to come tend to them? you can't play three games in a single day, which is how the schedule is set-up, nor can you ask a playoff team to play meaningful games before the postseason but long after they've clinched homefield advantage, set their rotation, etc. travel days are how they circumvent weather conditions in the postseason, btw; to my knowledge -other than 2001 and whatever year the earthquake hit SF - they've never bumped the WS schedule. fox wouldn't have had the rights to show it. again, there is one off day before the playoffs start. ONE. and tbs and fox have built their entire fall schedules around playoff dates that were set before the season even started. it's not fair, it IS about money... but you can't just sweep those away as afterthoughts, either.
Round Rock Others have mentioned that as an alternative, why was that not used? If "it's not an MLB stadium" is the only reason, (besides that being a weak excuse) I heard on the radio that regular season games have been played at a spring training facility before. Sounds like a precedent. Maybe I missed how Ric shot that one down. Besides, many Houstonians had evacuated to Austin, so it would have been a real home game.
That and the half-dozen or so NCAA baseball fields around Texas. UT? A&M? Something in San Antonio would have seriously rocked (but I'm biased towards SA).
Well I didn't ask if you were working...I asked how many people were...and I'd say a lot more people were not...I myself was one of them, my wife was another. Same with my brother-in-law. I've already said that because the NFL season just started, that's gonna give them more options to reschedule...but in doing so they did have to move the Cincy game and in turn push their bye week back. The Astros had an off day Monday in which they could have played a double header. They could have then played the last game, if necessary, the day after the season ends. Downtown had power and MMP was not damaged. The game could have occurred there with or without fans. And at least the players get to compete at home and remain close to their families. Both Downtown and the Med Center had power; I'm sure you could find a hotel that was still operating that the players could use. If not the Cubs could fly in on Monday...the Astros were required to fly in on Sunday for a game the same day, and they were probably a lot more fatigued having to deal with Ike in early morning hours than the Cubs who had two days of rest. No one is expecting them to play three games...but a DH is not out of the question with one game at the end of the season. That one game may not even be played, and if it is, the Cubs most likely will have clinched by then and could rest their starters...even if they choose not to I don't see how it would mess with their rotation since whoever pitches in that game wouldn't have been slated to pitch in the 1st playoff game anyways. But they have bumped it so there is precedent. My point was that the networks most likely figure postponements into their scheduling; so whether you use that travel day to make up a rained out game or because the playoffs were pushed back a day, the fact is you have that travel day to do so. Well the Texans and Ravens game was originally scheduled for CBS but when it got moved to Monday it was going to be shown on ESPN 2. To my knowledge ESPN isn't part of the CBS network. I'm sure Fox could do the same. And I seem to recall Sunday Night Football having the luxury of dropping/picking up games later in the season that are less/more important in the playoff picture. Certainly it was a deal worked out with the NFL, but if the networks can work that out in one sport, I'm sure they can do it in others. Whenever they "locked" in their schedule, it's gonna have some flexibility in it, especially when you are talking about sports...especially when you are talking about baseball. And more than likely, new fall episodes will be on hiatus until after the baseball season is over...I could be wrong but that seems to have been the case in the past. Nobody is sweeping those away as afterthoughts. But when you are talking about a life and death event, some things are more important than others. And shame on MLB for putting money first. The players have said that, the fans and the media as well. I guess we'll have to agree to disagree.
Drayton was never going to let the Astros play in an empty stadium. He made a ton more $$$ off of the home games in Milwaukee.
Please enlighten us as to how Drayton McLane made "$$$" off of the home games in Milwaukee. Provide links.
According to Richard Justice, Drayton got the gate like it was a home game at Minute Maid. second blog entry on this page: http://blogs.chron.com/sportsjustice/ With all that said, for the team to blame the Milwaukee trip for their problems is BS. For a team to be this mentally weak. People in Galveston have lost everything and they are b****ing about flying to Milwaukee and playing a game? A move that the owner agreed to? It was unfortunate that it happened like this, but it is unfortuante that most of Houston has no power, it is unfortunate that people in Galveston lost everything, unfortunate that lives were lost. These players need to get a grip and realize they are in a position to lift up many of these people who are truly suffering because of Ike. Instead they seem to be fine with rolling over. I agree with all this in today's column:
