Netflix Is A Joke...

For Opening Day Baseball

There is no amount of Seinfeld reruns I can watch to make me like Netflix right now. That’s because I’ve just sat down to watch the New York Yankees play opening day on something other than the YES Network. There have been many times when the “duh duhhhh” upon opening the Netflix app has given me a jolt of excitement. This time, it sounds like the closing of a jail cell in which I will be stuck for the next three hours.

It would be easy to shit on streaming platforms but I won’t do that because if you just rewound time to 30 or 40 years ago and told people then that, at some point in the future, they could watch any movie or show with the click of a button they would sign up for it in a heartbeat. Take oversaturation out of the equation for a second and just realize we live in the best era for personal entertainment, period. You know what I watched the other day? The African Queen. Would I have ever seen this movie without being able to type in Humphrey Bogart and have a plethora of options in his oeuvre to choose from? Surely not. I would have never gone searching for this movie. I would never have paid for the DVD. And yet, I was able to watch a classic movie easier than making popcorn. We are lucky. Infinitely. And the more streaming platforms the better. To get an entire catalog of movies for the very small price of $10 a month is a privilege. Anyone who says otherwise is a spoiled brat.

But…a big hairy but…

Aren’t movies and television shows enough for these greedy cunts?

I know the nature of business. Growth is good. We all benefit from this growth. But at some point someone has to put their foot down and leave something, ONE thing, just the way it is. If any sport deserves that, it’s baseball. America’s past time. A sport in which change is not only discouraged but actively frowned upon. Just look at the talking head reactions to the Dominican national team. You would think the players were fucking the announcers’ mothers rather than just flipping their bat a little too high and lollygagging around the bases. It took the MLB seven years to implement the ABS (automated ball-strike challenge system). Most people are pumped about the ability to challenge balls and strikes this year but there are still many holding on to the old ways of doing it - trusting a shoddy ump’s eye. At least we’ll never get another Angel Hernandez.

Some sports on streaming services have excelled. For example, football does not lose any of its luster on Amazon Prime or Netflix. That’s because football is a national sport. I could sit down and watch an NFL game with no rooting interest in either team and still enjoy it. But baseball is different. Much different. With 162 games a year, baseball is regional. You watch your team, week in and week out, without watching a single other team play besides highlights. There are enough games with your own team throughout the year that any more baseball isn’t necessary. With that regionality comes comfort. You are comfortable with your announcer, your manager, your team, and YOUR broadcast. It’s a comfort that can hardly be explained. As a Yankee fan, I hear those horns, and the angelic voice of Michael Kay, and I feel like I am at home no matter where I am watching the game from.

Watching this just made me tear up.

I’ve noticed this problem with playoff baseball, but at least I expect that when the Yankees make it to the playoffs, I’ll be listening to the likes of ratfucks like John Smoltz or my archnemesis Bob Costas. But opening day? The first game of the season? The tone setter? Blasphemy. Starting off the season with random announcers (even if one of them is CC Sabathia, a legendary Yankee) is just wrong.

I can remember last year’s opening day against the Brewers like it was yesterday. Game time – 3:05 PM. Leave work - 2:45 PM. Get home. Pour a Ranch Water. Grab a handful of sunflower seeds. Melt into couch like a D.A.R.E. commercial. The windows were open. The sun was out. I put on the YES Network and saw familiar faces I hadn’t seen in five months. Michael Kay. Meredith Marakovits. David Cone. Paul O’Neill. It felt like getting under a nice warm blanket after being left out in the cold. A reminder that better weather was on its way, and I’d get the privilege to watch 161 more Yankee games with my people on the television screen.

Now this year I’ve already stayed up past my bedtime to watch the New York Yankees opening day because they are playing on the West Coast and, what’s even worse than losing my beauty sleep, is my people are nowhere to be found. It’s not freezing outside, yet I feel a chill deep inside my bones. I should be excited, instead I’m depressed. The rest of this post will be me letting my frustrations out, shitting on the Netflix broadcast wherever I see fit. I am sure there will be plenty. I don’t think this will turn into a Sorondo length post but who knows. I mean, how bad can Netflix fuck up a baseball game? I guess we’ll see. Catch you guys on the other side.

Go Yankees…

1 – Watching Bert Kreischer introduce the MLB season is something I should like. I’m a fan of a jolly funny drunk. But fuck man, this is bad. You don’t get pumped up for a baseball game. You get dialed in. You relax. You sip and enjoy. If basketball was a cigarette, baseball is a cigar. No one asked for a WWE style introduction to the season. Unless the benches clear, there will be no brawl during tonight’s 9 innings. This isn’t the type of sport where you “make some noise” for its entirety. Bert yelling in my ear to start the season did not move the needle.

2 – Speaking of basketball, why are we announcing the players as if it were? I don’t need to hear Lean Back by Fat Joe on repeat while 11 players plus the manager get introduced. The music gets old by player three. And those poor people dancing on top of cars for the entire introduction. I mean really? Dancers on cars for the opening of the baseball season? I’d laugh if I wasn’t crying. This is why Netflix, a streaming platform for shows and movies, should not get into sports. This isn’t a “show”. No one cares about all the antics. The sport IS the show.

3 - That seaman can sing his ass off but of all things to skimp on, why skimp on the national anthem singer? You got 30 dancers on top of random vehicles to introduce the players and then a no-name anthem singer? Now I’m just confused.

4 – The pre-game camera work is atrocious. I feel like this kid.

Maybe Netflix thinks that the cinematography for sports is the same as the cinematography for movies, but these spinning cameras are doing nothing but making me seasick. We’re not reshooting 1917 here. Give me the normal, steady camera angles for the love of god.

5 – I’m not shocked that every commercial is for a Netflix show with some beverage ads sprinkled in. Why else would you buy opening day from the MLB for millions of dollars? But nothing beats the YES commercials. Everyone watching their own networks probably has a similar feeling. I miss the random local car dealership commercials, or O O O O Reilly’s Autoparts, or even the random New York personal injury lawyer who you know is into some shady shit but you love him anyway. And wait, they’re remaking Man on Fire into a Netflix television series? Go FUCK yourselves Netflix.

3 – Logan Webb looks like Landry from Friday Night Lights.

4 – I’d rather watch every baseball game on Netflix than Giancarlo Stanton running the bases (I’m shocked he just scored from second for the first run of the Yankees season - I didn’t think that was possible).

5 – Of all the things that Netflix took from the sports networks, the in-game interview should have been last on the list. No matter who the interview is with, it is rarely entertaining. Splitting the screen is bad enough, but hearing a player talk mid game is just not something I’m interested in. And to pick Jazz? Wild move. I know what they were going for here. Let’s get this crazy dude to say some crazy shit we can clip for the socials. Thankfully he didn’t say some crazy shit. He’s a crazy dude, but he’s our crazy dude. He must be protected at all costs.

6 – Bert Kreischer in a kayak in McCovey’s Cove drinking beers even though he’s been ordered not to drink by his cardiologist is funny.

7 – Austin Wells has more swag now – the Dominicans clearly rubbed off on him.

8 – Four innings through and I don’t HATE the announcers. I don’t LIKE the announcers either. But at least I don’t hate them. The majority of non-YES announcers despise the Yankees so you have to tip your cap to Netflix for including an ex-Yankee to balance it out. CC Sabathia started off a little shaky, but he has settled in and I could see him being a long term voice over baseball games (if he doesn’t end up as the Yankees manager one day).

9 – Netflix missed the first ever ABS challenge. Your only job was to film this historic moment, and you failed your job. Incredible.

10 – The fact that I have my laptop open, writing this, instead of just relaxing and watching the game is annoying the hell out of me. I blame Netflix. If this game were on YES as God intended, I wouldn’t be performing this masochistic exercise. I hate myself. I hate Netflix.

11 – How much did Hal Steinbrenner get paid to let this game go to Netflix? With the lack of moves made this offseason and all of Hal’s talk about the Yankees being a business first and foremost, you would think the extra couple mil in cash could have went to some free agents. Hal…us Yankees fans are done with just making the playoffs. The Yankees brand is all about winning. If they don’t win championships, it’s bad for business. Worse than not balancing the books. If the Yankees don’t win the World Series the value of the Yankees decreases. It’s as simple as that.

12 - Barry Bonds is the Mike Tyson of baseball. Mainly because of his voice. And holy shit did he just drop a bomb…George Steinbrenner called Barry Bonds, tried giving him the biggest contract in history only if he signed by 2 PM that day, and Barry hung up the phone. This little nugget just made the entire broadcast ALMOST worth it. Barry would’ve probably doubled his home run count in Yankee Stadium. Damn I miss George.

13 - The Yankees are up 7-0 with no homeruns. If they do hit a homerun and I hear something other than a Michael Kay “See ya!” I’ll probably crawl into a fetal position and die.

14 - Jameis Winston has taken this broadcast from an F to a D-. This man is pure entertainment. Any time he is on any screen I put down all distractions and listen in. Touchdowns and picks all over the place.

14 - Thank you to the New York Yankees for showing they can score without hitting homeruns AND not making me crawl into a fetal position and dying. 11 PM is WAY past my bed time. Goodnight.

15 - Netflix is a fucking joke.

P.S. - After the game I went upstairs and fell asleep to the sweet sounds of…an episode of Seinfeld.