FanHouse DickStockton

I had the displeasure of attending last night's game between the Cubs and Dodgers. I'd like to thank everyone who played for the Cubs last night other than Mark DeRosa -- and this girl with the awesome shirt -- for not showing up. I've heard from several people today that Dick Stockton -- Fornelli's favorite announcer -- kept proclaiming that the crowd was dead. We stood and cheered at several big moments, only to see a walk or inning-ending double play (thank you 6-4-3 Lee). When the pitcher can't throw a freaking strike, it's sorta difficult to stay loud the entire time. Fans are funny like that.

Anyway, I'm bound to my fandom, and that is why I'm still on board with my Cubs in four games prediction. Carlos Zambrano is going to pitch like an ace tonight, and the offense will show up. Consider Game 1 a wake-up call in which the team played with significant rust.

The one thing I will not tolerate is more piling on the fans. It's pathetic and lazy. Fans had nothing to do with that team not showing up last night, and every person in my section was paying attention to the game. People on talk radio today spewing crap about how Cubs fans don't care need to get a life. It's a farce, and on behalf of my entire extended family, I'm offended. We care. Quit overgeneralizing and come up with an original thought for once.

I've included more pictures from the atmosphere after the jump.

Okay, so I've spent a lot of time over the last two days watching playoff baseball on TBS, and while there are plenty of things I'm not too thrilled about with their coverage, for the most part it hasn't been half bad. The studio show with Ernie Johnson, Dennis Eckersley, and Cal Ripken is a bit unwatchable at times, but they're still getting the feel for each other, so there's a chance for it to get better.

A quick fix would be to replace Ripken with Charles Barkley, but I'm pretty sure that it would be impossible to get him away from whichever golf course/craps table he's frequenting at the moment. So I guess I'll just have to deal with Ripken and cross my fingers he gets better. The one thing I know I can't take much more of, though, is Mr. Dick Stockton.

How does this man continue to get work with networks? The man butchers names on a regular basis, and half the time I'm not even sure he knows where he is. Dick was working the Cubs and Dodgers game on Wednesday, and before the first pitch was even thrown he'd already made two mistakes.

When describing how historic a matchup it was to have the Dodgers and Cubs playing a postseason series, he said "to say this is a big series would be an understudy." I think he meant to say understatement, but with Dick Stockton, who knows for sure? Maybe he really meant that it would be a great series that TBS can move to the primetime slot when they don't have a Red Sox/Angels game to show.

A minute later he referred to Cubs starting pitcher Ryan Dempster as Bryan Dempster. It's a tiny mistake, I know, but it's the kind of error Stockton makes on a regular basis. If TBS wants to make their baseball coverage better, the first move they should make is finding a replacment for Stockton.

FOX Sports is doing something different for their broadcast of the New Orleans Saints-Washington Redskins game.

They are debuting "team oriented analysts". Dick Stockton will be doing the normal play-by-play. However, Brian Billick will be in the booth giving analysis from the Saints point of view ... while Brian Baldinger will be doing so for the Redskins.

The two will be breaking down the teams' play, what their goals should be and coaching moves that should make.

It should be interesting because (a) how will it come off with these analysts breaking down just one side of the coin, (b) air time for both guys to get this done, (c) keep the play-by-play flowing and (d) how Billick, a novice at this, will hold up against the much more experienced Baldinger.

We will update how successful this experiment has been as the game goes along.

UPDATE: Well, so far, so nothing. It was kinda rough in the beginning since all three were, at times, talking over each other. Now, they've seemed to have scrapped the idea as Billick has been doing a lot more Redskins stuff than he should under the rules.

Now that TBS' coverage of the Divisional Series has ended, I think it's safe to say they did a decent job of covering all the games. Yes, there were a few things about TBS's coverage that I wasn't a fan of. That little 9-foot marker they put over at first base to measure a runner's lead off of the bag? Yeah, that was stupid and pointless. Frank Thomas as a studio analyst left a bit to be desired, and don't even get me started on Dick Stockton and his crazy hair.

Still, TBS must have been doing something right, because the ratings for this years divisional round games are better than they were last year.

Fox, like other broadcast networks, reach more than 113 million U.S. households who own TVs. Cablecaster TBS is accessible in only about 90 million households and doesn't even have the potential reach cablecaster ESPN had on its playoff coverage last year. ESPN also put its game coverage on local over-the-air TV in the cities of participating teams.

So, with less accessibility into TV households, TBS' first-round coverage would logically have lower TV ratings than the first-round coverage on Fox and ESPN last year. That was made even more likely considering that viewer interest, in any sport, usually builds the longer that playoff series last - and TBS had three of its four first-round series end in sweeps.

Funny thing, though. TBS finished its first-round games averaging 3.8% of U.S. households - up 18% from last year's first-round games on Fox and ESPN.