Welcome to my torment, baseball fans. I usually don’t have much in common with you.
Many of us view the other’s preferred pastime as a soporific. While futbol fans are regarded as hailing from Dullsville, baseball “aficionados” come from that quaint hamlet SnoozeTown, USA. Perhaps the one constant commonality is our mutual disregard for what we consider a sport. Until now.
It seems both us have recently had our heads stamped with the word SUCKER in bold black letters.
Given that the world is still at the mercy of the COVID-19 pandemic, professional leagues are resuming their revenue generators — sorry, games — in empty stadiums.
Gone for now are the crowds of fanatics singing and dancing in support of their favorite clubs.
No more gasps from 100,000 people crammed into a stadium who watch Messi pinpoint a ball into a 90 degree corner the size of a laptop computer. The thunderous roar of 54,000 Scousers singing “You’ll Never Walk Alone” at Anfield has been muted by a need to protect against transmission of a malicious virus.
Weeks ago when futbol seasons resumed globally, network geniuses — American ones —thought it would be a fantastic idea to add crowd noise to television broadcasts. Some have even digitally added people in the stands.
It looks like the practice has found its way to Major League Baseball.
Executives and supporters of the little deceit have argued that part of the charm of live sporting events is the charm of the crowd. The atmosphere. The genuine oohs and ahhs of people marveling at athletic prowess.
But evidently people aren’t even needed for those “genuine” moments. Now with the punch of a button somewhere in a studio far away a crowd can scream wildly when Fernando Tatis Jr. steps to the plate or when that blind ump misses an obvious strike.
I don’t like fake crowd noise and fake fans in stands for the same reason I don’t like inflated attendance figures — I don’t appreciate being mislead. Lied to.
Executives want us to watch the games as if everything is normal. But in the age of COVID-19 everything is not normal. No amount of lying should convince us otherwise. Never. Under any circumstances.
