Baseball pulled off to the side of the road and let Hollywood pass Wednesday.
Just threw up its hands and said, "Hey, we're looking for different ways to market to kids, apparently the game itself isn't good enough and this new Spider-Man movie is a way to get kids interested and into the ballpark."
So baseball took the historically unprecedented step of selling a piece of its soul, and for that, those who have their fingerprints on this deal should be ashamed.
Very, very ashamed.
A Spider-Man web should not be anywhere near a base the weekend of June 11-13.
 | |
| 'Spider-Man 2' will be advertised on a base near you in early June.(AP) |
The only Spider-Man references on any field of play should come when Minnesota's Torii Hunter or the New York Mets' Mike Cameron scales a wall to rob Barry Bonds or Vladimir Guerrero of a home run.
They should not be produced when a big Hollywood studio forks over a bunch of dough for an advertising "opportunity" that gives each side "leveraging power" in the birth of a "non-traditional marketing partnership."
There are ways to raise revenue other than desecrating the field of play and chipping away at the integrity of the game.
Nobody here is denying the importance of revenue flow and finding new ways to create it.
You want your team to spend money in the free-agent market, right? You don't want the ticket prices to go any higher than they already are, right?
Obviously, those trains are traveling in different directions. Somebody's gotta pay the piper, and if Joe Ticketbuyer isn't willing to pay ever-rising costs -- and he shouldn't be -- then, well, that's where the marketing folks must come in.
So most of us have resigned ourselves to all of the signage on the outfield fences and upper-deck facings. Most of us have become immune to the commercials that assault your senses from stadium video boards. Heck, go ahead and sell space on the tarp that covers the field during rain delays. See if we care.
And did you know that during the playoffs, for example, some of those sports drink bottles you've seen on the benches weren't just left there by the players? They have been strategically placed in dugouts with instructions not to remove them -- or move them -- during games.
It's been done quietly, and it has not been intrusive. Again, somebody's gotta pay the bills.
But never before has baseball sold a piece of its most precious real estate -- its field of play -- for commercial purposes.
Until now.
This Spider-Man deal is simply crass, and it's bothersome on a number of fronts. Baseball has been around enough and is established enough that there should be some level of class, some level of dignity. If Arena Football needs to sell every square inch of open space on fields, helmets, jerseys and cheerleaders, whatever.
Baseball isn't some new sport on training wheels. Baseball has 100-plus years of history behind it. And those "Ricoh" patches displayed on the helmets and jerseys of the Yankees and Tampa Bay during their season-opening series in Japan aren't it.
And now that this latest Pandora's box is open, what's to stop another Hollywood company from offering twice what Columbia and Sony paid to trumpet the opening of another movie?
Now that all parts of baseball apparently are for sale, what's to stop Miramax from offering twice the money to, say, place Jack Nicholson or Cameron Diaz into the dugouts next to Joe Torre, or Dusty Baker, for a game or two? And after this, what's to stop baseball from accepting that, too?
Now that there is precedent, nothing is out of bounds or off-limits. And if you think it is, you'd better think again.
Bob DuPuy, baseball's president and chief operating officer who was badly overmatched on a conference call early Wednesday evening, made -- or attempted to make -- a number of points. Most were as lame as one of the marketing ideas that was scrapped (thank goodness): installing a Spider-Man logo on the nettings behind the plate in stadiums around the country.
The first was on the marketing to kids, that this entire Spidey deal was planned for June, when the little munchkins are all out of school and free to come to the ballpark. Which, translated, means that the game alone isn't enough to sell to kids anymore.
How about scheduling one afternoon game each fall in the World Series so that kids on both coasts could actually stay up to see the end of it? Or perhaps bumping up the start of the All-Star Game, or other World Series games?
That would be a pretty nifty marketing move to help make on-the-fence kids fall in love with baseball.
"The fact of the matter is, we're constantly looking at and discussing with our broadcast partners the time of our jewel games," DuPuy said. "Unfortunately, the ratings don't show better earlier, and they've grown as the game progresses."
He admitted concern as to the length of games and as to the lateness of games, but said, "We don't think it diminishes, frankly, from this part of the promotion."
Heck no. Why would a kid want to see a thrilling conclusion to a World Series game when he could be going to the ballpark to get a foam Spider-Man finger and look at cool movie logos on the bases instead? It's not like baseball is in danger of losing an entire generation to soccer -- insert gagging noise here -- or anything because soon there will be no adults with memories of World Series games from long ago.
DuPuy also noted that from the ground-level television cameras and for those seated in the lower bowls of the stadiums, the movie logos on the bases wouldn't even be visible. So what, exactly, is the point, then?
I think we all know that there will be some kind of deal to ensure that whomever is televising the games will prominently display the movie logo in several shots.
DuPuy also said the bases have been decorated for years, and talk about selling a can of snake oil here. Painting a logo to commemorate 9/11, a World Series, an All-Star Game or a major milestone within the game such as Cal Ripken's record or Jackie Robinson's anniversary is so not auctioning off the bases to the highest bidder.
Later, when pressed, DuPuy corrected himself and admitted that this is the first time it's been done "commercially."
But he quickly added that company logos have appeared on the bases during past Home Run Derbies and Futures Games during All-Star Week.
Please. Those are not championship season games.
For DuPuy to even link them with regular-season games is insulting to his sport.
So what's next, a Taco Bell advertisement on the back of Bartolo Colon's jersey?
An Advil logo on Sammy Sosa's batting helmet?
Attendance is up 15 percent this year. Forget the steroid controversy, most ticket-buyers apparently have. And as DuPuy himself noted, television ratings for the Yankees-Tampa Bay series from Japan were "astonishing."
So the revenue streams seem to be purring along just fine.
And that might be the worst thing about this entire Spider-Man affair.
If the game was in financial trouble and it was either sell advertisements on the players' backs or fold up the tent and go home, at least this would be understandable and, even, excusable.
But this is purely a money-grab. Raw, naked greed.
DuPuy insisted that any criticism is misplaced because it doesn't detract from the game, it "adds to the entertainment value," but the way this looks, I've got another idea.
How about if baseball just cancels its games over the weekend of June 11-13 and shows Spider-Man 2 on the stadium video boards instead?
