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NBC Got Almost Everything Right in Its Return to Major League Baseball

In a doubleheader on Thursday, all NBC did was take care of the baseball fan.
Jimmy Traina|
Jason Benetti worked with Luis Gonzalez(left) and Orel Hershiser in his first game as NBC’s lead play-by-play voice.
Jason Benetti worked with Luis Gonzalez(left) and Orel Hershiser in his first game as NBC’s lead play-by-play voice. | NBC

1. After the Netflix debacle on Wednesday, it was refreshing to see NBC give us solid, enjoyable broadcasts on Thursday.

NBC’s return as a Major League Baseball partner began at 1:15 p.m. ET for the Pirates-Mets game. And guess what? Unlike the night before, this game started on time because we weren’t subjected to a comedian and a wrestler screaming at us for no reason.

NBC actually did something totally radical: It showed us a ballgame. It covered the game properly. It catered to the people who tuned in to watch the Pirates and the Mets. It was glorious.

NBC’s presentation from a visual standpoint couldn’t have been slicker, either. The graphics were sharp and the scoreboard was easily digestible.

In the back end of NBC’s doubleheader, Jason Benetti, who will be the voice of Sunday Night Baseball once that begins after the NBA season, showed why the network poached him from Fox. Benetti is excellent on play-by-play. His calls are always on point while also making the telecast feel light and breezy.

I didn’t love the idea of rotating analysts going into the season and the concept didn’t do anything to win me over on Thursday. Matt Vasgersian worked with Al Leiter and Neil Walker on Pirates-Mets, while Benetti worked with Orel Hershiser and Luis Gonzalez on Diamondbacks-Dodgers. It was sometimes hard to tell who was speaking in both cases. I also think the lack of chemistry with one analyst could be an issue. I’d still prefer one lead analyst to work with Benetti. But we’ll see how that plays out over the season.

Right now, all that matters is that NBC aired two games on Thursday and everything couldn’t have gotten better for the viewer.

2. Guess what Netflix did after producing one of the worst Major League Baseball telecasts you’ll ever see? It raised their prices. So, they bought Opening Night in hopes of getting a bunch of Yankees and Giants fans to sign up for the service and then increased their fees the very next day.

And let me repeat, this was after a totally embarrassing broadcast on Wednesday night.

3. This was an outstanding call from Brian Anderson from start to finish on Purdue’s game-winning basket against Texas on Thursday night. So much detail and description combined with the perfect amount of yelling.

4. If you read this column, listen to SI Media With Jimmy Traina or follow me on social media, you know that I love Larry David more than anyone on earth.

So, I was downright giddy Friday morning when I saw that Larry did a commercial for the YES Network.

Larry was typical Larry in the spot, so that was enjoyable. However, the commercial makes no sense.

The premise is that Larry goes to watch the Yankee game, but can’t find it.

There’s no issues at all finding a Yankees game when they play on YES. The issue of trying to find the game comes up when they play on Amazon, Apple, Peacock, Fox, FS1, ESPN, ABC, Roku and whoever else Major League Baseball has sold its soul to.

5. As the person who has been ranting and raving longer than anyone else about streaming taking over sports, I’m about to drop a surprising take for you.

Sports Business Journal reports that the NFL is reviewing a plan that will allow teams to sell their preseason games to streamers.

While I think this absolutely sucks, I don’t care and I’m not going to get worked up about this one.

Streamers can air anything that I don’t HAVE TO watch. They can do whatever they want with the Home Run Derby, pregame shows and preseason games.

The only thing I care about is regular season and playoff games because that’s what I HAVE TO watch.

Leagues and teams can do all the greedy money grabs they want when it comes to games that don’t count and aren’t real.

6. We dropped two SI Media With Jimmy Traina podcasts for you this week.

NBC’s Jason Benetti joined me to talk about becoming the voice of Sunday Night Baseball, getting called into emergency duty on the NCAA tournament, an unusual entry on his Wikipedia page and much more.

In addition, SNY broadcasters Gary Cohen, Keith Hernandez and Ron Darling appeared on the podcast to talk about their popularity among Mets fans, the unfortunate circumstances of getting shut out of the playoffs, analytics on a broadcast and more. Plus, Hernandez talked about Seinfeld.

7. RANDOM VIDEO OF THE DAY: I saw this while scrolling through TikTok earlier this week and I saved it for Friday becase it’s a little lenghty. If you are an old-school WWF fan, you will love it. There was nothing like Bobby Heenan and Gorilla Monsoon doing these ridiculous vignettes.

Be sure to catch up on past editions of Traina Thoughts and check out the Sports Illustrated Media Podcast hosted by Jimmy Traina on Apple, Spotify or Google. You can also follow Jimmy on X and Instagram.

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Jimmy Traina
JIMMY TRAINA

Jimmy Traina is a staff writer and podcast host for Sports Illustrated. A 20-year veteran in the industry, he’s been covering the sports media landscape for seven years and writes a daily column, Traina Thoughts. Traina has hosted the Sports Illustrated Media Podcast since 2018, a show known for interviews with some of the most important and powerful people in sports media. He also was the creator and writer of SI’s Hot Clicks feature from 2007 to '13.

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