Tag: Major League Baseball

Major League Baseball Supports SOPA

The Major League Baseball logo.
Image via Wikipedia

I know I haven’t done much blogging at all on the Mets since the season ended but I did feel compelled to write up this posting because it effects everyone, not just bloggers. I also felt it belonged here on a Mets blog because MLB is backing this legislation – David Daniels

Here we are about 6 weeks before spring training, the winter meetings are over and baseball news is few and far between. But some of us bloggers have been monitoring a disturbing piece of legislation making it’s way through Congress right now. It’s called SOPA, the Stop Online Piracy Act, and it is a bill that can take down every single blogging website caught with any kind of pirated material, including this one. It’s coming up for a vote this week!

SOPA is actually well-intentioned. Corporations, like Major League Baseball, want to prevent piracy and copyright infringement. But they do so in an overly-aggressive, innovation-endangering way. They allow the entertainment industry to censor sites they feel “engage in, enable or facilitate” infringement.

The Issues with SOPA:

The Electronic Frontier Foundation describes SOPA as the “blacklist bill” because it would “allow the U.S. government and private corporations to create a blacklist of censored websites, and cut many more off from their ad networks and payment providers.”

That means the Attorney General would have the power to cut off select websites from search engines like Google. It could also cut off advertisers and payment processors like Visa from the sites. The Attorney General could essentially kill all of a site’s traffic and revenue in a matter of days.

SOPA only allows targeted sites five days to submit an appeal. That doesn’t leave much time for them to defend themselves before losing their site. Continue reading “Major League Baseball Supports SOPA”

MLB 2011 Season Predictions

This is a guest post by Jim Brakewood. Jim is a Mets fan and dedicated fantasy baseball aficionado. He told me about his predictions for the 2011 MLB season and I offered him an opportunity to post his thoughts for The Mets Report readers. Comment at the bottom of the page with your thoughts on Jim’s predictions.

American League                              National League

AL East: Red Sox                                    NL East: Mets (pfft kidding, Braves)

AL Central: White Sox                          NL Central: Brewers

AL West: Rangers                                   NL West: Rockies

AL Wild Card: Yankees                        NL Wild Card: Phillies

AL Champion: Yankees                        NL Champion: Braves

World Series: Yankees over Braves

Sorry Mets fans, I couldn’t help the Mets winning the East… joke.  Red Sox from the beginning of the season to the end may very well have the best record in baseball. Top to bottom, with a few question marks in Dice-K, Lackey, and Beckett, has the best team. So why don’t I have them in the World Series? I really believe the New York Yankees are going to trade Jesus Montero and whomever else they need to in order to grab another stud pitcher, whether it’s Liriano from Minnesota (some rumors have King Felix being available) or Wandy Rodriguez from Houston. I’ve heard rave reviews about Burnett and Ivan Nova. A-Rod also claims to be in the best shape of his life and from what I’ve seen and heard…..I believe him. He is going to have a monster year.

I know the popular pick is Minnesota right now. I just don’t trust Mauer and Morneau to be healthy all season and I can’t say I am a fan of the pitching staff beyond Liriano and perhaps Pavano. The Tigers will be the biggest challengers to Chicago: between Verlander, Scherzer and Porcello and the bats of Migs, V-Mart, Guillen, Ordonez and Inge they should be able to capture the Central. Verlander has been amazing this spring and I don’t see any reason it will stop. I just love the White Sox this year; they have athleticism, power, great depth at starting pitching, and an upper tier closer. Beckham is poised to have a break out year, Ramirez and Pierre add to the speed and athleticism with Dunn, Quentin, Konerko always a threat to go yard. Continue reading “MLB 2011 Season Predictions”

Mets Have Biggest 2010 Ticket Sales Drop

Florida Marlins at New York Mets

http://cdn.pis.picapp.com/IamProd/PicAppPIS/JavaScript/PisV4.jsI wrote back at the end of April that the Mets were experiencing the largest drop in ticket sales this season among MLB teams. That was according to a report in Fanhouse. Since then, things have only gotten worse for the Mets according to the NY Times.

In April, sales were down an average of 6,690 tickets per game. Now they’re down 6,852 tickets per game. Things have gone completely into the toilet. If you’re on the Mets email list, you know how aggressive they’ve become this season trying to sell tickets. It’s become a daily event for them to email about some new ticket sales promotion. Continue reading “Mets Have Biggest 2010 Ticket Sales Drop”

Baseball Day Games – Why Can’t We Have More of Them?

Casey Stengel;Roger Craig

http://cdn.pis.picapp.com/IamProd/PicAppPIS/JavaScript/PisV4.jsEven though both the Mets and Yankees had lost their games before 5pm, I thoroughly enjoyed my workday and that was because there were so many day games on today. I’m left to wonder if this is what it was like for the previous generations of baseball fans?

Today more than half of baseball had started playing by 1pm. I started by listening to the pre-game show on WFAN live from Citi Field at around noon. Since this was a day game there were large groups of kids in attendance and you could hear them chanting “Let’s go Mets!” and generally having a good time at the park. It’s a great sound to hear in an office. Continue reading “Baseball Day Games – Why Can’t We Have More of Them?”

Arizona Immigration Law and Baseball

Thousands turn out for a May day march and rally in support of immigrant rights in Los Angeles

http://cdn.pis.picapp.com/IamProd/PicAppPIS/JavaScript/PisV4.jsThe impact of the new Arizona immigration law on baseball is far-reaching and potentially could cause a problem between labor and management. Of course, this is only a mirror of the effect it will have on society, in general, in Arizona. I’ve spent some time in Arizona on business trips in the past. It doesn’t take long to figure out that this is a serious and overt problem for the legal residents of the state.

I understand, and agree, with the notion that the people that are here in the U.S. should be here legally. If they’re not, they should be deported. That’s not a groundbreaking idea. But the implementation of the law in Arizona is absurd. The police are required to check the legal residency of anyone they think is here illegally? And do so without profiling? It’s beyond comprehension that this can be implemented without racial profiling. “Show me your papers” will be the new mantra in Arizona. Continue reading “Arizona Immigration Law and Baseball”

Major League Baseball And Newspapers

NEW YORK - FEBRUARY 14: The New York Times he...

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

I read an interesting post on Murray Chass’ blog today, and believe me Murray, you are a blogger. Chass has contempt for bloggers like me but I have to say that I like his writing. It’s nice to get a fix of “old school” style every now and again. His points are well written even if I often don’t agree with the content itself. I like to read posts from bloggers like Chass because he comes from a very different point of view than I do. And I appreciate that.

Yesterday, Chass lamented that many newspapers that regularly cover MLB teams aren’t covering the World Series this year in-person. He goes on to write that it’s a sign of an industry that’s hurting. There’s nothing new there that we haven’t heard over the last few years. But there are some quotes from MLB Commissioner Bud Selig sadly pondering the loss of some free publicity for MLB. As if they don’t get enough on TV and the Internet already.

Continue reading “Major League Baseball And Newspapers”

May 31- Dodgers Game May Be Postponed

New York Mets

Image via Wikipedia

The weather report is calling for rain and thunderstorms most of today. The Mets had the tarp out on the field immediately after last night’s game. The contingency plan is for a day/night double header on Sunday. The word is that the Mets would like to call the game early today, if possible.

A day/night double header is exactly what the Mets don’t need before leaving for San Francisco and playing a game Monday night there. Thanks to ESPN for changing the game to Sunday night. And thanks to the MLB scheduling team for planning an LA/New York game on Sunday right before the Mets leave for San Francisco.

Obviously, ESPN is going to take this game for Sunday night. It’s the two biggest TV markets in the country. MLB should’ve done a better job with the schedule. Now the Mets will pay the price.