If you're a veteran of getting out-of-town sports packages, you might be annoyed by what goes on during commercial breaks. If you go through the streaming package for MLB and NHL, you get streaming specific ads no matter which game you are watching. It is always the same three ads, so by the middle of May you will be ready to watch the Twins. When the service waited for the broadcast to kick back in, it was the same graphic with the same annoying music as the three ads were finished. This year, MLB.TV seems to be trying something else, and as shocking as it may be to read, it's fantastic. The 30-second baseball zen is a substitute for the frozen graphic MLB.TV uses to fill in between the streaming ads and the return of the game. The shots are slow motion. Two of them feature Shohei Ohtani, one being him delivering a fastball in slow motion or another which follows him from thwacking a homers at the plate and then as he jogs down to and around first base, marveling at his work. There are others. One shows a groundskeeper watering the infield. The basepaths slowly fill in to show you the time until the broadcast returns, as they bounce between something on the field or something ancillary to the game, all in slow motion with no music, a baseball diamond superimposed over it. It's like a timer.
The feeling of baseball is captured perfectly. One of the game's greatest attractions is its relaxing nature, an ethereal quality that settles in for the summer on a day-to-day basis. Baseball is more of a backdrop for the spring and summer months than the center of attention. You can't watch a game from the stands on a nice June or July evening or afternoon because the field and the city are beyond the outfield wall. Baseball Zen tried to capture that for a short time. Every half-inning, you are put back into that mindset, which is a fitting readjustment from scrolling.
It captures the skill and grace of the game. It would be hard to look cooler than Ohtani's swing, his confidence, and the way he ambles down to first when he knows he has sent a ball into the great wide open beyond the wall. The swagger is heightened by seeing it in slow motion. It is boiled down to its essence.
His pitch was the same. There is a fury there, but seeing it in slow motion reminds us how packed into the pastiche it is. There are amazing things happening on a baseball field hundreds of times a game, and they all make us relax.
This is a small gesture, but it is an attempt by baseball to highlight what makes it unique and special, and it is also marketing some of its biggest stars by showcasing them in a way that makes them look cool. It is not much, just during commercial breaks on a service that only the hardcore will subscribe to. It's something.
It's miles better than the annoying music and jingles that turned every baseball fan into a cult member. When they get something right, let's celebrate.
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