This is usually the time of year when baseball’s Hot Stove is starting to really heat up. We would normally have teams doing “Caravans” with media in cities and towns far and wide in their territories, large scale in market “Fan Fests” which brought people together to meet players and alumni, engage with brands, and talk about “The Summer Game” in the deepest of winter no matter what the team’s projections are for the coming season, as well as the annual events like The Baseball Writer’s Dinner which really got fans thinking about success past, and the promise of seasons future with the biggest and brightest of stars. We also had in many markets “Truck Day,” which became a literal rite of winter, with teams loading up their equipment and heading both south and west in anticipation of…spring training.
That is in addition to the countless player appearances, discussions, and community events that all build baseball throughout the offseason as fans start to make their plans for heading to Florida and Arizona for days and weeks in the sun for the rituals of spring training.
This year.
Nothing.
While COVID limited much interaction in place last year and drove any in person events away, the Baseball Lockout has amplified that impact this year, to the point where teams on any form of media have purged their players images, data and video as if they did not exist. While many bank on this being the offseason, the fact remains that THIS time of year was one that baseball had an opportunity to engage with fans and remind them why they love the game…its stories, its personalities, its traditions, when the snow is on the ground. It was used as a touchpoint for media, and for brands, to start sizing up the summer, and in many markets gave teams the ability to engage with fans away from a hectic and crazy busy season when off day events are very limited.
And while this is probably seen as short term pain for the team business side of baseball, we are in a world where fans have learned to find other things to do with their time, and those reminders of baseball through fan fests and caravans and community events during a cold winter may actually be needed more NOW than ever.
Now you can still find a little of a baseball fix with the games of The Clemente Winter League on CBS Sports Network, or you can watch your fill of Bull Durham or Ken Burns “Baseball” on MLB Network or watch classic games on any regional with the rights, but the buzz, the talk, the personalities for baseball are pretty much silent this winter, maybe more than any other year, for a sport and a business which needs to always compete for relevance. Will fans return in droves so long as spring training happens and the season starts with Labor peace? Maybe….actually I would say probably, because baseball fans have been tested before.
But we are in a different time from lockouts past, and while we love the games, and the brands spending love the measurable engagement that happens each year, it is a test of resilience and a test of fandom. Those subtle, nostalgic and cost effective offseason reminders of the beauty and rhythm of baseball are missing this year, hopefully they labor thaw will bring back the people and the stories like every year past.
We can hope right? That’s what Opening Day is all about, whenever it comes.
