In addition to New York City, live coverage of the Series was also seen on WRGB in Schenectady/Albany (now a CBS affiliate), WPTZ (now CBS-owned KYW-TV) in Philadelphia, WMAR-TV in Baltimore and WTTG in Washington, D.C.
In 1949, the World Series was also seen live in other Northeastern and Midwestern cities (Harrisburg, Pittsburgh, Syracuse, Rochester, Buffalo, Erie, Cleveland, Detroit, Columbus, Cincinnati, Dayton, Toledo, Indianapolis, Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Louis) that had been hooked up to network lines over the previous year.
Mutual may have been reindulging in dreams of becoming a television network or simply taking advantage of a long-standing business relationship; in either case, the broadcast rights were sold to NBC in time for the following season's games at an enormous profit.
NBC aired the second and third games of the 1951 National League tie-breaker series between the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants, necessitated by the teams' finishing the regular season in a tie for first place.
Ernie Harwell called the game for Giants television flagship WPIX – the independent station's broadcast was simulcast nationally by NBC – and his description of the home run was a simple shout of "It's gone!"
"[9] The 1951 playoff between Brooklyn and the New York Giants and that year's World Series were the first major league baseball games telecast live from coast-to-coast[10] to coast;[11][12][13] transcontinental network transmission lines had been completed and activated in September, in-time for the Japanese Peace Treaty Conference in San Francisco and the start of the 1951–52 television season.
[25] A part-owner of the Pittsburgh Pirates, who was too superstitious to watch the Series live, Crosby listened to the decisive contest with his wife Kathryn and two friends on a shortwave radio in Paris, France.
On July 13, 1963, NBC's coverage of the Detroit Tigers–Chicago White Sox game from Comiskey Park in Chicago was carried by KCRA-TV in Sacramento, KCRL in Reno and KVIP-TV in Redding – however it was not televised in the San Francisco market on KRON-TV.
After the Series New York Daily News sportswriter Dick Young opined that Allen, the voice of the Yankees, had been stricken by "psychosomatic laryngitis" caused by his team being swept.
This brought the total value of the contract (which included three Monday night telecasts such as a Labor Day 1966 contest between the San Francisco Giants and Los Angeles Dodgers) up to $30.6 million.
[41] Commissioner Bowie Kuhn, who felt that baseball could attract a larger audience by featuring a prime time telecast (as opposed to a mid-afternoon broadcast, occurring when most fans either worked or attended school), pitched the idea to NBC.
Another factor behind Gowdy's dismissal was the criticism from the national media which alleged that he sided with the Boston Red Sox (a franchise that he had covered prior to his days at NBC) on a controversial play in the 10th inning of Game 3 of the 1975 World Series.
Stockton on NBC stayed silent as Fisk rounded the bases, waiting until he made his way into the Red Sox dugout before proclaiming: "We will have a seventh game in this 1975 World Series."
A Canadian Football League game between the Edmonton Eskimos at the Winnipeg Blue Bombers was tentatively scheduled for 1:30 p.m. Eastern Time on Sunday October 17, even making newspaper TV listings.
During the 1984 regular season, the reason for most of the changes from the traditional 2:00 p.m. Eastern Time start was because of NBC's golf or tennis commitments as well as September 1 title fight featuring Eusebio Pedroza.
Bob Costas considered the Game of the Week his dream job saying "You can put a personal stamp on a baseball broadcast, be a reporter, something of a historian, a storyteller, conversationalist, dispenser of opinion.
The preempted episode would air two weeks later on November 8 (with host Rosanna Arquette and musical guest Ric Ocasek of The Cars), with an introduction by Ron Darling, who explained that when the Mets entered the locker room, they were informed that they caused the first delay in SNL's 11-year history (at the time) to their dismay.
[110] As previously mentioned, longtime Los Angeles Dodgers' broadcaster Vin Scully[111] called the 1988 World Series[112] for a national television audience on NBC with Joe Garagiola.
As NBC showed a replay of Gibson rounding second base in his home run trot, Scully then made a point to note Eckersley's pitching performance throughout the 1988 season, to put things in perspective.
[119] Bob Costas, who, along with Marv Albert, hosted NBC's 1988 World Series pre-game coverage and handled post-game interviews, later made on-air statements that enraged many in the Dodgers' clubhouse (especially Tommy Lasorda).
As previously mentioned, former President of the United States, Ronald Reagan (who had just left office) served as the color commentator[122] instead of Tom Seaver[123] (Vin Scully's normal NBC broadcasting partner at the time) for the first inning[124] of the 1989 All-Star Game from Anaheim.
Serendipitously, the original spot first aired during the commercial break immediately following Jackson's lead-off home run in the 1989 Major League Baseball All-Star Game (as Vin Scully exclaimed, "Look at that one!
And from the SkyDome in Toronto...for now at least...so long!Author and presidential speechwriter Curt Smith went a step further in saying that Major League Baseball's deal with CBS Sports was "sportscasting's Exxon Valdez."
To put things into proper perspective, two weeks prior to the announcement of the baseball deal with CBS, NBC had committed itself to paying $401 million for U.S. broadcast rights to the 1992 Summer Olympics.
According to industry insiders, neither NBC nor ABC wanted the entire baseball package—that is, regular-season games, both League Championship Series and the World Series—because such a commitment would have required them to preempt too many highly rated prime time shows.
When NBC lost its baseball TV rights to CBS after the 1989 season, Tony Kubek left the national scene, joining the Yankees' local cable-TV announcing team.
During the 1995–96 television season, the World Series, Super Bowl, NBA Finals and Summer Olympics were all telecast by NBC, marking the only time in history that all four marquee events were aired by the same network.
And unlike Fox, who ran a scorebox icon in the corner of the screen throughout the game, updating viewers on the score, and the count and the runners on base, NBC only aired its version between pitches.
[300] According to NBC producer David Neal,[301] who was in charge of the 1997 World Series production matters "There is no question we know viewers are looking for information, but they don't want it to obscure their view of the game.
In 1999,[316] NBC field reporter Jim Gray,[317] who had previously covered Major League Baseball for CBS, came under fire for a confrontational interview with banned all-time hit king Pete Rose.