Past The Press Box : Colin O'Keefe of The American Sportswriter : On Sportswriting, Social Media, Sports Blogging, Journalism, Sports Marketing

I've been to approximately 20 Mariners games so far this year and as much the hydroplane races annoy me, there's one jumbotron regular I find even more irritating. That'd be the constant barrage of ads for MLB.tv. While the ads are dumb, this isn't what annoys me, it's the fact that they're lying in the face of everyone there.

You know what the 2010 slogan is for MLB.tv? Go ahead and Google it. Yeah, that's right: Baseball Everywhere. For those who have used the service—and I have for the past two years—it's easy to see this is untrue. Now, I knew full-well about the MLB's blackout restrictions going in, and everyone else should as well, but for Major League Baseball and those affiliated to continue to tout the product as a premier or perfect platform for fans is wrong.

As an anecdote, I can watch the Seattle Mariners anywhere...as long as 'anywhere' isn't home in downtown Seattle. Or all of Washington State. Or when I was at school in Missoula, MT. I could travel to as far away as Fairview, Montana (1,100 miles) and still not be able to watch the Mariners.

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Everyone has their own unique preferences when determining which sporting event is the greatest. Many people prefer the Super Bowl, other traditionalists believe the Fall Classic is the best event in sport while I'm sure there's more than a few odd individuals who think that title should go to the Daytona 500. The debate is impossible to settle but it'd be difficult for anyone to refute the uniqueness and spectacle of the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament. 65 teams, single elimination, an endless number of storylines.

Going beyond all of that: the Big Dance is tailor-made for the era of Twitter, Facebook and blogging, much more than any other sport. That, combined with the timing, will make this year's Dance the biggest event in the history of social media. Quite the claim, I know, but here's five reasons why it could be.

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Once again, the conversation on Twitter is dominated by a single item. Even if it isn't even completely true, social media and Twitter in particular can make one feel like everyone else is doing the same thing they are. But isn't that the point of social media, to find, network and converse with people who share similar interests? That is never more obvious than with an instance like The Oscars. Or, well, the Super Bowl.

In a story I've been meaning to highlight for sometime, and couldn't agree with more, The New York Times points out that it appears as though social media has created a virtual live 'water cooler' for major televised events and have a major impact on television ratings.

The Nielsen Company, which measures television viewership and Web traffic, noticed this month that one in seven people who were watching the Super Bowl and the Olympics opening ceremony were surfing the Web at the same time.

“The Internet is our friend, not our enemy,” said Leslie Moonves, chief executive of the CBS Corporation, which broadcast both the Super Bowl and the Grammy Awards this year. “People want to be attached to each other.”

This is something I've been trying to harp on for some time, going back to the NBA's rise in ratings. Of course, it could have something to do with the fact that my timeline is dominated by snarky sports bloggers and sarcastic beat writers. A look-in:

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Living in Seattle and being a Mariners fan is growing more and more enjoyable. Yes, there's Jack Z and all the great moves he's made turning 100-loss team into a much buzzed-about contender. But on top of that, Mariners fans are blessed (yes, blessed) with a wealth of phenomenal reading material via what has to be the best blogosphere in the majors. There's Lookout Landing, USS Mariner, Pro Ball NW and even ASW's own Northwest Diamond Notes. It isn't mindless stuff either, these are intelligent baseball writers. As great as their content is, if I come across a post a bit too heavy with Sabermetrics and advanced statistics, I just can't do it. Like hitting an old 50 Cent song on shuffle, I roll right past.

It's not that I think they're wrong, I don't understand them. I read about sports for pleasure and haven't invested the time in doing 'homework' (see: LL's Sabermetrics 101 series) so I can understand some of the blog posts I read. These are the statists the best and most accurate baseball writers/bloggers use. They're the best evaluator on why one ball-player is better than another. And yet, a majority of baseball fans do not understand them, So, how does this change?

In a guest column on Baseball Prospectus, ESPN broadcaster Jon Sciambi says it starts in the booth:

Let's not forget "it's the search for objective knowledge about baseball." The goal is not unveiling newfangled stats; it's about getting people to understand basic ideas and concepts. To achieve that, we can't just slap stats up on the screen and explain them. Understanding has to come in the form of analysis. We have to use the stat and explain it. Sometimes it needs to be the [play-by-play] guy playing analyst and getting the color guy to react [...]

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