Radio Broadcast Rankings: Complete Table and Notes
Over the course of this week, we’ve been releasing the results of our radio broadcaster rankings — itself the product of reader crowdsourcing, and a logical companion to the television broadcaster rankings released in March.
Click the relevant links to read about radio broadcast Nos. 30 – 21, Nos. 20 – 11, and Nos. 10 – 1.
Below is a complete (and sortable) table of the radio broadcast rankings, followed by some notes on same.
| Num | Team | Votes | Charisma | Analysis | Overall |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | San Francisco | 678 | 4.8 | 4.7 | 4.8 |
| 2 | Milwaukee | 101 | 4.9 | 3.9 | 4.8 |
| 3 | Texas | 76 | 4.4 | 4.5 | 4.6 |
| 4 | Cleveland | 40 | 4.5 | 3.8 | 4.5 |
| 5 | Toronto | 323 | 4.3 | 4.2 | 4.4 |
| 6 | Washington | 155 | 4.4 | 4.3 | 4.4 |
| 7 | Philadelphia | 94 | 4.5 | 4.0 | 4.4 |
| 8 | Atlanta | 131 | 4.4 | 4.1 | 4.3 |
| 9 | St. Louis | 355 | 4.6 | 3.3 | 4.3 |
| 10 | Tampa Bay | 84 | 4.1 | 4.0 | 4.2 |
| 11 | Chicago NL | 65 | 4.2 | 3.7 | 4.2 |
| 12 | Boston | 65 | 4.0 | 3.6 | 4.1 |
| 13 | Detroit | 56 | 4.0 | 3.7 | 4.1 |
| 14 | Oakland | 43 | 3.9 | 3.9 | 4.0 |
| 15 | Baltimore | 27 | 3.9 | 3.3 | 3.9 |
| 16 | New York NL | 124 | 3.7 | 3.8 | 3.8 |
| 17 | Arizona | 24 | 3.5 | 3.8 | 3.7 |
| 18 | Cincinnati | 65 | 3.7 | 3.3 | 3.6 |
| 19 | Colorado | 27 | 3.2 | 3.4 | 3.5 |
| 20 | Kansas City | 22 | 3.2 | 3.1 | 3.4 |
| 21 | Minnesota | 54 | 3.6 | 2.9 | 3.3 |
| 22 | Seattle | 117 | 3.4 | 2.9 | 3.3 |
| 23 | Houston | 35 | 3.2 | 3.2 | 3.2 |
| 24 | Pittsburgh | 28 | 3.2 | 3.0 | 3.1 |
| 25 | LA NL | 116 | 3.2 | 3.0 | 3.1 |
| 26 | Miami | 21 | 3.1 | 2.8 | 3.0 |
| 27 | LA AL | 21 | 3.0 | 2.7 | 3.0 |
| 28 | San Diego | 34 | 3.0 | 2.8 | 2.9 |
| 29 | Chicago AL | 52 | 2.8 | 2.9 | 2.8 |
| 30 | New York AL | 173 | 2.3 | 2.0 | 2.1 |
Notes
• Radio teams, on average, fared better among FanGraphs readers than their television counterparts: the average radio team received an Overall score of 3.75; television, only 3.24 — i.e. almost precisely a half-point difference.
• Regarding the readership, two things. First: they (you?) were indispensable to this project, especially in the provision of amusing and/or useful comments regarding the league’s various broadcast teams. Second: it seems like a long-term, interactive project like this is a viable thing. Is there any other use for it beyond rating broadcasters? Feel very free to use the comment area for suggestions to that end.
• Next week, we’ll look at a table combining both radio and television broadcast teams and also how to integrate all this information, if possible, into the game previews that appear in the Daily Notes.
Carson Cistulli has published a book of aphorisms called Spirited Ejaculations of a New Enthusiast.
Can you post distributions as well. This information is not very helpful without those (i.e. min, max, mean and standard dev.). Thanks.
How about doing it with beat writers?
This is a great idea. You might even want two ways to do it – beat writers for papers, then bloggers/new media. In DC, for example, while Adam Kilgore is a good beat writer for the Post, Mark Zuckerman is fantastic at NatsInsider/CSN, but he wouldn’t be a typical beat writer…
I fear a series on beat writers. The Seattle bloggers would absolutely melt your servers with their complaints…
I want this. I want Fangraphs to post my 1000 word hate filled comment for Evan Grant of Dallas Morning News. The man who voted Michael Young American League MVP with his BBWAA vote. The man who said instead of extending Josh Hamilton this past offseason the should (and I fucking kid you not) extend Michael Young because then guys like Napoli and Hamilton will follow his lead and sign extensions too. The man just has an unhealthy man crush on Michael Young.
In the conclusion-and-notes post for TV broadcasts, I predicted that the radio broadcasts would have a significantly higher average score. This hypothesis has proven accurate.
Discussion question: why do radio broadcasters score, on average, .51 higher than television crews?
My guess is that, in general, if you’re frequently listening to a Radio broadcast, you’re already pretty ok with the broadcast team. If you really hated them, you wouldn’t listen, and probably wouldn’t respond to the survey. On the other hand, if you’re a fan of the team, you’re going to watch games no matter who the broadcast team is. As a result, I’d expect some selection bias in the numbers, and that might be what is responsible for the half-point difference.
I don’t believe that is correct. I often find myself listening to the radio where I have no TV (work, in the car, etc…) and I would listen even to a bad broadcast.
From my experience (Phillies) the radio broadcasters are significantly better than the TV crew. So much better that I would pay an extra $10/month for MLB.tv if I could sync the radio broadcast to the visual feed. Radio crews rank higher because it is easier to weed out the bad broadcasters. In radio the entire broadcast depends on the play-by-play and color, whereas the TV broadcasters come second to the visual aspect of the game. Bad TV announcers (cough* cough* Chris Wheeler) can get by for a remarkably long time or stupid trivia and bad anecdotes.
Well, I think the Braves radio is better too, but we’re also coming from markets where the majority of people (according to the table) really like the radio broadcasters. Each city will have it’s own reasons why, but my point is that, because the surveys for TV and Radio were conducted independently and at different times with a non-identical sample space, it’s difficult to draw too strong of a conclusion that the radio broadcasters are actually better. They may be better, but it could also be that the people responding to the radio one, on the whole, are people who tend to prefer the radio broadcast to begin with.
You can mute the TV and still watch the game. If you’re listening on the radio, you have to listen the broadcasters. While that may increase some listeners’ hatred, they’re more likely to stop listening altogether; on the other hand, the ones who persist may eventually grow fond (or at least tolerant) of the radio guys they once disliked. Meanwhile, the muted TV watchers continue to have their broadcast sundae with an undiminished topping of broadcaster hatred.
Radio guys are just better. They don’t have to spend time primping their hair or staring at a camera while “welcoming us into the booth”. They can spend all that preparing for their broadcast.
Also, I’d point out that a great voice is essential for radio, much more so than TV, and that great voice can make the difference between an average and an above average experience.
It’s because Joe Buck is 8,000,000,000,000 times worse than the worst radio broadcaster,so that skews the overall #’s worse than Mike Minor skews your ERA.
I wonder what the national distribution of Fangraphs readership is… More readers in the Bay Area would lead to more votes for their team. All reverence due to John Miller, but twice as many votes than any other team? Seems flawed somehow.
A very popular blog by the Giants beat writer (here) linked to the vote page for Miller and Flemming. Probably resulted in a lot of votes from non Fangraphs readers.
Toronto fans always respond well to these sorts of things, the internet must be more readily available there.
nah, SF Giants fans are over represented on here. (and i’m one)
too many articles about them on here also, if you want to be honest about it.
So what? A larger size of voters does not imply better score.
In fact, probably the opposite. As with most things internet, hatred is more motivating than love.
Concessions, commercials and marketing / promotions would be interesting to crowdsource also.
Thanks so much for all the work into the radio and TV polling! It was fun to read about.
Ballpark ratings. As in entire experience. Site lines, seat comfort, concessions, prices, atmosphere, neighborhood, ease of getting there by various modes of transportation, parking, sound effects/organ, cleanliness, helpfulness of staff, and usefulness of scoreboard/jumbotron/other informational devises.
The Yankees LOSE! THE YANKEES LOSE!! THAAAAA YANKEEEESS LOOOOOSE!!!!
(i guess everybody hates that d-bag)
Ueck isn’t number 1? Have people seen the footage of Artie Lange and Norm McDonald talking on Letterman (I believe) about being in the booth with Ueck? Hilarious.
Farmer and DJ get no love.
I would get MLB.tv in a heartbeat if i could sync the radio broadcast with the tv broadcast through my apple tv. As it is now i watch Cubs games to pacify the wife while still getting to watch baseball and usually end up listening to brewers games while working on stuff around the house to pacify myself.
For me the best day of the year is the first spring training game when I get to hear Uecker calling a game
Two things: Thank You Carson for creating a giant chart for me to scroll over and turn white. Curiously satisfying.
Secondly, how about a rating of the graphic used by the local broadcast (the thing showing the score, pitch speed, baserunners, ball/strike/out…) Or is that too trivial to most folks?