Phillies game producers eyeing creative ways to engage fans
The Phillies production team is looking at creative ways to engage fans in 2020
Hardly anything about the upcoming 2020 season will be anything of the ordinary for Philadelphia Phillies fans. And, it all starts with not being allowed to attend games in person at the ballpark due to social distancing guidelines during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Therefore, for fans to get their “Phillies fix,” they will have no choice but to take in games either through radio or television broadcasts. But, even then, things will not be the same as they always have been.
Jeff Halikman, senior producer of Phillies baseball telecasts on NBC Sports Philadelphia, noted on a recent podcast with Jim Salisbury that even the broadcasts themselves will look and feel different.
“You won’t see the fan shots, that’s a guarantee. But, what I do think you’ll see is more player reaction,” Halikman noted. “There’s always a mix of the fans going nuts, which I love, and there’s a mix of the guys at home plate waiting like 2-year-olds that have never experienced anything like this, even if they have the week before, to celebrate with their teammates.”
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In order to capture “euphoric” moments, Halikman said the Phillies broadcast crew will rely on capturing different reactions, maybe seeing more of the manager or the player who just gave up a walk-off home run, for example. “Maybe we see more of that frustration and stress on their faces,” he said. “I think there will be a lot of drama, it just won’t be the same as what we’re used to.”
Halikman said his team is exploring opportunities to do some things differently this season to “keep people interested and help people really enjoy their Phillies from a distance.”
He hinted there may even be a way in which fans can have their reactions to pivotal game moments seen on the following game’s broadcast.
“We may have some opportunities to do some different things this year. Bringing all that stuff to the fans is what we’re hoping to do,” said Halikman. “Keep your cameras rolling at home, because your celebrations at home when Harper hits a walk-off may easily be on the broadcast the next day.”
“So, get your phones ready, keep them charged, and be recording.”
Possibility of Mic’d-Up Players
Could another way to keep fans engaged this season is to have players mic’d up? Halikman did not rule out the possibility, but said he thinks there will come a time where it is a more regular part of the broadcast.
“I think it would be a good thing. I think any time fans have access to something that they can never participate in, I think it’s great,” he said. “Whether we talk to a manager during a game on the headset, whether we interview a pitcher who is like three minutes from leaving a game and had just pitched great … or, if it’s a player being mic’d and we are playing back stuff.”
One thing that having mic’d up players or coaches would provide, Halikman noted, would be interactions between people that one would not expect, such as a coach talking to an umpire before the game.
“You get a back-and-forth that you never hear when you’re sitting in the stand, press box, or at home,” Halikman said. “They know these guys; they’ve seen these umpires hundreds and hundreds of times.”
“You don’t see the friendship like we see sometimes when we’re on the field before a game, when coaches come up to former players and stuff. That’s the kind of interaction that you really get, sometimes even before the game starts.”
While the concept of having mic’d up players has several pros, there are some cons that come with it as well. For Halikman, the main focus is making sure players feel comfortable and that something is not said that should not be said.
“I know it seems easy to say, ‘These guys make millions of dollars. Who cares? They can wear a mic and we just take out the stuff that they say that’s inappropriate,'” Halikman said. “Well, you want them to be natural. You want to hear them say what they want.”
“You put a mic on me, and I walked around all day, I would know a mic’s on me, so it would make you a little bit cautious. It wouldn’t make it yourself.”
Nonetheless, Halikman thinks it can definitely happen if they find a player who is comfortable doing it; perhaps, not during current times, however. He also said that while it takes a lot of work, it’s not a hard thing to do.
“It does take a lot of people because you’ve got to have people make sure that everyone’s listening to what’s being said, because you don’t want to play something bad,” Halikman noted. “You can’t go live with it, for obvious reasons. But, you can’t play something back that you wouldn’t want the player to want to say. Sometimes people say things they don’t mean to say.”
“A lot of people are on the edge when you do it, whether it’s the team, the PR department, the player … everybody’s a little worried for obvious reasons,” he added. “You don’t want something to be said that shouldn’t be said.”
A New Way to Produce Games for 2020 Season
The Phillies television crew will not travel with the team this season across its 30 road games that cover eight different cities and nine different opponents. There will only be one production team, the home team, in a production truck at each broadcast.
When the Phillies are the road, Halikman said they will produce the games from their production truck and broadcast booth back at Citizens Bank Park, albeit having less control over what is shown with the cameras and replays.
“If the Phillies are playing the Mets and the Mets are the away team, the broadcast crew that we work with from New York will take the feed,” Halikman said. “So, they will have less control over the broadcast, but with all the teams agreeing during this stretch where everything’s been planned out, every home team will work to make sure it is a very level broadcast for both teams. We’re going to want the same thing coming back to us when we’re the away team.”
“It’s going to be interesting. It’s going to be different; no doubt, it will be different. What we’re doing is what’s considered a world feed.”
Because of only having one feed, Halikman noted that fans will see games that are “a little bit more down the middle.” Tom McCarthy, John Kruk, Gregg Murphy, and Ben Davis, among others, will still add their commentary, and Phillies graphics will still be shown. However, more might be shown of the other’s team dugout than usual.
“Maybe a little bit more storylines about the other team, just to keep it down the middle, because the other team wants to see their players, too,” Halikman said. “I don’t think that’s a bad thing.”
The Phillies are currently slated to be shown nationally four times, twice on ESPN’s Sunday Night Baseball and twice by FOX. Even then, the home team’s production crew will provide the feed.
The thing that will be really different, Halikman said, is that the Phillies broadcasters will be watching the game from a monitor like fans are at home.
“They can’t see the field. Now, they will have a monitor that gives them the entire field that will be fed to us from that ballpark. So, they do see when guys get a jump,” Halikman said. “We can’t show everything, as you know, with one camera. So, when we’re cutting to a ball going into the gap, Tom can see the runner who left first base and whether he’s going to try for third or try for home.”
“That will help him a little bit towards that direction of knowing what’s going on on the field. But, it will definitely be a challenge.”
On Possibility of Restrictions Loosening
Halikman is optimistic in that he thinks there will be a chance that at least some fans can attend games in person by the end of the season.
“I think it would be great, because I love the fans being there more than anything. They create that buzz that gives us that energy every night to do the game,” Halikman told Salisbury. “Until they’re there, I hope we can give them that excitement at home.”
For now, the senior producer thinks, like everything else since the middle of March, that it is a “wait and see” approach as to when some sense of normalcy can return inside the ballpark.
“We have been told this is how we’re doing things. We are spacing, social distancing in our truck to the point where, normally we have one truck [and now] we’ll be using two,” Halikman said. “We’ll have people spaced out that would do some of their jobs in one truck, now will be in another truck just to keep distance. We’re doing all kinds of things to distance.”
“The players are doing it, the coaches are doing it, the front office is doing it, [and] we’re doing it,” he added.
“We’ll have to wait and see.”