ESPN’s Use Of Mic’d Up Players Continues To Push MLB Into Progressive Broadcast Territory

ESPN’s use of micing up players during Sunday Night Baseball moved into a new phase with regular-season games. The broadcast team and the head of baseball production are constantly balancing the entertainment factor in a way that makes the players comfortable.

For decades, fans watching Major League Baseball games on television have asked themselves, “What exactly are the players talking about when they get on base?” There always seems to be some form of chatter between the first baseman and the runner. Wouldn’t it be great to hear it?

Starting in 2018, fans started to get a taste of just that when the Worldwide Leader started mic’ing up players in Spring Training, most notably with Bryce Harper. In 2020, Walt Disney-owned ESPN and MLB made the giant leap to using the format during the regular season. And while it was dropped in 2021 over what was believed to be labor talks ahead of the CBA, it picked back up this season. Major League Baseball continues to be the only sport in which players are mic’d up during regular season play.

ESPN’s move to do it during regular-season games moved the concept from novelty to common place during each of the national Sunday Night Baseball broadcasts. Given that those games count in the standings, the team has worked to ensure that the added entertainment doesn’t distract from the game, and more importantly, provides a distraction for the players.

“It was taking that nervousness away from the player of ‘What happens if the ground balls hit to me? What happens if I if I’m not paying attention?'” said Eduardo Perez, of the Sunday Night Baseball broadcast team, who spent 13 years as a big-league player before becoming a coach and eventually a television analyst. Perez noted that the players are talented enough to “multitask” in-between pitches and that the experience is good for baseball, but also exposes the player personalities. “They understand that we’re in this all together to promote the game and it promotes the brand promotes the organization promotes themselves and it’s the reality of being part of the game.”

As to how the conversation takes place, the broadcast team loosely structures questions and instead looks to what comes out of the conversation and follows it.

“We’ll talk to the player before the game and ask if there’s topics they’d rather not discuss, but after that, it’s really a blank canvas,” said Karl Ravech, who has been with ESPN since 1993 and has been the voice of Sunday Night Baseball and key to the network’s baseball programming for three decades. “We can go any direction and oftentimes they’re the ones that will lead us down whatever road we go.”

The one thing that mic’d up players offer to the network is insightful content from a different perspective than the broadcast team during lulls in play. Baseball, by its very design, has breaks in the action that affords the conversation, and that keeps fan attention.

Phil Orlins, ESPN’s vice president of baseball production, believes it’s extremely important to position the baseball brand in a progressive manner that takes advantage of the opportunities that are out there with a sport that has the style, pace, and intricacies that baseball has.

“Mic’ing up players is a real opportunity for baseball to do something unique and different and progressive, Orlins said. “I think it’s a really important statement about the baseball brand that they can interact — essentially with the media but it’s the media as a third party, the viewer in a direct way that no other sport has been able or willing to do. “

There are, of course, detractors from the in-game conversations, largely from purists – the hard-core fans of the game. As television has become increasingly competitive for viewers with the increased competition of additional television channels, streaming services, and gaming platforms, keeping fans entertained is a key component.

“I’m always amazed by the small group of people who will get on social media and suggest that this is not something that should be done,” said Ravech. “‘Let them play the game. How dare you interfere with whatever they’re doing?’ is a common refrain.” But Ravech honed in on the ability to market the players in baseball, something that many feel has been lacking. “There’s great reward in exposing an authentic side of the players that people otherwise don’t get a chance to see.”