You would be hard pressed to find another human that loves peanut butter & jelly (preserves!) sandwiches more than this guy. Actually, maybe the 1996 version of my old friend Jason who would come over to the house every day over the summer with a packed lunch would take the cake (a PB&J flavored cake). It was PB&J every time. Not twice a week, not 3 times a week. Every. Day. PB&J. It almost sounds like a rally cry: “EVERY DAY PB AND J!” Now that I am a parent, it could possibly be argued that Jason hated PB&J and his mother was just playing a gigantic, longitudinal practical joke on him. There is absolutely no way that she woke up every morning for 7 straight years, got the PB&J out on the counter and thought, “my son will speak highly of me when he opens his lunch today.”
Even at 35 years old, it is still the snack of choice in my house, albeit with all-natural peanut butter, on wheat bread and a sprinkle of flax seed. One has to care about his figure, if not for himself, for his wife. And of course, for his selfies.
But the purpose of this post is to discuss a screenshot my friend sent me a while back. I am an avid fan of baseball, in all forms (except Little League), but am a (much) less than avid fan of ESPN. ESPN’s embrace of the 24-hour “news” cycle has had such a profoundly negative impact on the deterioration of cognitive thought in America, that it can honestly be argued that E! Network may provide more thought-provoking material now. Although I try to avoid ESPN as much as possible, I went out to eat for lunch and on TV I saw two large men in suits screaming at me about “Lebron James telling Lavar Ball to keep his sons’ names out of his mouth.” I can just see the Spotlight staff at The Boston Globe feverishly taking notes.
Now back to my hard-hitting drama featuring our protagonist, the PB&J sandwich. Patrick had sent me a screenshot of the top stories on ESPN mobile that showed that the World Baseball Classic semifinals, THAT TEAM USA WAS PLAYING IN (!!!), was the 8th (top) story that day. “That day” being the evening of the actual game. I can’t list what all of the other 7 stories were, but I can tell you what 1 of those 7 stories were. You guessed it: “The NBA’s Secret Addiction: PB&J. Despite ESPN’s efforts to impose on me this seemingly important story about a secret addiction that has taken hold of so many NBA players, I will not take the bait. I may blog about it, but dammit I will not read about it.
I can see the argument that the NBA is more entertaining than the MLB, or baseball in general, but if ESPN is going to set the consumer’s agenda by forcing someone to scroll through (or perhaps click on) foolish and pointless stories to get to a story on the semi-final game of an exciting, global tournament in a major sport, we have certainly entered an era where media has absolute control over the consumer. This is not a groundbreaking proclamation, as this has been the case for decades, but the current state of reliance on media to get up-to-the-minute “news” has to be at an all-time high. So when the “Worldwide Leader in Sports” website is showing the viewer that PB&J sandwiches are more important than a World Baseball Classic semi-final game, are we surprised when more Americans are not invested in the spectacle of this tournament? Other countries are much more invested in the WBC, whereas in the US, we may by chance come across the game when flipping through channels on a Tuesday Night.
Baseball is not for everyone, but ESPN should take more responsibility for the service that they provide to the millions of people that view their content. We have seen this with their coverage of soccer, as that sport has gained more popularity domestically. This hasn’t happened by accident. With more coverage, many people begin to have their interests piqued. The World Baseball Classic may not be high on ESPN’s priority list, especially because they did not have the rights to it (currently airing on ESPN Deportes only), but ESPN must realize the true power that they possess and the ability to alter the popularity of this tournament in the States. Players like Mike Trout and Bryce Harper may actually join the squad! But for now, I will validate my claim of ESPN power and eat this damn PB&J that has been staring at me since I started typing.