The world according to Jim:
• Buried in the coverage of ESPN’s split with Major League Baseball following this season is this nugget from Commissioner Rob Manfred. According to the initial report by The Athletic’s Evan Drellich and Andrew Marchand, Manfred told the owners in a memo that the league has “not been pleased with the minimal coverage that MLB has received on ESPN’s platforms over the past several years outside of the actual live game coverage.”
In other words, baseball is an afterthought – if it’s even a thought – with the Pat McAfee/Stephen A. Smith engagement farming mechanism that drives much of ESPN’s daytime programming.
But consider this: If ESPN as a rights-holder gives the sport such short shrift, what do you suppose happens when it’s not, beginning in 2026? Here’s a hint: Baseball might go from secondary topic to invisible. …
• Item: The Team That Is Ruining Baseball is 0-2 in the Cactus League.
Comment: We love the start of the exhibition season because it’s a chance to watch baseball again, after a long winter. (And if we’re antsy, how do you think folks in the snow belt feel?) As for the results, if you’re depending on non-roster players and minor leaguers for your schadenfreude, you might want to reconsider. …
• The New York Yankees have rescinded their no-beards policy, some three or four decades after it was outdated. Once again, we wonder what The Boss would have thought. (And no, we don’t mean Springsteen.) …
• But if you look at the contenders who have the best chance to derail a Dodgers repeat, the Yanks’ acquisitions might make them the ones to fear the most. Max Fried bolsters their starting staff (and we’re waiting for Marcus “I’m a starter” Stroman’s head to explode when he’s told to head for the bullpen.) Devin Williams is a lockdown closer. Paul Goldschmidt is a more than adequate replacement for Anthony Rizzo (still unsigned, by the way) at first base. And the underrated move is the acquisition of Cody Bellinger, which will enable the Yankees to move Aaron Judge back to right field and improve their outfield defense.
(And no, this isn’t a reaction to that fateful fly ball Judge took his eye off of in Game 5 of the World Series last October. Bellinger is still that capable a center fielder.) …
• As for National League teams that could impede the Dodgers’ road back to the World Series? Atlanta (with a healthy Ronald Acuña Jr.), the Phillies and the Arizona Diamondbacks (especially after adding Corbin Burnes) are the top three threats. The New York Mets, after signing Juan Soto for a fortune and Pete Alonso for a far smaller one, are No. 4 on this list. …
• Free agent update: We are now a week into spring training, and according to Spotrac’s free agent tracker there are still 73 unsigned players as of Friday afternoon, among them Rizzo, J.D. Martinez, Patrick Corbin and Mark Canha, as well as Joe Kelly, Yasmani Grandal, Alex Verdugo and Alex Wood. Once again, baseball’s veteran middle class is being squeezed.
Meanwhile, the St. Louis Cardinals – who, we remind you, missed the postseason in 2024 – still haven’t signed anybody. We blaming that one on the Dodgers, too? …
• For those who haven’t been paying a lot of attention, the Big Ten and Southeastern Conference are well into their attempt to divide all the spoils of college athletics.
The goal of the two most powerful of the power conferences to grab four automatic berths each in the next iteration of the College Football Playoff is just the first step. At some point, you can expect those conferences to hold March Madness hostage, as in: “Give us everything we want, or we’ll bolt the NCAA and start our own postseason basketball tournament.”
I mean, what’s to stop them from disassociating themselves from the NCAA, setting their own eligibility and compensation rules, and the like? Those conferences could establish salary caps before Major League Baseball does. …
• As has been noted here before, the one way to solve the madness that is the combination of NIL money and the transfer portal is for the college system to swallow its misgivings and make the players employees, with signed contracts. The major obstacle? Administrators are scared of the potential of a players’ association with teeth. Stay tuned. …
• One thing we are reminded of whenever the Lakers play at home: Lawrence Tanter remains the best public address guy in the business, any venue, any sport. The reason: He’s not a yeller or screamer, as are so many in the business, yet those well modulated tones can generate plenty of energy and excitement. It’s a refreshing antidote in an age where arena and stadium atmospheres are increasingly ear-splitting and overcaffeinated. …
• ESPN – which, surprise, rediscovered hockey when the network regained the rights to the NHL after ignoring it for years – did it right with its coverage of the 4 Nations Face-Off final between the U.S. and Canada. Particularly impressive was the opening segment Thursday night that interspersed clips of the current U.S. team, sitting at their stalls in the dressing room, with Kurt Russell’s recital of the Herb Brooks pregame address to the 1980 U.S. Olympians before the Miracle on Ice, as portrayed in the movie, “Miracle.” (Which was, of course, a Disney production.)
Too bad that speech didn’t work so well this time. …
• And now it can be told: All of that money generated by others’ use of the term three-peat
Those, he said, “are very minor in comparison to what they deserve.” True. But every penny helps.
jalexander@scng.com