Guide To Watching Old Baseball Broadcasts

There are a ton of old baseball broadcasts on KZbin. But where do they come from? Do people actually watch them? And which games should you start with?
#baseball #baseballhistory #mlb
Fig Leaf Rag by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. creativecommon...

[@Homedepotorange]

I love watching old regular season games cause you never know how it's gonna end. I'll even enjoy some random matchup between the Pirates and Mets from the 70s or somthing

[@mitchelvalentino1569]

Great topic. I got hooked on old baseball footage in the 90s when I saw the _When It Was A Game_ movies on HBO. Then I found VHS collectors and got some 1980’s broadcasts from them. Later I was deep into torrenting old broadcasts, similar to you. Nowadays I keep an eye out for any new footage that may appear, usually linked on the baseball-fever forum or on the various KZbin channels I follow. Old World Series games are my favorites. Some real gems pop up from time to time, and it’s very exciting to see something I thought was lost. I also enjoy old radio broadcasts, since I can listen while I work.

[@baseballreplayjournal]

The radio broadcasts are even better than the television broadcasts, in my opinion. The story behind those is also fascinating - the story of Pat Rispole is one of a kind.

[@Rick_King]

I've watched a few old Dodgers games on KZbin with Vin Scully broadcasting. Old baseball is the best, anything before the evil Rob Manfred became Commissioner, and began to destroy the game, piece by piece.

[@dentonyoung4314]

I love watching old baseball broadcasts.

[@raschticky]

A broadcast of Game 3 of the 1951 Giants-Dodgers pennant being discovered would be incredible. My 93 year old grandfather was a huge NY Giants fan, and I know he would love to see it!

[@baseballreplayjournal]

I'm hoping for it! I'd love to see it myself.

[@DogSniffing]

If MLB put every season or even a few old seasons in fulll up...oh baby I would never stop watching baseball. Maybe make a old season go "live" in full during the off season. WS parade ends and we move back to watching 1986 season online. I love watching the old indoor stadiums, they look unlike anything else.

[@aparise1]

I love watching old games in the off-season and / or when I'm playing some Strat

[@baseballreplayjournal]

I agree - though I tend to have problems if I play and watch at the same time. It's easy for me to get the two games confused, lol.

[@ruqone]

I like watching the old 80's games from NBC broadcasts. I wonder how I could get all of those Saturday games in high quality.

[@farpointgamingdirect]

I collect old-time radio shows, and I have quite a few old broadcasts of baseball games in my collection. I really enjoy listening to these games while playing my baseball sims

[@USDefenseHawk]

If I recall the story correctly, Bing Crosby had the 1960 World Series game 7 recorded. (He was a part-owner of the Pirates). The recording wasn't found until some 50 years later, long after his death. People are finding old stuff all the time. A decade or so ago, a co-worker of mine had showed me raw footage of regular season pre-game warmups and sporadic game action from MLB games from the 1930s that his grandfather had kept. It's a shame that despite all the archaeological digs of the early and mid 20th century, it never got into the conscientiousness of American culture back then to regularly film and keep complete games of sporting events so future generations could see them. MLB would even discard original scoresheets!

[@baseballreplayjournal]

It's true that Crosby had the game recorded, but I guarantee that it was discovered before it was released in 2010. As I said, there were rumors going around for years that the game still existed. Waiting until 2010 to release it was likely for commercial value, since it was the 50th anniversary of the game. This is the way that Rare Sportsfilms and The Miley Collection do business, by the way. I strongly disapprove of both companies, and really wish that the major collectors would share their collections with the public. This stuff belongs in the public domain - and, in the case of pre-1972 broadcasts, actually IS in the public domain. It's obscene to see these guys profit off of this stuff.

[@USDefenseHawk]

@@baseballreplayjournal It's shame companies like that take advantage of everyone and deprive so many fans of seeing some great games of the past.

[@Curtykobashiy]

I’ve always wondered how much archival footage the leagues and teams have in their vaults. I hate footage just sits and does nothing instead of being available for the public to have access to it. What teams do you find have the most available local game footage in circulation and what teams have the least amount of local footage? As a Detroit sports fan I wish the Ilitch Family & Gores would team up to start an RSN that just shows old Tigers, Pistons, and Red Wings wins parallel with a channel that shows the current day stuff. Any Detroit Sports Fan would have that channel in their rotation of channels to check out when surfing. As a Deadhead & a Sports Fan this topic intrigues me to no end!

[@baseballreplayjournal]

Honestly, I've got no idea. When I learned that most baseball teams didn't keep something as simple as scoresheets from their own games, I started to think that they probably didn't have much in terms of archival footage. I think the Cubs probably have the most footage out of any Major League Baseball team, though I only say this because clips from old WGN broadcasts going back to the 60s keep coming out at a slow pace. I believe that the NBA has a copy of every single game since the start of the 1983-84 season, though that might have just been a rumor from SportScene (which was an NBA focused tracker). Oddly enough, most of the uploaders there were from Eastern Europe - and these guys had crazy stuff in their collections, including local broadcasts and exhibition games that were only shown on obscure cable networks. Speaking of the Red Wings - there was a guy on The Sports Torrent Network who uploaded a ton of broadcasts of rare Red Wings games from the mid and late 1980s. I wish I still had those. There was a lot of good stuff there - stuff that I don't think has made it onto KZbin yet. If you want to see the baseball equivalent of a Hunter Seamons matrix, check out @davevolskysbackdoor5673 - his enhanced versions of old games are simply incredible.

[@USDefenseHawk]

If I had to guess, I'd say the NHL really frowns on old broadcasts. They seem to think it would take away fans from watching CURRENT broadcasts. Which is nonsense. Die-hard fans do BOTH. Like the "Miracle on Manchester" 1982 playoff game between Gretzky's Oilers and the L.A. Kings. Squabbles about who owned the broadcast prevented a re-airing of the game for decades (though the game eventually was put on KZbin). But if you want to watch a couple Red Wings playoff games, there's G4 and G6 from the first round in 2001 on KZbin. ;>) I never saw the broadcasts live since I was at those game. If it's any consolation, my favorite Detroit broadcast was G5 of the 1984 WS. (Loved Sparky yelling at Dick Williams, "No! Don't walk him! Don't walk him!" after Goose Gossage talked manager Dick Williams into letting him pitch to Kirk GIbson.)

[@thehargraves63]

I would love to see Game 5 of the ‘72 NLCS, but I don’t think it is out there. Would have seen it by now. I listen to old radio broadcasts more than watch old games in TV.

[@baseballreplayjournal]

I think clips of the bottom of the 9th have survived, but that's all. I've also got a huge collection of radio games - something around 3,000.

[@sportstimemachine2102]

Byu??? On my channel they refer to me as Utah Mike . Great video love todays topic

[@terryp3034]

Great topic, and why am I not surprised you're into the old broadcasts? The quality of the commentary from the 90s backwards was so much more insightful the vast majority of what's offered today. I've experienced MLB via radio my whole life, so 3 or 4 nights a week, I've got an old game playing in the background. Somehow, it's very grounding and reassuring. Again, another great topic from your channel.

[@BobJohnston-gy1nh]

Love all the classic games and watch them frequently. Great stuff

[@charlesclinton3305]

As a Tigers fan I would love for WDIV and the Tigers to work out some arrangement where Click on Detroit (the station's KZbin channel) can upload old games especially games the Tigers won.

[@Live01Legends]

I love watching 1995-2001 Cleveland Indians games

[@cityhawk]

I love watching regular-season games from the 1980s. The easiest ones to find are the White Sox ones from the early 80s when they were on WSNS with Harry Caray. Even though I'm a Yankees fan, it’s interesting for me to watch teams that are out-of-market, and rarely get a chance to see them. It's oddly fascinating.

[@Vampiredear]

I love these old broadcasts too. It started when I had a roadtrip during the offseason and downloaded the 1993 world series radio broadcast onto my phone and it was great. The crowd was bananas on both teams and it was so funny knowing who was on roids, how Lenny Dykstra blackmailed umpires, and other little things. lol. And while not a really old broadcast, most recently I watched the game in which Nationals celebrated the founding of the Montreal Expos and they got the Expos unis on (2019). A glimpse into what could have been. TYSM for this video. Since I'm here I also tried to research how people recorded the radio broadcasts? I know you had those giant tapes in the beginning, but when these little compact tapes rolled in, did people just record onto 3-4 cassette tapes? (assuming 90 minute lenght)? Reading on a forum, one guy said he just used a VCR for this purpose. But I guess if you were so interested in archiving the game in the first place you'd just record the TV broadcast most of the time.

[@baseballreplayjournal]

There's a great story about the old radio broadcasts - the ones that go back to the late 1950s. I'll get to that in a later video. The really early radio broadcasts were recorded at the behest of the Commissioner of Baseball, and were hidden away in the Hall of Fame until collectors made cassette copies sometime in the 1980s. I don't know if everything that exists is currently in circulation. John Miley and his company own a lot of extremely rare recordings that have never been circulated, which is very frustrating to those of us who collect. If you get into radio broadcast collecting, you'll notice a sudden jump in the number of games available starting in 1977. I'm pretty sure that's when people started using compact cassette recorders to record local games straight off the radio. There were people who would use VCRs and high quality video tape to make audio recordings. It was a thing in the Grateful Dead scene back in the late 1980s - though, honestly, the early Japanese digital recordings sound better. The 1993 World Series is awesome, by the way. There are a lot of broadcasts from the 90s and later that tend to be overlooked by collectors for one reason or another. Those 1993 Phillies were something else.

[@Vampiredear]

@@baseballreplayjournal yeah there is a jump when compact cassette became popular enough. By the way, I want to get into Japanese Baseball, I know that the fans are next level and it's a totally different vibe on the field too so I would love to see that. What would you say would be the best introduction?

[@mikematson6323]

I put on old games on KZbin from time to time for background noise. One I purchased on iTunes years ago was Dave Stieb's No Hitter.. I'd like to see the 10 Homer game by the Blue Jays..

[@nicklesf6566]

Nobody collected more game tape than the great Tony Gwynn.

[@falco2911]

My full game uploads get a little over 1,000 views on average. That's propped up a lot by my most viewed which has 27k. My uploads mostly come from unlisted youtube videos I find, or videos on MLB's website. Theres a few from internet archive, a few from Yankees Classics broadcasts, and a few from actual VHS tapes I've found myself I think it's fun to watch some of these evergreen videos and try to spot clips from games I've uploaded, like at 6:46 for example. There's one channel that has very obviously gotten a couple video ideas from me. That one RareSportsFilms game I've uploaded happens to be my most popular, and I once got a comment on it saying that they might try to get my channel taken down.

[@baseballreplayjournal]

What does your viewer retention look like for those uploads?

[@falco2911]

@@baseballreplayjournal Typically around 10-20%

[@danhendrickson7708]

I bought one DVD from that crook at raresports films and to buy the DVD I had to call him to give him the address to send it to. The guy grilled me like I was criminal. He asked a whole bunch of questions he had no business asking. I bought a bunch of 1940's NFL Championship films from a private collector and posted them on my youtube page. They were all taken down because that jerk claimed he owned the copy right. Those are still up on youtube on another channel. He's done the same thing to others too.

[@baseballreplayjournal]

My dad had the same experience a few years ago. He spends a lot of time on the phone complaining about bootleggers. He doesn't own the rights to 1940s NFL championship game films, lol. You should have disputed that claim. I sincerely hope that somebody finally takes this guy to court one day. His entire business is built on fraud and deception. They don't even touch up the films that they offer, as they claim; all they do is stick their logo over a huge chunk of the screen.

[@danhendrickson7708]

@@baseballreplayjournal I wish I would filed a dispute but as long their stil on youtube i'm good with it.

[@stevefox2220]

I had the same experience with him back about 30 years. I found him pretty odd to be asking some personal questions when all I wanted was a film . But I did order one video from him and enjoyed it but there was no other way to see some of these films back . Thank goodness for KZbin!

[@danhendrickson7708]

@@stevefox2220 Yes thanks to youtube hopefully it will put him out of business someday.

[@arthurgscholich3833]

Great channel!! What about downloading favorites from KZbin for making your own personal collection?

[@cardinalsbaseballclassics]

I've got a bunch of old games on my channel!

[@gamma68]

I never knew there were older tv broadcasts from Japanese games out there. Can you provide links to any special games in particular?

[@baseballreplayjournal]

There are tons on KZbin - but you need to search in Japanese.

[@gamma68]

@@baseballreplayjournal Could you post a link here to one Japanese game? I don’t know the language.

[@nacoran]

I'm hoping AI will be able to clean up the definition on these a bit. I love some of the old games but they make my eyes hurt watching. (I was an Astros fan in '86, and although they fell short in game 6 that was still a formative game in my youth.)

[@StevenBis-u6f]

Great video, any chance you can help me find a pre 1974 tape of yankees at yankee stadium.

[@baseballreplayjournal]

You won't find many full games. The only one I can think of is game 5 of the 1956 World Series, which you can find here on KZbin. There are clips of other games if you look, though there isn't much.

[@henrywallacesghost5883]

You don't need to wonder if anyone is watching them because they keep track of the views😂

[@Gallalad1]

Gotta say. I grew up in Europe and thought baseball was the most boring sport on earth bar cricket and I held that view until I changed conitnents and began watching games. Baseball doesnt translate to TV imo. Its built for watching in person. You cant see the shift, players moving in for plays or base stealing bases. TV just doesnt show it all. VR would be a game changer for baseball.

[@baseballreplayjournal]

100% correct. The thing that kills me is that television broadcasts of baseball used to show various camera angles in an attempt to capture all the action away from the ball. Sadly, FOX moved us away from that, and decided instead to concentrate on up-close pictures of faces.

[@Gallalad1]

@@baseballreplayjournal definitely! I will also say though. i think baseball should do promotion and relegation because the game would thrive with more local love. Like imagine if Rochester county played the Yankees. The energy would be insane!