Live From World Baseball Classic: MLB Network Concludes Wild Two Weeks With World-Feed Production, Onsite Studio Coverage of Championship in Miami The broadcaster relied on NEP Japan in Tokyo, NEP's flypack solutions in Taichung By Kristian Hern ndez, Senior Editor Tuesday, March 21, 2023 - 9:48 am
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If the Major League Baseball regular season is a marathon, the World Baseball Classic (WBC) can rightfully be seen as a sprint. With domestic and international baseball fans glued to their television sets, MLB Network has been tasked with supplying the production and operations foundation for this sprint with a world-feed model for 63 media partners in 144 countries.
It's the sheer volume of 47 games in 14 days in three countries on two continents in multiple time zones, says Jason Hedgcock, senior director, remote technical operations, MLB Network. There were a lot of double- headers, so we needed to develop a plan that could be executed and replicable.
Leaders of MLB Network's production and operations teams onsite in Miami: (from left) Stephanie Perone, Tom Guidice, Susan Stone, Jason Hedgcock, Samantha Calastro, and Chris Pfeiffer
Global Game: Inside the World-Feed Production Since the launch of the World Baseball Classic in 2006, MLB Network has provided resources to broadcasters looking to showcase the global competition. For this year's edition, the network has constructed a baseline production of eight unilateral hard cameras: a high-speed unit at 6X, a mid-home robotic camera, POVs for broadcasters to splice into their respective telecasts, and an RF camera for basic angles from a handheld position.
As in years past, broadcasters can supplement and augment their specific coverage with their own cameras. For instance, Fox Sports is adding two cameras - at low third base and low first base - to its arsenal for Tuesday night's championship bout between the U.S. and Japan. If international broadcasters want to enhance their own dedicated coverage, MLB Network is more than willing to allow that to happen.
The compound in Taichung comprised shipping containers as makeshift production trailers. (Photo: Samantha Calastro)
A lot of our international rightsholders that want to come onsite have new technologies, so that requires fewer cameras from us, says Stephanie Perone, director, remote technology operations, MLB Network. It comes with an extra amount of communication, but it's more planning on the frontend.
For the championship game in Miami, the network's onsite team of 90 employees is working out of Game Creek Video 79 mobile unit for the world-feed production and is integrating graphics and Statcast from operators at network headquarters in Secaucus, NJ. Besides Fox Sports, MLB Network provides resources for Fox Deportes and Univision and, on the international side, TV Asahi, Tokyo Broadcast Systems, and Amazon Prime Japan, two from Venezuela, and two from Cuba. Operationally, establishing a reliable transmission scheme is essential.
Hedgcock and company are responsible for commentary insertion for broadcasts in 14 languages. Throughout the tournament, English-language commentary has been done by top-notch pairings: Tyler Maun and Ryan Rowland-Smith in Taichung, Taiwan, for Pool A; Stephen Nelson and Jos Mota in Tokyo for Pool B; Rich Waltz and Buck Martinez in Phoenix for Pool C; and Dave Flemming and Yonder Alonso in Miami for Pool D.
MLB Network's biggest concern has been serving up feeds and workflows that work for every broadcaster across the board.
Inside an empty shipping container before gear was installed (Photo: Samantha Calastro)
We need to keep the technology compatible because we're transmitting to some countries that have advanced technology on par with or better than the U.S. and some that do not, Hedgcock says. We have to produce a product on a technical level compatible with all of these rightsholders so that they can ingest it and broadcast it to their audience.
In comparison with the 2017 World Baseball Classic, the world-feed model has been perfected since the shortened MLB season in 2020. Largely thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic, MLB Network found itself the main supplier of video feeds for both national and regional sports networks. Nearly three years later, a handful of pandemic-inspired habits have become vital to productions over the past two weeks.
Some of the things that we learned in the pandemic with multiviewers for remote announcers have been employed here, adds Hedgcock. We've also become more efficient since 2020, and this event shows how we can partner with multiple broadcasters in a better way.
From a production perspective, presenting the world feed to various media entities comes with a challenge: shots seen on these unilateral cameras have to remain somewhat neutral. Luckily, the production staff, led by MLB Network VP, Live Events, Chris Pfeiffer, has gained valuable lessons from the pandemic.
The main priority is to document the game, but we try to add in the international flavor with certain stories, Pfeiffer says. Fans can't get enough of [Japan's Shohei] Ohtani, so we made sure to have a camera on him to show everything that he does on the field and in the dugout. There has also been so much energy in these venues that we want to capture the atmosphere with shots of the crowd.
Working Overseas: NEP Japan, Local Staffers Pitch in for International Pools The magic of the World Baseball Classic is to offer fans in the U.S. and other areas of the globe a peek into unfamiliar baseball venues. In previous years, these have included Hiram Bithorn Stadium in San Juan, Puerto Rico, in 2006; Foro Sol in Mexico City in 2009; Fukuoka Dome in Fukuoka, Japan, in 2013; and Gocheok Sky Dome in Seoul in 2017.
This year, the tw
