NESN Programming

The Boston Red Sox own NESN (the New England Sports Network) and Bill James works for the Red Sox – so why not also have him work for NESN with his own show?

There are many people out there who would be very interested in what Bill James had to say (his books make the NY Times bestseller lists for a reason). Plus James has a very understated sense of humor. The only problem would be the fact that since he is employed by the Red Sox he couldn’t comment on any of the current Red Sox players or other current MLB players for that matter (tampering). That’s OK – just make the show about historical baseball.

You could have Bill James plus a studio host (someone like Don Orsillo). The 22 minutes of programming for the half-hour show could be broken into the following segments:

· One segment on a particular player (this would be easy since all James would have to do is take material directly from his Baseball Abstract)
· Viewer email is answered by James
· This week in baseball history
· Bill James answers questions from callers

The show would be very interesting to baseball junkies and very inexpensive to produce. In fact – if they kept the show from being Red Sox centric – the show could easily be syndicated for other regional sports networks across the country.

Since Bill James cannot comment on current players because he is a Red Sox employee – I would suggest a second show by NESN. This show could be called The Stats Geeks and he hosted by two stats geeks and an in studio host. The show would be similar to the Bill James’ show but the segments would be as follows:

· Review of the week’s transactions, trades and injuries. For instance - the stats geeks could predict how Milton Bradley’s fantasy numbers would work with his trade from Cleveland to the Dodgers. They could talk about league and park factors, etc.
· Viewer email is answered by the stats geeks
· The stats geeks both go over their best and worst fantasy baseball players for the week
· The stats geeks answer caller questions

Again – if NESN keeps the show from being Red Sox centric – it would easily be syndicated.

I should get a job in TV programming.