Play it in Daylight: Baseball in April? No Thanks

Story by Yinzer Crazy Contributor Roger l. McNamara

Highs and Lows.    The principal argument of this essay is that Major League clubs stationed in the Northern reaches of the U.S. should withhold the scheduling of night games at home until Memorial Day.  Nothing against playing under the lights, but everything against playing in the cold, impacting as it does both performances on the field and spectator comforts in the stands.  As this is typed it approaches 3:00PM in the Eastern Zone, when the following current and forecasted evening Fahrenheit temperature ranges prevail across the Northern arc of Major League baseball franchise cities:

                                                                     Current              Tonight  

            Boston                                                  59                        48

            New York                                              57                        51

            Philadelphia                                         62                        48

            Pittsburgh                                            53                        44

            Cleveland                                              54                        45

            Detroit                                                   67                        40

            Chicago                                                  58                        42

            Minneapolis                                          56                        39

Milwaukee and Seattle are excluded from this list because the architecture of both American Family Fields (Brewers) ad T-Mobile Park (Mariners) includes a retractable roof.  Please note well:  even in today’s hot spots of Philadelphia and Detroit the dramatic post sunset plunge.  Also light snow is a part of today’s Minneapolis outlook.   

Spring vs. Summer.  Looking more deeply at two of the cities separated by roughly 900 air miles is further revealing.  The following table is intended  to underscore temperature differences between a Season’s early going and the arrival of the warmer days of Summer.   

                                                       Average Daily Temperature Range                       

                                                                 April-May         June-Sep

                              Boston                        45 – 36             85 – 56

                              Pittsburgh                      49 - 39                83 -  54

                              Chicago                      48 – 39            83 -  57

Be reminded that even the reported Summer mid and upper 50s lows depict overnight dips, usually reached within an hour or two of daybreak.  Evening first pitch conditions will generally be much closer to the daytime highs.  Which is to say, very comfortable. 

Different Games, Different Reactions.  Most readers will have experienced the following at least once.  Attend an evening football game, say 7:00PM coin toss, outdoor venue, mid-October through mid-November.  Kickoff temperature is 45 degrees.  Dress for it --- sweatshirts, stocking caps, thick shoes 

covering wool socks, maybe gloves for when the evening wears on.  So prepared, all is well from a comfort standpoint, especially when nurtured with a hot cocoa or two. Now let’s turn to the baseball game.  Another outdoor park, 7:00 PM anthem and first pitch, identical weather pattern, identical dress code. Dang, it’s cold out here.  Baseball as an outdoor live viewing experience simply does not work at much below 55 degrees in air temperature.   

Objections.    Editors and readers may weigh in with objections to this proposal.  Three which occurred to me are:

• School age youngsters, especially those in High School, will miss afternoon April-May games.  Just as folks my age once did for October World Series games, when teachers would bring radios into the classroom to keep us apprised.  In today’s world an occasional few afternoon hours away from the text books are unlikely to materially impair the march of America’s youth into productive adulthood.  Also, any student engaged in after school extracurricular pursuits is unlikely to attend an after dinner evening ball game;

• Grownups need to work by day in striving to keep a household afloat.  The traditional Monday-Friday 9 to 5 shift is largely a thing of the past, a social development likely stemming from some combination of Covid-19 and remote computer technologies such as Zoom.  Mom and Dad are more likely --- are they not? --- to attend an afternoon game played in relatively benign weather than a night time contest marked by a big chill; 



• King TV ---  we all know how TV governs the sports world, captivating masses of viewers and hauling in fortunes of advertising revenue.  In 2021 it joined ticket and concession sales to fill MLB team coffers to the tune of $6.1 billion.   Still it remains that baseball, compared with either basketball or football, takes down a far lesser share of aggregate revenue from TV.  In response some franchises have established in-house cable TV options, such as the YES network airing Yankee games and New England Sports Network covering the Red Sox.  These are relatively new ventures, needing more time to assess their overall revenue stream impact.  Finally, it is well to keep in mind that baseball, again compared with other major team sports, shows itself comparatively weak on a TV screen.

Conclusion.  Play Ball, but at sites North of the Mason-Dixon line let the pitches fly in daylight hours during the cooler early and ending months of a Season.