Home MLB Make sure you don’t miss the unmissable

Make sure you don’t miss the unmissable

by Matt Smith

After a rest day, the World Series is scheduled to get going again tonight with game three from Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia.  Forty-five year old Jamie Moyer will try to prove wrong all the people who have pegged him as an accident waiting to happen for the Phillies.  The veteran will certainly welcome some support from his offense, which has struggled desperately with runners in scoring position during the first two games.  The Rays’ starter, Matt Garza, has to believe that the Phillies won’t be so generous tonight and his focus will be on limiting the amount of runners they are able to get on base in the first place.

It promises to be another close game as the next instalment of an unmissable series, even if the U.S. TV ratings don’t appear to be reflecting this.  Consequently, it’s worth noting that tonight’s contest might be affected by bad weather and that the rest of the series will definitely be affected by a change in the time difference between Britain and the States. 

Five’s coverage of game three begins at 01.00, but it’s possible that the game may start later than normal, or could even be postponed completely, due to rain.  It seems as though these fears have reduced over the last twenty-four hours, so hopefully the baseball gods are doing their best to get the game on.  Bud Selig is responsible for making a decision on whether the game is postponed or not, which I’m sure fills you with as much confidence as it does me.

If the game cannot go ahead, it will be played tomorrow night with games four and five each being pushed back a day (taking away the scheduled travel day on Tuesday).  From a British point of view, it would be better if they played a double-header tomorrow instead as this would mean that game three would start at 17.00 our time.  A midday start in the States would clash with the NFL though, of which one of the games is being played in London at Wembley, so that’s not going to happen.

If game three does go ahead as scheduled, we will have the benefit of an extra hour in bed to catch up on some sleep once it has been completed.  British Summer Time ends at 02.00 in the morning on Sunday as clocks go back an hour (it’s just a shame that the British summer never started).  So if the game starts at 01.30 and lasts three and a half hours, it will actually finish at 04.00 (beware: the more you think about it, the more your head will hurt).  You may need to take this into account if you are recording the game: that extra hour of sleep won’t feel quite so golden if you try to watch the game later in the day and find the ending has been chopped off.

The most important thing to note is that although we head back to GMT this weekend, daylight saving time will continue for another week in the States.  This means that from game four, first pitch will be an hour earlier than has been the case so far (somewhere around 00.20). 

And if that’s not enough, if we get to a game six then it will start fifteen minutes later than normal to accommodate a half-hour spot on Fox by U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama (thanks to BaseballGB reader Joe Cooter for giving us the heads up on that). 

Looks like they’re doing their best to make it difficult for us.  Lucky we’re a dedicated bunch.

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