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National media need geography lessonBy Eric Deggans © St. Petersburg Times, published April 1, 1998 In fact, so many reporters placed St. Petersburg's Tropicana Field in Tampa that you might wonder whether the city was suffering from Rodney Dangerfield syndrome -- getting serious lack of respect for its two decades-plus effort to bring major league baseball to the west coast of Florida. It began Friday with a map in USA Today showing the dome in Tampa. By Tuesday afternoon, reports on CNN featured live shots from Tropicana Field, describing its location in Tampa Bay, Fla. The cable news channel soon corrected the error and gave the location as St. Petersburg. Anchor Dan Rather also read a quick story during the CBS Evening News about the Devil Rays' Opening Day over a video clip showing action in Tropicana Field in "Tampa, Florida." Elsewhere, the Devil Rays rated scarcely more than a mention on national TV news on such networks as MSNBC and CNN's Headline News. They were more interested in probing the latest President Clinton/Paula Jones legal wrangle. Sharing the spotlight with the Arizona Diamondbacks in Phoenix, another new team celebrating its opening day, didn't help. Stories often combined both opening days in one report. ESPN, busy airing games such as the Cleveland Indians vs. the Seattle Mariners and the Diamondbacks vs. the Colorado Rockies, couldn't spare more than a few mentions of the Devil Rays' contest. The SportsChannel Florida telecast the Florida Marlins' win over the Chicago Cubs. One anchor on the CNN/SI cable channel -- the combined sports venture between CNN and Sports Illustrated -- cautioned Tampa Bay area fans to "be careful what you wish for," since our quest for baseball glory has led to this Opening Day loss. Subscribers to the wireless Videotron or VTV VideoWave TV system, including the Times' building on Ashley Drive in Tampa, couldn't even watch the live game on WWWB-Ch. 32 because the service doesn't carry that channel. In contrast, most reporters and anchors at area news stations descended on Tropicana Field with zest to cover Opening Day festivities. NBC affiliate WFLA-Ch. 8 and CBS affiliate WTSP-Ch. 10 started live broadcasts from the stadium at 4 p.m. (a note to WFLA anchors Gayle Sierens and Bob Hite: Those clunky black headphones and headset microphones are extremely untelegenic). WFLA even moved its telecast of Oprah Winfrey's talk show to make room. WFTS-Ch. 28 didn't join the coverage until 5 p.m., allowing fans to see that day's Montel Williams Show, and WTVT-Ch. 13 didn't show Kelly Ring and John Wilson anchoring live from Tropicana Field until 6 p.m., though it did offer several shots of Devil Rays players watching the afternoon broadcast of The Jerry Springer Show. Most of the pregame coverage touched the same bases, from the years of effort that went into bringing a franchise to town to the facilities at Tropicana Field, the crowds streaming into the game and the expected financial benefits for area businesses. Lacking a news department to produce its own pregame show, WWWB relied on WFLA's efforts, rebroadcasting a Devil Rays special the station aired Monday night and simulcasting the channel's coverage from 4 p.m. to about 5 p.m. Unfortunately, that didn't keep WWWB from making its biggest gaffe of the night, cutting away from Hall of Famers Monte Irvin, Al Lopez, Stan Musial and Ted Williams throwing out the first balls to show a car commercial. Commercials also pre-empted important plays during the game. One hopes that, over the next 50 or so Devil Rays games it's expected to broadcast, the station will learn to readjust its priorities.
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aseball may have been the center of the Tampa Bay area's existence Tuesday, but a glance at the national media reveals that the Devil Rays' first game didn't receive quite the same attention outside the Sunshine State.
