The Baseball Tonight Podcast

ESPN made a crucial lineup change during the offseason on the Baseball Tonight podcast, and the result is a truly first-class outlet of baseball journalism.

Eric Karabell, who ESPN replaced as host, provides respectable fantasy analysis, but he was particularly unsuited for a podcast focused on the game as a whole.  When he teamed up with Keith Law, the podcast felt like two baseball nerds (a word I use with no disrespect) broadcasting from their dorm room, rather than a discussion between "dirt under the fingernails" baseball journalists.  In addition to having a whiney, nasally voice and a penchant for using the word "ridiculous" to describe the performance of players and dismiss the insights of fellow analysts, Karabell's commentary treated players like they were disembodied stat sheets rather than human beings playing an extremely difficult and complex game.

Buster Olney

Enter Buster Olney.  With a baseball resume of extraordinary depth and breadth, Olney has transformed the Baseball Tonight podcast into perhaps the best forum for baseball insight available today.  Unlike Karabell, Olney is superbly matched with a podcast focused on the game as a whole.  First and foremost, he's a true lover of the game.  He loves players and their personalities; he loves locker room and front office politics; he loves the performances of rookies and the wily insights of veterans; he appreciates the difficulty and complexity of the game; and he seems to have a deep desire to reveal the human element in baseball through his journalism.

The true strength of Olney's work is the quality of his guests, and his utilization of the long-form interview.  Unlike the Baseball Tonight television broadcast, the podcast allows for fifteen to twenty minute interviews with various major league notables, and Olney's stature allows him to book "A-list" guests for nearly every podcast.  Guests also include ESPN's regular commentators--Stark, Kurkjian, Crasnick, and the superb researcher Justin Havens.  Some of the better guests this year have included Katy Feeney, the MLB VP in charge of scheduling, who helped make sense of the interleague scheduling challenges, and Randy Marsh, the supervisor of umpires for MLB, who gave a fascinating account of how umpires are graded, and how new technologies might impact umpiring in the future.

In terms of regular guests, one show this week included Braves closer Craig Kimbrel and Pirates GM Neil Huntington.  Beyond talking about the Pirates, Olney and Huntington told stories about their upbringing on dairy farms, and with Kimbrel, Olney engaged him in a great discussion about his dedication to Alabama football fanhood.  This, coupled with some initial analysis of the previous day's games, injury updates, some interesting facts, and ESPN audio clips from the embattled Don Mattingly and Terry Francona, who discussed his return to Boston, may not seem earth-shaking, but the accumulation of first-rate guests eventually provides the listener with an extraordinary view of baseball's rich tapestry.

Let's hope Olney sticks with the podcast.