The Tuesday Discussion: In-Game TV Interviews

June 10, 2025

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This week we asked our writers to respond to the following:

What is your opinion of the in-game interviews with baseball players during telecasts?

Here are their replies...

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Paul Semendinger - I dislike them greatly. They add nothing to the game. They only distract from the game. The interviews aren't interesting. They are mundane. The players can get distracted. I do not need to hear from a player as he is playing. These interviews take away my enjoyment of the game. I mute the tv when they're on. (The same with the in-game manager interviews as well.)

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Mike Whiteman - As a "child of the 80s" I grew up where the interviews were before or after the game, and that was fine. Of course the technology to wire up a player on the field wasn't yet perfected.  

Today we can see the interview on the field while the game is on. While I'm not sure I'd want my players taking part in this if I were manager, it could be interesting for me as a fan, especially if the right questions (how are you positioning for this player, what are you anticipating, etc.) are asked. 

In the end, it doesn't really impact my enjoyment of the game. 

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Ed Botti - Terrible.  Ridiculous.  Distracting. 

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Cary Greene - Fans seem to like in-game interviews and with the game steadily changing over the years and becoming what it is today, I think anything baseball can do to appeal to its fans and cater to their lust for content is probably a good thing. That said, this past Sunday night, Jazz Chisolm botched a spin throw while in the middle of an in-game interview. Chisholm was manning third base during the interview as Ceddane Rafaela hit a tough chopper in the hole as Chisholm fielded the and attempted a 360 throw on the play. Chisholm would have had Rafaela by a full step had his throw been accurate, but Rafaela took second base on the errant throw as Chisholm cursed into the microphone. 

Old school baseball fans are probably turned off by the notion of giving an on field athlete a microphone during the flow of a game and Chisholm's incident on Sunday night probably throws fuel on their fire, but my opinion remains unchanged because I do think it makes the game more entertaining for most fans. Do I personally like the in-game interviews? Yes, but I'd rather see them done from the dugout, while the player is awaiting his turn in the on deck circle. I don't really see the need for on-field interviews while the player is playing defense. 

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Derek McAdam - I’ve personally never been a huge fan of the in-game interviews. The players never seem to be fully engaged (understandably) and usually give relatively simple responses. I’d be a little pre-occupied too if someone started asking me many questions while I was doing my job. 

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Tim Kabel - I do not like in-game interviews of players. I think it is gimicky and it takes away from the game. We just saw Jazz Chisholm, Jr. make an error while he was wearing a mike. There is no guarantee that he wouldn’t have made the error if he wasn’t wearing the mike, but, the fact that he was distracted, probably contributed to it. I don’t know if this practice will go away, but it should.

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EDITOR'S NOTE - I asked Google Gemini to create the image using this prompt; "Can you make a graphic of a Yankees baseball player talking on a telephone from the 1970s while playing on the field?"