Nursing a 1-0 lead against the Minnesota Twins, the San Francisco Giants seemed to be in a lot of trouble. In the bottom of the eighth inning, Minnesota’s first two runners reached, creating a first-and-third with nobody out situation. San Francisco relievers John Brebbia and Camilo Doval worked their way out of it. And there’s a decent chance that viewers of the game didn’t see it — or even know it was happening. They were too busy watching a preview of Monarch.
After the seventh inning of that game, there was a rain delay, which lasted a little less than an hour. When the delay started, Fox took viewers of the Giants and Twins game to see the Atlanta Braves versus St. Louis Cardinals. When the game in St. Louis ended, Fox began broadcasting a look into its upcoming show, Monarch. When San Francisco and Minnesota resumed play, the Fox broadcast did not go back to the game at Target Field.
watching the giants game pic.twitter.com/j5Gk7Gl5R1
— Grant Brisbee (@GrantBrisbee) August 28, 2022
This naturally upset some people.
The Giants-Twins game was on Fox. Game went to a rain delay that lasted about 50 minutes so they switched to Braves-Cardinals. Ok. Cardinals win, Fox says bye. Giants and Twins are playing now, and the game isn’t on TV. Well done, Fox.
— Steve Berman (@BASportsGuy) August 28, 2022
https://twitter.com/dopb_29/status/1563720310901264384
@MLBONFOX where is the Giants and Twins game? What happened? #raindelayover
— Martin Aguilar (@martinarttweets) August 28, 2022
The game was available on the Fox Sports app and getting it was a painless process. There was no signup necessary. All anyone had to do was load the app into their smart device and it was there to be watched.
Unfortunately, that was not made clear. That was not made clear during the Monarch preview on FOX and it wasn’t mentioned on either team’s Twitter account. Both the Giants and Twins noted the delay.
Tonight’s #SFGiants game in Minnesota is now under a weather delay. We will inform you of any updates as information becomes available. pic.twitter.com/JWAj3SsDkb
— SFGiants (@SFGiants) August 28, 2022
We are now in a weather delay through 7 innings of play.
— Minnesota Twins (@Twins) August 28, 2022
But neither made an update about the progress of the delay.
Eventually, the main Fox network did resume its coverage. But several key moments of the game took place while other programming was being shown.
And the worst thing about this is that this was not a blowout. Not going back to a game (at least in the local markets) would be bad. But if it was a lopsided game, it’s unlikely that anyone would care that much. But the Giants were up 1-0 at the time of the delay. The game ended up going into extra innings after the Twins staged a dramatic tw0-out rally in the bottom of the ninth inning.
The “Heidi Game” happened in 1968. For the last 54 years, it’s felt implausible that anything similar would happen. Yet on Saturday, it did.
[Grant Brisbee, Photo Credit: Fox]
