‘Get Up’ and ‘First Take’ ignored MLB Home Run Derby, which is airing on ESPN

ESPN has the Major League Baseball Home Run Derby on Monday night, but you wouldn’t know it by watching Get Up or First Take that morning.

The days of MLB being a hot topic on ESPN are long gone, but when the network is set to air one of the league’s premier events, it would be in their best interest to sell the fans on caring by pretending to care themselves. And with the Home Run Derby on ESPN, Get Up and First Take didn’t seem to care.

MLB got a spot on the bottom line ticker, and there were a couple of commercials promoting the event during the 8 a.m. – noon ET hours on ESPN. Get Up! gave its audience a baseball-related highlight by showing Mr. Met falling off the stage during The Lumineers’ concert at Citi Field. Host Peter Schrager closed the show by noting that the Home Run Derby would air at 8 p.m. on ESPN.

But a segment on MLB or the Home Run Derby? Nope. Even on ESPN.com, the MLB scores page lists Monday as a dark day with no events.

Need to manufacture a segment on LeBron James or the Dallas Cowboys? Get Up and First Take are your preeminent destinations. But with ESPN airing the Home Run Derby at night, they couldn’t think of anything?

ESPN was very football-heavy on Monday morning’s Get Up and First Take. So, you don’t want to force Dan Orlovsky to break down the Derby, fine. Surely, you can find someone who can read a list of the top-5 Home Run Derby performances, give us a compilation of a Chris Berman yelling “Back, back, back, back, gone!” or ask Karl Ravech if he thinks Cal Raleigh can hit 70 homers.

Do something to make the Home Run Derby look like an event ESPN cares about, without having to push the NFL aside.

Instead, ESPN left it up to The Pat McAfee Show to remind audiences they had the Derby Monday night. While MLB topics went missing on Get Up and First Take, McAfee’s show aired live from the site of the Derby in Atlanta, where he interviewed Rob Manfred, CC Sabathia, and Aaron Judge during the ESPN portion. McAfee also interviewed Shohei Ohtani during the YouTube hour of his show, after hosting All-Star Media Day on MLB Network.

Perhaps this was an attempt by ESPN to downplay MLB’s importance, following its reported rekindling of media rights discussions last month. But it also seems to do itself a disservice by treating the Derby as an insignificant event when it’s airing on their network.

To their credit, ESPN did have SportsCenter broadcasting from Atlanta Monday afternoon. And we’re not saying Get Up or First Take should have been there, just pretend to acknowledge the Derby’s existence.