London Calling!

[Cowtipper]

London Neighborhoods Ranked by a Guy who Has Never Been to London, but is Dimly Aware of the City, Mostly from Rock Records

Are those like stone tablets or something?

[Johnny Lunchbucket]

London Neighborhoods Ranked by a Guy who Has Never Been to London, but is Dimly Aware of the City, Mostly from Rock Records

1) Soho — It’s where Roger Daltrey woke up in somebody’s garden and it was the epicenter of all that was swinging in 1968. Also, Shane MacGowan snogged some girl there while taking shelter on a rainy night, and I'd like to do the same.

2) Mayfair — On the London Monopoly board, Mayfair is their Boardwalk. Also, it's where some hairy-handed gent was spotted by Warren Zevon after he ran amok in Kent.

3) Waterloo — Sure you can take in a play at the Old Vic, but if you don’t want to watch a sunset with Ray Davies here, you and I can’t be friends.

4) Hampstead — God damn it, when Chrissy Hynde describes fat cats driving past corrugated tin shacks full up with kids, she specifies that she doesn’t mean a Hampstead nursery, and I can only conclude that Hampstead has the finest nurseries in the world. If you want to fuck with rich House of Lords kids, this is clearly where to find them.

6) Covent Garden — Robyn Hitchcock says he’s been hanging round here for centuries, and I can only conclude that it’s clearly never boring.

7) West End — If you’re gonna go nuts, pointing a gun in your hand at your head, kicking in chairs and knocking down tables, this is the place to do it. Otherwise, there’s probably a Miss Saigon revival you can take in.

8) Brighton — Go to the beach, or rumble with The Stray Cats — really, it's up to you!!

9) King’s Cross and Euston — It’s where the Pet Shop Boys found themselves lost and it’s where I can visit the British Library.

10) Notting Hill — It’s where Mark Knopfler formed The Notting Hillbillies and the epicenter of some of the Londoniest parks.

11) Kensington and Chelsea — All the best museums are there, even if Elvis Costello didn’t want to go there.

12) Shoreditch — Rod Stewart didn’t want to get married there, but it has a badass name and I think it would give me some street cred to be able to claim I've been there.

13) Islington — Apart from the lovely strolls upon the canal, Marillion identified this as where The Thief of Baghdad hides, presumably when he’s not in Baghdad.

14) The City — The Jam says there's a thousand faces here and they’re all shining bright. Also, the kids there know where it’s at, so this is a place I’d totally want to check out on my first visit to London. Plus … St. Paul’s Cathedral!!

15) Camden — A world-famous market, and The Devil Moon took Shane MacGowan up here in pursuit of a London girl.

Good

[whippoorwill]

It's seeming more and more that this isn't about bringing baseball to the people of London but about bringing American baseball fans to spend money in London.

I think if I was there I would ignore the MLB promotional stuff (other than the game, of course) and spend my time exploring the city.

Is this your first trip to London, or had you been there before?

Just found this thread and your first sentence sounds about right to me.
Maybe that wasn’t how they expected it to be though.

[Gwreck]

It's seeming more and more that this isn't about bringing baseball to the people of London but about bringing American baseball fans to spend money in London.

I think if I was there I would ignore the MLB promotional stuff (other than the game, of course) and spend my time exploring the city.

Is this your first trip to London, or had you been there before?

Just found this thread and your first sentence sounds about right to me.
Maybe that wasn’t how they expected it to be though.

Again, how is this assessment being made? I do not have that sense at all after actually being here.

No doubt Milwaukee or Cincinnati won’t be asked to come to London anytime soon, and there of course was a sizeable US contingent but in no way do I get the sense that this was focused on US fans. There were tons of people there in gear from other teams (even including Tampa (!). This is a European-focused event first and foremost.

[Johnny Lunchbucket]

Of course. If it was only about drawing tourists to London it wouldn't make any sense.

MLB needs to find fans to replace us or it'll die once we do. They see English speaking places like UK and places where baseball is played (Latin America, Japan, Korea) as the most obvious locations.

NFL & NBA & NHL see the same thing. NHL took 4 teams to Sweden and held an exhibition in Melbourne this year. NFL will play in Brazil and France in addition to London this year, most-ever international games.

[whippoorwill]

It's seeming more and more that this isn't about bringing baseball to the people of London but about bringing American baseball fans to spend money in London.

I think if I was there I would ignore the MLB promotional stuff (other than the game, of course) and spend my time exploring the city.

Is this your first trip to London, or had you been there before?

Just found this thread and your first sentence sounds about right to me.
Maybe that wasn’t how they expected it to be though.

Again, how is this assessment being made? I do not have that sense at all after actually being here.

No doubt Milwaukee or Cincinnati won’t be asked to come to London anytime soon, and there of course was a sizeable US contingent but in no way do I get the sense that this was focused on US fans. There were tons of people there in gear from other teams (even including Tampa (!). This is a European-focused event first and foremost.

Good to hear!

I love that you are there

[Johnny Lunchbucket]

I don't recall seeing this at the time but apparently plans in the CBA for a 2025 series in Paris quietly fell through after failing to find a local promoter.
https://apnews.com/article/mlb-paris-ca ... 01f9e07a9c

[Lefty Specialist]

Boy, having also been there, I have a pretty different take. This was not for the Brits- there were random locals there but it was almost purely Americans. If MLB is looking to expand their footprint this isn't the place to do it. If they wanted a young diverse European crowd, what they got was a crowd that skewed older, white and American, with some families as well. In other words, very much like a game at Citizens Bank Park.

There were people with all sorts of jerseys, but even they were mostly Americans. I see people wearing Marlins jerseys at Mets games against the Pirates, too.

This is speaking from left-center field. (Section 239). It was a great experience and the last game was spine-tingling. But it's just a junket for Americans. In places like Mexico, San Juan, the DR or even Japan and Korea, it's a different story because the locals actally care about the sport. Not here.

Your kilometers may vary.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Boy, having also been there, I have a pretty different take. This was not for the Brits- there were random locals there but it was almost purely Americans. If MLB is looking to expand their footprint this isn't the place to do it. If they wanted a young diverse European crowd, what they got was a crowd that skewed older, white and American, with some families as well. In other words, very much like a game at Citizens Bank Park.

There were people with all sorts of jerseys, but even they were mostly Americans. I see people wearing Marlins jerseys at Mets games against the Pirates, too.

This is speaking from left-center field. (Section 239). It was a great experience and the last game was spine-tingling. But it's just a junket for Americans. In places like Mexico, San Juan, the DR or even Japan and Korea, it's a different story because the locals actally care about the sport. Not here.

Your kilometers may vary.

A friend of mine went to the London games with his wife and kids. His experience resembles very much what you just posted.

[Gwreck]

No reports yet on this series but last year’s Cubs-Cardinals series had 71% of the ticket sales coming from the UK.

[Lefty Specialist]

MLB made you buy the tickets through Ticketmaster UK, so I'm surprised it wasn't 100%.

[Gwreck]

I didn’t personally audit their methodology but have no reason to doubt the data. Given that you have to put in a billing address for tickets, they know full well if the tickets are being bought in the UK or overseas.

[nymr83]

Of course. If it was only about drawing tourists to London it wouldn't make any sense.

MLB needs to find fans to replace us or it'll die once we do. They see English speaking places like UK and places where baseball is played (Latin America, Japan, Korea) as the most obvious locations.

NFL & NBA & NHL see the same thing. NHL took 4 teams to Sweden and held an exhibition in Melbourne this year. NFL will play in Brazil and France in addition to London this year, most-ever international games.

I don't really know much about the NHL. I Would strongly suspect though that the NFL and NBA both don't have the demographic problem that MLB does (fans being older) - both sports are VERY popular and the NFL in particular would still be an immensely profitable enterprise if nobody outside the United States ever watched.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Maybe MLB should add more playoff teams. Then more fans would be interested and attendance would rise and the money would roll in. MLB could maximize this idea by letting every team qualify for the playoffs. Think how much money they'd make then. If that's not enough money, MLB could rename the regular season as the playoffs. Then they'd make so much money that they wouldn't have a place to store it all and so they'd have to give some of the money back to the fans. They could schedule giveaway money days where they shoot hundred dollar bills into the stands from those old t-shirt guns. Fans would pay higher ticket prices to attend those games. But that would mean even more money that MLB would in turn, have to shoot right back at the crazy fans who spent hundreds of dollars for field level seats for those games The league would make so much money in this vicious circle that in the end, MLB would have to reduce the number of playoff teams in order to make a proper amount of money that it could rightly store.

[Lefty Specialist]

Uncle Steve could do that right now if he wanted to. Shoot Benjamins instead of t-shirts into the crowd. Makes more sense than signing Joey Wendle or Omar Narvaez.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Inside the experience of MLB's London Series, which mattered much more than the Mets vs. Phillies scores
The Phillies and Mets split two games at London Stadium, but the weekend was not about the results

Excerpt:

LONDON -- I planned my honeymoon around the Mets, which in hindsight (and at the time of booking, if I'm being honest) was a terrible idea.

Jet-lagged, dehydrated and somehow slightly sunburned, I headed into London Stadium, prepared to watch the National League-leading Phillies stomp the Mets in front of crowds of 55,000 people. It felt like I was being punished for some mortal sin I didn't know I'd committed.

The London Series, it turns out, was perfect.

The baseball wasn't particularly good, unless you consider ninth-inning chaos good (which I do, to be clear, but your mileage may vary). But The Baseball, that joyous, life-ruining, addictive part of our soul that we can't seem to rid ourselves us, was good.

The Brits may not understand baseball but they know how to put on a show. The concourse around London Stadium, built for the 2012 Olympics and now home to the West Ham United of the Premier League, was packed with the English idea of American food: disgustingly overloaded two-foot hot dogs and pizza that looked like cardboard and Philly cheesesteaks topped with a sauce I'm pretty sure glowed in the dark. There were jugglers and dancers and a marching band that didn't march and batting cages and a DJ and beer bats taller than me (I'd unfortunately learn on the tube ride home that selling people that much beer AND a makeshift weapon is a terrible idea).

It felt more like a Phillies home game inside, which would have been fine and a credit to the fandom had that not resulted in raucous booing of Quad-A relievers they'd probably never even heard of and definitely had no reason to boo other than the shirt they wore. But the main takeaway is that everyone was happy to be there, even as Sean Manaea gave up a three-run home run to Whit Merrifield and Jose Alvarado imploded to a level that should be considered treasonous. None of that particularly mattered. The boxscores say Mets and Phillies split the series. Great. Good for them.

Read it all at https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/insi ... es-scores/

[MFS62]

Anyone who plans their honeymoon around baseball is our kind of person.
Later

[Lefty Specialist]

I would have gotten one of those beer bats if I thought it would fit in my carryon luggage. They were cool, and lots were sold.

He's right though, those two-foot hot dogs were gross.

[batmagadanleadoff]

London Series two-pint beer bat

[Lefty Specialist]

What was funny was that when you got down to the bottom of the bat it was really hard to drink and a lot of beer was spilled onto faces and shirts. That pic is from Saturday's game, where the weather was really sunny and it got downright hot in the leftfield seats, like being in the bleachers at Wrigley. Someone even tried to get a cup snake going with moderate success.

[MFS62]

How was the beer(or didn't it matter)?

Later

[Lefty Specialist]

Beer was.....eh. I had a few Heinekens. Not very crafty. There probably was more variety somewhere, but I never found it.

At the other end, the mens rooms were well run and cleaner than you might expect.

[Edgy MD]

I just realized that I left out my love for Clapham, where the girl came from that Squeeze never thought it would happen with, but it did.