The Athletics and Radio

Baseball on terrestrial radio is down a team in the Bay Area.

The Oakland Athletics announced earlier this week that they will not have a local flagship station in 2020 (and for the foreseeable future).

Instead, A's baseball will heard around San Francisco and Oakland via the TuneIn Radio app.

This sounds fatal but, really, it's not. The A's will still have radio affiliates in other parts of California.

And yet?

I know -- OK, boomer -- but it's a bummer to know that if you're in the car around the Bay Area, you won't be able to hear the A's on your terrestrial car radio.

Still, there's TuneIn and SiriusXM.

But, for me, it's sad, even if it was inevitable.

Is this the beginning of a trend? Some would say it's already happened. Teams in other sports have opted for walking away from local radio for an internet stream.

Many minor league baseball teams have gone this way also.

Like, ahem, the Hudson Valley Renegades, who left the three-station network that "we" were on a few years ago. Yet you'll hear us loud and very clear on the internet (including TuneIn Radio).

I'm not here to advocate for one or the other. At this point, I simply want there to be an audio element for sports.

It's always too easy to push for video and hey, I get it, it's great. I've worked on TV and video streams and it is wonderful.

You probably know I love me some Local Live (and will be on there tomorrow at 6 p.m., calling Brunswick hockey against The Gunnery, as Hockey Fights Cancer).

But there's still something to be said about listening to a game while in the car or mowing the lawn or maybe working around the house. It's can still be the soundtrack of a BBQ.

That's part of why I created Robcasting. It can act as the simulcast of the video feed when needed.

Anyway, I don't know that this is anything more than one baseball team dropping a flagship station in their city, but it's something that we'll be keeping an eye on.