In order to represent so many fans’ sentiments about the rising difficulty in finding where to watch MLB games, the Yankees found the perfect complainer.
YES Network released a new commercial Friday featuring “Seinfeld” mastermind and “Curb Your Enthusiasm” star Larry David in order to show how easy it is to watch games on their network. David, struggling to find a Yankees game on TV, calls up longtime play-by-play announcer Michael Kay to help him in the commercial.
“Hey Michael, I’m trying to get the Yankee game,” David says. “How do I get it?”
“Just say it into the remote,” Kay says, “watch the Yankees on YES Network.”
The commercial comes as more and more MLB games are broadcast on streaming platforms, taking games away from traditional local outlets like YES Network. It has left fans needing to pony up more money for streaming platforms and has their heads spinning trying to figure out where to watch each game.
The Yankees’ Opening Day win over the Giants, for example, was broadcast on Netflix.
“On a personal level, it’s frustrating to not do a big game. And Opening Day is a big regular-season game, and now it’s two years in a row that we haven’t done it,” Kay told The Post. “So that’s certainly not ideal. The YES Network, we think we cover the game better or as well as anybody. And we’re not gonna be able to do it until Friday.
“But I get it, I get the economics of it, you have to get involved with streaming services, so they sold this game. And the way that I look at it, if you’re gonna be the announcer for the Yankees, you know that they are gonna take every single national game that they’re allowed to take.”
Kay’s relationship with David dates back a number of years, when Kay hosted David on YES Network’s “CenterStage” show.
“He happens to be a really big sports fan,” Kay said. “He’s not just like one of these celebrity sports fans. He really knows what’s going on. He’ll text me during games: ‘Why’d they do that?’ The commercial is kind of built on that, too.
“If you watch the spot, it could’ve been an episode of ‘Curb.’ I’m sure they could’ve built it out to half an hour. He’s a guy who doesn’t suffer things easily. … The thing that I learned about Larry is he is that guy on ‘Curb,’ but just not mean. He doesn’t have great patience and stuff like that. He doesn’t suffer fools gladly. This commercial was kind of right in his wheelhouse.”
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
