The Pittsburgh Pirates hosted the first major sporting event in Pittsburgh since March 10, a 129-day period, but there were no fans for their exhibition game against Cleveland on Saturday night at PNC Park.
There were, however, many cheers.
The Pirates have been playing games within the training squad in an empty ballpark filled with crowd noise that manager Derek Shelton called “league-wide standard.”
The crowd noise plays in a continuous loop, so the Pirates discovered that it is impossible to simulate the sounds of a pumped crowd cheering on the home team.
“I realized, hearing it for the first time, that you really can’t tell if it’s a local audience or not. I’m not sure who they’re supporting, ”said general manager Ben Cherington, with a smile. “This is all unprecedented, so you can tell us what you think of this.”
The Pirates’ player comments during training camp have been divided, as they expect a difference between their scrimmages within the squad and the exhibition and regular-season games against MLB opponents. Pirates pitcher Joe Musgrove, who started against Cleveland on Saturday night and will pitch on opening day in St. Louis, sees the automated noise from the crowd as “a little annoying.”
“I prefer it to be quiet, to be honest,” said Musgrove. “The sound, is constantly exactly the same, um, I don’t even know the word to use here, the same tone. It never changes.It is not like a real noise from the crowd where, in the moments of the game, after the blows, it becomes noisy and then goes down again, in the great moments it becomes noisy. It’s a kind of constant white noise sound. “
Hello Beautiful. pic.twitter.com/Ggkm5P2uv5
– Pirates (@Pirates) July 18, 2020
That was not the case when Musgrove was pitching against Cleveland on Saturday night. Even if it didn’t look like a baseball crowd, with thousands of empty seats, the Pirates tried to make it look like one. There was a recording of Vince Lascheid playing the organ, applause and the sound of guns firing after Musgrove stoked Carlos Santana for his third strikeout in the first inning. Walk-up music was played for the Pirates’ hitters, with automatic cheers when introduced by the public announcer.
“You don’t have the loud noise, and it’s not the true noise from the fan you hear,” said Musgrove. “It runs through the speakers, so it’s kind of weird. As for my ability to focus on the task at hand, it was almost the same. ”
The timing of automatic cheers, however, can be tricky. They shot before and after Bryan Reynolds singled to right on his first at-bat.
The noise from the automated crowd is especially noticeable to catchers, who are in the middle of the chatter between umpires and hitters or umpires and coaches. Pirate catcher Luke Maile likened the sound of the noise of the automated crowd to a truck rolling through the infield, especially when lined up inside.
“You are no longer really invisible as a receiver, so I am trying to set myself later (with) goals much more often than I would,” Maile said, “because if it is right or wrong, you feel kind of naked by there without having that white background noise. “
What bothered Pirates catcher Jacob Stallings was how uncomfortable he felt playing in silence before the noise of the crowd was thrown into the stadium. Several Pirates players compared it to high school or rookie games, when the only people in attendance were scouts.
“I really don’t want to hear the other teams’ conversations from their bench,” Stallings said, “and I don’t want them to listen to ours.”
That is a concern for Shelton, who discovered that everything that is said in one booth can be heard in the other. He hopes the noise of the automated crowd drowns out the chatter and protects managers as they discuss the strategy. Relay pitcher Kyle Crick suggested it is a good idea to avoid spreading disputes and junk conversations between teams.
“I think we should have a little white noise,” said Crick, with a smile, “just to confuse the microphones or anything else.”
This clip from #Pirates lets you hear the differences from the artificial crowd noise loop and automated applause at PNC Park, as Phillip Evans hits a triple RBI to Robbie Erlin’s center-right to score Josh Bell. pic.twitter.com/ajAWO0hH1s
– Kevin Gorman (@KevinGormanPGH) July 18, 2020
If MLB games can’t be played in front of fans, it doesn’t mean they can’t be played without fanfare. Expect crowd sounds to be audible, even if they’re automated and a bit annoying.
“I would prefer this over silence,” Shelton said. “In my opinion, there are certain conversations going on in the field that should not be overheard. You don’t want all the conversations between the batter and the umpire, between the catcher and the umpire and the manager and the umpire, some of those things should have some privacy for them, so having some noise is a good idea. ” .
Shelton has sat in the stands to measure the noise of the crowd, wandering through the infield and the garden to talk to the players about the volume. It’s been found to be louder in the stands than in the field, and the automated crowd noise loop has been tweaked to allow automatic cheers when teams are highly successful or score a race.
“I’d be really happy if some beer vendors or some peanut vendors or Cracker Jacks were thrown there. I think that would add up, ”Shelton said. “The only thing I think is that it can get a little rancid because it’s in a loop. If we could launch a few different put options it would be great. I think it will be fine. “
Kevin Gorman is a writer for the Tribune-Review. You can contact Kevin by email at [email protected] or by Twitter.
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Pirates / MLB | sports
