Video, audio of Kelso's games will air on Net
Wednesday, August 16, 2006 6:59 AM PDT
By Ben Zimmerman
Printable version
E-mail this articleThanks to the inspired efforts of former Kelso baseball standout Chris McCoy, anyone with Internet access will be able to watch video of Kelso at the 13-15 Babe Ruth World Series in Clifton Park, N.Y.
McCoy, a 2001 Kelso High graduate and senior-to-be at the University of Washington, will join several of his colleagues from PitchSmarter.com at the World Series, where they will stream video footage for all of Kelso's games. The footage can be accessed at www.pitchsmarter.com, which will also include a message board, statistics, a way for fans, parents or coaches to upload their own tournament video to the site, and possibly a daily blog by Kelso manager Bob Rice.
"This literally developed out of a fraternity dorm room," McCoy said. "There's gonna be bugs, and it won't be perfect by any means because we'll be making updates and changes in real time."
McCoy said there is a 25 percent chance that Kelso's games will be Webcast live. More likely, the games will be downloadable on an inning-by-inning basis several hours after their completion.
"At the very least, every Kelso game will be available the next morning," said McCoy.
Fans here, however, can listen to all of Kelso's games live on KLOG Radio (1490 AM). KLOG's Kirc Roland will provide play-by-play and his son Spencer, a senior-to-be at Mark Morris, will serve as the color commentator.
PitchSmarter.com is an information resource for parents, players and coaches involved in youth baseball with innovative media features. McCoy described the World Series endeavor as the "kick-start" for the next phase of the company's vision.
"This is the first time this has ever been done," he said, "and Kelso is the first team. It's pretty cool to be able to rest on that. I grew up in Kelso, and this could be the start of my company making it ---- using Kelso (youth baseball) as the starting point.
"We want to create an online community and let it manage itself," McCoy added. "Our ultimate goal is to let parents, kids and coaches share their video and express themselves."
McCoy and his associates raised $8,000 in five days to finance their trip, which will not earn them any money.
"For me, the decision to do this is because it is Kelso," he said. "I remember when Jeff Bailey's team went to the World Series. He was 12, I was 8. The first thing I did every morning was pick up the sports page. I listened to Kirc (Roland of KLOG) every game. I saved all the pictures.
"This is all about building a community around content, and letting the community provide and drive that content," added McCoy.
McCoy hopes to receive access to the skills competition at the 13-15 World Series on Thursday, and said the site will begin featuring Series content "in the next few days."
The process for adding video footage (for parents and others) is "as easy as drag-and-drop," he said.
free spirit wrote on Feb 7, 2008 1:19 AM:
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