Major League Baseball just doesn’t get it.  Archaic blackout rules, postseason game times that alienate potential future fans, and an economic system that allows some teams to serve as farm teams for a few big market teams, leave many outsiders scratching their heads.  Add baseball’s latest internet offering, Postseason.TV, to the list of baseball’s facepalm moments.

Due to the misfortune of having a few unavoidable scheduling conflicts (coupled with MLB’s insane 2:37 p.m. game time for the first two games), I went into the National League Division Series between the Philadelphia Phillies and Colorado Rockies knowing I’d be away from the television for parts of the games.  As a result, I searched for an app that would allow me to watch the games on my iPhone.  The normal TV feed is available on the iPhone, unless you’re in an area subject to a blackout restriction.  The catch?  The entire U.S. and Canada are within the blackout zone.  Lovely.

Major League Baseball does offer an alternative called Postseason.TV.  Available on your computer and on the iPhone, Postseason.TV does provide video coverage of the games.  The catch this time?  It is awful.

Postseason.TV costs $9.99, and requires you to play the role of television producer.  The app presents you with a list of cameras at the stadium, and you have to pick which camera view you want to watch.  You choose between camera views such as “High Home Plate” and “Left Field Stands.”  Nobody switches camera views for you, so you’re stuck on that camera until you manually switch to another camera.  There are a few split screen options, such as “Quad Mode” on the iPhone.  This might sound interesting, but trust me- it isn’t.  There are more than just a few problems with this:

– There isn’t a single camera angle that is enough, by itself, to even remotely follow a game.  Some angles are rather pointless by themselves, unless perhaps you have a favorite player you want to watch while missing the action.

– If you want to back out of one camera view and switch to another, there is a delay before the new camera kicks in.  So, forget about playing producer, and switching cameras in the middle of a play.

– Even though you can keep multiple cameras on screen, they often aren’t in sync.  So you could be seeing two different pieces of action at the same time.

– In Quad Mode on the iPhone, two of the views that you’re stuck with are views of each team’s dugout.  Exciting.

– There are no graphics on the screen, such as batting averages or player names.

– The connection on the iPhone isn’t reliable.  It stutters, pauses, get blurry, and cuts out.  I finally gave up on the first game I watched, and switched to an audio feed.

Major League Baseball bills this as a “supplement” to television coverage.  No thanks.  Given the clumsiness of the app, it only takes away from the enjoyment of the game.  It certainly doesn’t enhance it.

I have to imagine that network contractual issues are responsible for the crippled offerings of Postseason.TV, because Major League Baseball couldn’t willingly foist this monstrosity on its fans.  Presumably, MLB and the networks are worried about siphoning viewers away from the television broadcast, but how many fans prefer to watch games on a computer?  Very few.  It is people like me who have no choice, for one reason or another, who watch games on a computer.  Even if you have a choice, stay away from Postseason.TV.