The Year Strat-O-Matic Became A Household Word
Strat and the 1981 Strike
The Year Strat-O-Matic Became A Household Word
Baseball was in trouble.
The 1981 strike did more damage than most of us understand. Not having daily boxscores was devastating for fans of the sport who had become accustomed to following the game on a daily basis. And, as those of us who have walked away from the sport know, it’s hard to get back into it once you’ve found something to take its place.
There were also services like Sportsphone, the New York Based service that centered around delivering sport score results through paid calls.
A few weeks after the strike started, SportsPhone announced its substitute service:
Now, this technically didn’t start the habit of Strat-O-Matic replacing baseball broadcasts. It was, however, a clear symbol of the times.
The clearest example of Strat-O-Matic replacing real baseball came on July 14th, when the All Star Game was supposed to take place in Cleveland. Strat-O-Matic fans got together at Municipal Stadium to play their own version of the game — and it received coverage in sports sections throughout the United States and Canada:
I should note that some were playing APBA as well. The APBA Journal reports that there were at least two All Star Games played using APBA — one of which featured none other than future villain Bud Selig:
Perhaps the most remarkable example of this phenomenon was The Minneapolis Star, which printed daily Strat-O-Matic boxscores for almost the entirety of the strike:
Sadly, it seems that nothing quite like this happened in 1994. And, as you know, the 1994 strike was far more devastating to baseball’s reputation in the end.
So was the 1981 strike made easier by Sportsphone and Strat-O-Matic? What do you think?