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Yellowknife ball fan hits World Series broadcast

Herb Mathisen
Northern News Services
Published Friday, October 31, 2008

SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - It's not often a Yellowknifer gets the chance to ask a question in front of an audience of millions around the world.

Yet on Sunday night - and from his own home, no less - resident Matt Simms got just that opportunity.

NNSL Photo/Graphic

Baseball fan Matt Simms watched the World Series with his 15-month-old daughter, Leora, over the past week. During game four Sunday night, announcers read a question regarding the likelihood of instituting instant replay in Major League Baseball, posed by the Yellowknife resident via email. Unfortunately Simms didn't get to hear the answer to his question, as friends and family immediately called him upon hearing his name. - Herb Mathisen/NNSL photo

The question: What is the probability of having instant replay instituted by Major League Baseball?

In the bottom of the seventh inning of game four of baseball's World Series, announcers Dave O'Brien and former-pitcher Rick Sutcliffe fielded fan questions about the game. After replying to queries from places as far off as the pacific island of Guam, O'Brien read an email sent in from Yellowknife, Northwest Territories.

Simms said he wasn't expecting to hear his name.

"Yeah, I was pretty surprised it got in," he said.

After seeing a blown call in the first inning of the game - in a series already marred by many questionable calls from umpires - Simms whipped off to the computer room to send the email.

He asked the announcers how instant replay could be further incorporated into Major League Baseball games in order to get calls right. Simms said it would be tricky, as adding instant replay would make baseball games even longer than the three hours they already are.

The email was read and the announcers weighed in with their opinions.

Did Simms agree with their answers?

"To be honest, my phone was ringing right away," he said.

"It kind of wasted the whole point of it," he laughed.

Simms said his sister and her husband called from Winnipeg. He also heard from some of his family down East.

"It was pretty crazy," he said, "but it was cool that it got out on the air."

Simms said he's also received quite a few emails from friends - with some bugging him that he's now a "rockstar."

"They said it's the first time they heard someone from Yellowknife make it onto an international broadcast," he said.

This is not the first time Simms' questions have gotten through on a broadcast, however.

In the past, he said he has had a couple questions answered by Toronto Blue Jays' announcer Rance Mulliniks during Canadian games.

He said he thought his luck could be attributed to the stations trying to showcase their national or international reach by airing feedback from fans as "far-off" as Yellowknife.

Simms, a ball player and an avid Blue Jays fan, watched the World Series between the Tampa Bay Rays and Philadelphia Phillies with his 15-month-old daughter Leora, and said he was rooting for the Rays - one of the Blue Jay's divisional rivals.

"I'm taking it on the chin," he said, earlier this week. "I want Tampa Bay to win so they have some World Series hangover next year and do not take out the (Blue) Jays."

He explained it has been rare lately for a team to repeat as champion and if Tampa Bay won, they could mail it in next year.

"It's a little selfish," he said of his Tampa Bay support.

As it turned out, his cheering couldn't help out the team. Tampa Bay lost the fifth and deciding game Wednesday night 4-3.