So where do we stand?
It has taken 10 years (or 60 depending on how you look at it) but we are
on the cusp of having a near complete series.
We now know that Rare Sports has 4 of these games in complete form, one
game missing a single at-bat and two partial broadcasts.
After the jump, we will combine all the information we have
to give the most complete view of the series to date.
Game 1
Runtime: 2 hours 32 minutes
What’s missing? : Broadcast is believed to be complete Sign-on? : Yes, including Armed Forces Network sign-on.
Sign-off? : Yes
Commercials? : Yes
Source? : Armed Forces Network
Availability: A DVD copy is sold, containing both the television and radio audio attached to the broadcast. This DVD was made available in 2015 around the same time that the kinescope reels were sold on eBay for $1500.
Game 2
Runtime: 2 hours 17 minutes
What’s missing? : Broadcast is believed to be complete
Sign-on? : Unknown
Sign-off? : Unknown
Commercials? : Yes
Source? : Armed Forces Network
Availability: A DVD copy is sold, containing both the television and radio audio attached to the broadcast. The DVD was made available in early 2017.
What’s missing? : Broadcast is believed to be complete
Sign-on? : Unknown
Sign-off? : Unknown
Commercials? : Yes
Source? : Armed Forces Network
Availability: A DVD copy is sold, containing both the television and radio audio attached to the broadcast. The DVD was made available in early 2017.
Game 3
Runtime: 3 hours 1 minute
What’s missing? : Tony Kubek’s 2nd homerun in the 7th inning.
Sign-off? : No
Commercials? : No
Source? : Unknown
Availability: A DVD copy is sold, containing only the television audio with the broadcast. The DVD was made available in 2007.
Runtime: Unknown
What’s missing? : Broadcast is believed to be complete.Sign-on? : Unknown
Sign-off? : Unknown
Commercials? : Unknown
Source? : Final reel comes from Armed Forces Network. Rare Sports holds another kinescope copy of this game that was acquired from the Milwaukee area.
Availability: On February 2, 2008 this game was shown in its entirety before a SABR gathering. In the original listing, a point was made of emphasizing that the game would be shown in its entirety. This was a classic 10-innings affair that ran 2 hours and 31 minutes. Since that date, no known copies have been made.
Game 5
Runtime: 1 hour 27 minutes
Sign-on? : No
Sign-off? : No
Commercials? : Yes
Source? : Unknown
Availability: A DVD copy is sold, containing both the television and radio audio with the broadcast. The DVD was made available in late 2013 but was later updated to include radio audio.
Game 6
Runtime:
What’s missing? : Contains most of the first 5 ½ innings but
is missing bottom of 3rd, all of innings 7-9. Sign-on? : No
Sign-off? : No
Commercials? : Yes
Source? : Unknown
Availability: This partial is sold as part of a World Series compilation disc that includes highlights from all 7 games, along with a World Series preview.
Game 7
Runtime: Unknown
What’s missing? : Broadcast is believed to be complete.Sign-on? : Unknown
Sign-off? : Unknown
Commercials? : Unknown
Source? : Unknown
Availability: On February 3, 2007, this game was shown in its entirety before a SABR gathering. Since that date, no known copies have been made.
While this may seem like an advertisement for Doak Ewing’s enterprise, the truth is we are currently limited to only their offerings. The lone other known kinescope copy of a game (Game 1) was sold by Rare Sports through a consignment seller; however the whereabouts of the copy are still unknown. A search of MLB’s content shows only news and World Series film footage. The reality is that Rare Sports has been the only entity to produce the broadcast footage from this series.
The trade, as always, that you get with a private entity
versus a professional league has both pros cons. One of the pros with these broadcasts being
distributed by a private entity is that they are being shown in nearly complete
original form. Commercials and network
pregame/postgame footage remains intact, when a commercial release by a league
would face many licensing issues.
Another is that they are actually seeing the light of day. Despite an often slow, drawn out time period
between the releases by Rare Sports or the amount of time it often takes for
materials to find their way out of private collections, they eventually make it
out to the public. In the case of MLB, we
haven’t seen a game over 30 years old released in nearly 5 years. Their network has stopped showing full,
classic broadcasts altogether and their YouTube channel only releases snippets
and clips.
The cons come in the limitations in technology, packaging
and bonus materials. Leagues have the
full rights to use team logos, artifacts, photographs and any other
accompanying materials related to the teams involved. Likewise, in this case, MLB has a vast
archive of footage ranging back most of the leagues history. We do not know what MLB has from this series
in their vaults. Leagues also have the
resources to bring in former players, announcers and team personnel to provide
commentary or backstory to the events that take place during these series. Leagues also have deep pockets which allow
for extensive restorations, cleanups and transfers in an archival format so
that these rare, decaying pieces of media survive for future generations.
The bottom line: While it has taken us a decade (or 6) to
get here, we are finally inching closer to this entire series being in the
hands of the public. At the current pace
of 2 years per game, hopefully we are all around in 2021 to see this Fall
Classic from start to finish.
Editorial Note: This post will be updated regularly as new
information becomes available.
Great to hear the release of Game 2, but where is Game 4 when Eddie Matthews hit the game winner off Tommy Byrne in the bottom of the 10th. Keep up the great work!!
ReplyDeleteBen - One thought would be that Doak knows that Game 4 was the most exciting (Howard 9th inning 3 run game-tying HR/Matthews 10th inning come from behind walkoff) and Game 7 is the most important, so he held those two back.
DeleteWe've known since 2008 that he exhibited both games in their entirety to Milwaukee-area SABR chapters. The only other explanation would be that the quality of the prints are not great or are not good enough for video release.
Either way it becomes a waiting game. Hopefully some day the missing footage from Games 3, 5 and 6 are also found.
I don't see Game 3 on the Rare Sports Films site. Have they pulled it? Or did you find it somewhere else?
ReplyDeleteSteve,
DeleteIt does appear to not be listed on RareSportsFilm. It is one of his older offerings, so maybe he is getting ready to update it. It could use an update to include radio broadcast or if he found the missing at-bat or pregame.
Game 3 is available on Baseball Direct at the following link:
https://baseballdirect.com/product/baseball-videos/world-series-videos/world-series-videos-year/ws-1950s/1957-world-series-game-3/
Hope that helps!
He has all 7 games of the series, with maybe a few small gaps. Why he is sitting on it, who knows. He sat on the Larson perfect game for decades and he also has game 1 of the 1955 series.
ReplyDeleteIt really is getting a bit outrageous waiting for all these games to finally see the light of day. At first I thought he was saving them up for the anniversary, but last year came and went with nothing. I don't understand what he's waiting for anymore...surely he must realize the audience is slowly disappearing.
ReplyDeleteThat's the first I've heard about 1955 game 1 though; where did you hear that from? My dream however, would be for significant portions of the 1958 series to show up for the 60th anniversary this fall. I would love to see the clutch pitching of Turley and play of Hank Bauer culminating in dramatic games 6 and 7.
Has anyone tried to call Ewing and ask him why he's just sitting on a hidden goldmine of games?
I, too, had not heard about the 1955 WS Game 1 but it wouldn't surprise me. He has partials of Game 2 and Game 5.
DeleteOften times, when it comes to Doak, there are a few reasons he would sit on a game.
1) the quality just isn't that great, making it a rough watch. He doesn't have the resources or technology to restore a lot of these films.
2) it isn't worth his time to transfer/sell the film for whatever reason (too much missing, not great shape, not a lot of interest)
3) he has a limited resource here. Once he has made available the last of his films, that's it unless he finds more. Keeping games in reserve keeps his business going.
4) There could always be a financial reason we don't know about when it comes to any potential licensing with MLB.
5) He's holding out hope he finds more footage of a partial game that he can then merge and sell
None of those are great reasons and I would rather have access to all the games he has. Whether we ever get that, who knows. I know he recently (this year) came into possession of at least two more partials of an All-Star Game and a GOTW. Whether we ever see these, who knows. His baseball releases this year have been nearly non-existent.
Well, Doak has just listed game 7 of the 1956 world series on his site. Another classic is finally accounted for!
DeleteWhen I last spoke to Doak which was probably late 90s, he told me he would release game 1 of the '55 World Series in ten years. It is now over 20 years later and he still has not done so.
ReplyDelete