How FOX Plans To Televise ‘Field of Dreams’ Game

A unique baseball game. A unique broadcast.

There is plenty of excitement surrounding the first regular season Major League Baseball game played in Iowa. Thursday night's American League match-up between the Chicago White Sox and New York Yankees at the Field of Dreams movie site near Dyersville will definitely be a showcase event.

That's how FOX Sports is treating the broadcast, too. According to the Chicago Sun-Times, the network is spending a lot of money to televise the game. The newspaper reported that the budget matches what FOX normally spends to air a division-round playoff game.

It takes a lot of planning by many people to stage an event like the Field of Dreams game. For the people who work in television, broadcasting a game from a make-shift stadium with 8,000 seats in the middle of a cornfield is a logistically challenge.

Matt Gangl, the man who will direct the broadcast for FOX Sports, told the Sun-Times that thousands of feet of cables will be run to the remote facility. The network plans to man 30 cameras during the broadcast, more than three times the number that is normally used for a regular season game.

The game should be a fun one to watch. According to Gangl, FOX wants the broadcast to look as realistic to the "Shoeless" Joe Jackson-era as possible. Jackson's last season with the White Sox was 1919, when he and seven teammates were permanently banned from baseball for allegedly accepting bribes to throw the World Series against the Cincinnati Reds. The eight banned Chicago players were featured as "ghost players" in Field of Dreams.

• Yankees, White Sox Will Be Wearing Special Uniforms

In the story, the Sun-Times reported that FOX plans to display old-time, on-screen graphics during the broadcast. Another visible element designed to look like period pieces will be the hand-hung advertising signs -- usually electronic scroll boards -- behind home plate, which a crew will manually change each inning.

The Sun-Times also reported that FOX will attempt to recreate scenes from the iconic 1989 movie during the broadcast. The novelty of the event is designed to attract viewers of all kind, not just baseball fans.

Coverage of the Field of Dreams game Thursday begins with an hour-long pregame show at 5 PM. No matter which team wins, the entire event will be a memorable one. Hopefully, it's something the state of Iowa, the city of Dyersville and Dubuque County will all be proud of.

Source: Chicago Sun-Times