A 50-Year-Old Game Worth Watching

Sure, it's been 50 years, and what will appear on TV tonight might only slightly resemble what people know as a baseball broadcast anymore (not that that's a bad thing), but Game 7 of the 1960 World Series on the MLB Network (8 p.m.) deserves a look -- and maybe more.

According to the MLB Network, an archivist working in Bing Crosby's estate found the broadcast of the concluding game of the Pirates-Yankees series earlier this year. Crosby, the legendary actor (he won an Academy Award)/crooner (his "White Christmas" still ranks as one of the best-selling songs of all time)/entertainer/TV personality, was part owner of the Pittsburgh Pirates for a period after World War II until his death.

He was in France during the 1960 World Series, though, and had the game taped.

"He apparently came back from France, watched the game a couple of times and tossed it on a shelf," MLB Network's Bob Costas said this morning on ESPN Radio. The game was shown in Pittsburgh earlier this fall, and Costas said the audience of former players, fans and VIPs responded with a combination of excitement and nostalgia.

For MLB Network, it's the kind of presentation the baseball-specific network should be able to share -- and thanks to the archivist and the work of many others -- will. For fans, it's a glimpse at one of the more historic games in a sport that values its history more than any other.

Those things certainly make it more valuable than whatever reruns the broadcast or cable networks have tonight. And for a sports fans, viewing such a game, even all these years later, only enhances one's credentials as a true fan.