# Your opinion on 5:10 PM start times for baseball

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-opinion-on-5-10-pm-start-times-for-baseball/533241>\
**Category:** The Game Room\
**Created:** [March 21, 2010, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-opinion-on-5-10-pm-start-times-for-baseball/533241 "2010-03-21T16:13:58Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![dalej42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@dalej42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dalej42)\
**Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 11:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-opinion-on-5-10-pm-start-times-for-baseball/533241/21 "2010-04-06T11:58:11Z")

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> [@Troy\_McClure\_SF](#):
>
> The Giants play their Saturday night games at 6, which I actually like a lot. Having that 9-10 hour after the game makes it a lot easier to go out and do something after the game.
> 
> I do find the 5pm start pretty interesting. How many people can actually make a 5:10 start after work? I could probably make it, but only because I’m off at 4:30 (earlier than most), and my work has a shuttle from my office door to transit. Without that shuttle, there’d be no way I could make it. 6pm seems like a much better option during the week (aside from Dodger Stadium, because who shows up to a Dodger game on time?).

5:10 would be too early during the week, I think. In sprawlurbia Phoenix, most people don’t work downtown and suburb to suburb commutes are common.

I do think the early start time on Saturday might hurt TV ratings some. However, I’ll guess that Saturday night regular season tv ratings are already fairly low.

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**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\
**Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-opinion-on-5-10-pm-start-times-for-baseball/533241/22 "2010-04-06T18:00:56Z")

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I like the idea of Saturday games starting at ~5pm. It’s early enough so you can watch a game with the kids, and be back home by bedtime. Or if you like the night life, a game that wraps up by 8pm on Saturday doesn’t much limit your options for the evening, so I think it would work pretty well for young adults. And the games would be over early enough that the coveted ‘get off my lawn’ demographic would be able to enjoy them and still get home reasonably early.

I’ll be interested to see how it works out.

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**Author:** ![Jim\_s\_Son](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19adc/32.png) [@Jim\_s\_Son](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jim_s_Son)\
**Post date:** [April 7, 2010, 6:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-opinion-on-5-10-pm-start-times-for-baseball/533241/23 "2010-04-07T06:55:38Z")

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I remember the Atlanta Braves doing this in the late 1980s. Start time was 5:35PM. The Braves at the time broadcast 140+ games on WTBS and figured with a 2 1/2 hour game, the game would be over by 8PM and WTBS could carry prime time regular programming. It didn’t last too long.

The idea doesn’t make sense to me and I think it will be dropped.

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