Mark McGwire and the MLB Network

When baseball’s Mark McGwire revealed that yes indeed, he had taken steroids, his comments were only part of the story. Did you notice who he did his only video interview with?

Yes, it was NBC’s Bob Costas. But it wasn’t on NBC. It was on the MLB Network, where Costas also hosts a show. (Click here for the full interview).

Think that wasn’t by design?

Well, given that Costas went after him pretty good in my book, I’m not going to join the crowd online suggesting the MLB Network – or Costas – was trying to give McGwire a safe haven.

The interview suggests anything but.

It’s safe to say that pre-MLB Network, McGwire would have likely gone to Costas via NBC. Or, perhaps someone on ESPN. (Certainly not 60 Minutes).

This was simply about the relationships Costas has built in baseball. Nothing more. (Costas says that here and he adds that he didn’t even know why McGwire had finally agreed to talk to him the day the news broke).

In this case, it’s clear Costas asked his own unscripted questions as the interview unfolded and I thought Costas did a nice job of going after McGwire in a respectful way. I especially like his questioning of McGwire about Roger Maris’ 61 homers in 1961 being the only “authentic” home run record, according to the Maris family.

I don’t get as worked up, as some seasoned sports journalists or major network TV execs have, that Costas didn’t challenge McGwire – enough – about his assertion that he would have been the home run king without steroids (3:40 into the clip linked to above, and at 24:50 after McGwire said he didn’t take steroids for additional strength).

People watching the interview can make up their own mind if they think McGwire is full of it when he says he thinks he didn’t need the ‘roids to hit homers. In the same way people made up their mind that Sarah Palin was a goofball for not being able to list off a few newspapers or magazines that she read in her infamous walk-and-talk interview with Katie Couric. We didn’t need Couric to badger her, “Really, you can’t name a specific newspaper you read?” Palin’s answer, or lack of one, was enough. Though, in that case, Couric as interviewer took heat for her true intentions behind the question.

Overall, I thought Costas with McGwire was Costas. A good interview. And McGwire probably got what he wanted. A chance to get some sympathy, more so than had he just released a statement and stayed off TV.

But again, the real lesson here is the rise of the broadcast networks that are owned by the professional sports leagues, themselves: The NFL Network, the NBA Network, the NHL Network and the MLB Network.

Have we reached the point where big sports news will break first on those networks? Can we trust those networks to cover the scandals with their teams?

When it’s not Bob Costas in the interview chair, we’ll all be a lot more skeptical.