Comments on: Review: MLB.com AtBat for iPhone

By: Andy

Andy — Tue, 04 May 2010 17:07:53 +0000

No jailbreaking. The AtBat app includes direct links to open a QuickTime app in the Safari browser with the feed you have selected. So it's really Safari that's running in the background.

By: Sean

Sean — Tue, 04 May 2010 17:02:44 +0000

Andy, you state that the live audio feed can be played in the background on the iPhone. How did you manage that? As far as I know, such a feature will not be possible until Apple releases iPhone OS 4.0 later this year. Currently, only default apps like iPod and Safari will run in the background on the iPhone--unless, of course, you jailbreak the phone.

By: Andy

Andy — Mon, 03 May 2010 15:55:24 +0000

Yeah, I mean exposition. The game story.

And yes, the pitcher stats are, in particular, REALLY bad.

By: Chuck Hildebrandt

Chuck Hildebrandt — Mon, 03 May 2010 15:53:51 +0000

Andy, when you say "game recap", do you mean the media-written expository news story about the game? Because each game does have a summary available for it, for both all plays and for scoring plays only.

One other major, major annoyance about the player cards: on the ones for pitchers, instead of showing you their pitching stats, they show you their batting-against stats! What the idea behind that!?

By: Vinny

Vinny — Mon, 03 May 2010 13:45:30 +0000

I don't bother trying to look at video unless I'm on wi-fi. Gameday sucks; it locks up for whatever reason sometimes and then jumps ahead three or four at-bats and you're left wondering what the hell just happened. Also, the audio feeds are delayed so much that if you check the stats in game on a pc (through yahoo sports or something) you'll find you're usually an at-bat behind. Having said all that, I like it, since I don't have an AM portable radio and wouldn't even know where to find one any more. Great for listening to games on the go.

By: Andy

Andy — Mon, 03 May 2010 13:24:13 +0000

Joe, the performance might have something to do with where you live. I'm in a major metro area and have good 3G coverage, and the video loads quickly. Occasionally it drops to lower-quality if the data stream throughput drops, but then it goes back to HD when it picks up again. Videos never take so long to load--usually it's about 5 seconds for me. But your criticism is generally a common one for iPhone users--if you live somewhere without good AT&T coverage, it can be a problem. The iPhone is going to be available on Verizon soon, plus I think there is an AtBat application for the Droid. As for crashing, I've never had it happen to me. Don't know what to say about that.

By: Joe

Joe — Mon, 03 May 2010 13:14:25 +0000

I've been disappointed in it so far. I find the main scoreboard page to be virtually useless and the video takes FOREVER to open. I realize it won't be instanteanous but having to wait over a minute is just exasperating. It also seems extremely unstable. I often find it just kicks me out at random moments. When I've got the GameDay feature up continuously that works well and that's my primary interest so I like that a lot. Ultimately, as an iPhone user I find it little more useful than going to the MLB website and watching GameDay that way.