New media company plans to improve how Staunton Braves baseball is broadcast on Facebook
STAUNTON — Staunton Braves fans will have a new way to watch the summer league baseball team this year.
Piedmont Sports will be broadcasting all home games on the team's Facebook page. According to Piedmont's owner, Jay Wagner, Staunton will become the first team in the Valley Baseball League with a multi-camera broadcast.
"This has been the busiest month of my life," Wagner said of May. "But it's going to be worth it."
Wagner has been calling Braves games on Facebook since 2018, but he said this summer the experience of watching from home will be completely different for the fan. Wagner will team with Joe Deck to call the games, which will also be simulcast on ESPN 1240 radio.
The big difference this year is there will be more than one camera showing the action in 1080p resolution. For opening night Saturday there will be two cameras, one behind home plate and one in center field. Wagner would like to add more cameras later in the season, but that's still a work in progress.
"We're trying to walk before we run," he said.
There will also be a scoreboard graphic on the screen for fans to keep track of the game.
Wagner launched Piedmont Sports in 2019 and was ready to use his technology for Charlottesville-area high school sports in the spring of 2020. That never happened because the pandemic shut down sports that year.
When sports started back up the next school year, many of the high schools began using NFHS cameras to broadcast games when the number of fans attending was limited. That was good for the fan, but not for Wagner's business.
Over time Wagner was able to work out a deal with the Braves for Piedmont Sports to broadcast their games. Piedmont will also be broadcasting the Charlottesville Gladiators, a professional basketball team in the American Basketball Association. And he's working on broadcasting the University of Virginia's club ice hockey team.
There is no cost to the Braves to broadcast the games and no cost to the fans to watch the games. Wagner plans to use advertising to make his money.
Not only does Wagner think this is a benefit to Braves fans in Staunton who might not make it out to Moxie Stadium for a game, but also to family and friends of the players who live in other parts of the country.
"We'd love to take it on the road too," Wagner said. "But we're going to need a whole offseason to figure out how it that will work."
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Patrick Hite is The News Leader's education reporter. Story ideas and tips always welcome. Contact Patrick (he/him/his) at phite@newsleader.com and follow him on Twitter @Patrick_Hite. Subscribe to us at newsleader.com.
This article originally appeared on Staunton News Leader: Staunton Braves baseball will get improved video broadcast for Valley League season
