Found this article in New York Newsday; it was under the heading: Some stories never quit." Sounds pretty good.:
The man behind the plate at all seven games of the recent World
Series was Long Islander Edward Plumacher, who finally got to the Big
Show.
"It was thrilling," Plumacher says. "Absolutely."
Though Plumacher wasn't on the field in Cleveland or Miami, his
company, QuesTec Imaging Inc. of Deer Park, tracked pitches for NBC,
which broadcast the seven-game series. NBC used QuesTec's images more
than 80 times during the league championship playoffs and World Series
play. For that, it paid QuesTec $110,000.
Taking part in big games has been QuesTec's goal for years, but it
has struggled with a drain on its finances caused by technical and
management problems, disputes with the British Columbia Securities
Commission - its shares had been traded on the Vancouver exchange;
they're now on NASDAQ's Bulletin Board - and the 232-day baseball
strike in 1994.
By last year, QuesTec had honed its complex imaging systems, which
use cameras and computers to diagram pitches and put them in
perspective. They show, for example, what a batter faced last time up or
what he likes to drill over the wall.
QuesTec's break, says Plumacher, its 36-year-old president, was an
invitation last year to display its system at the annual meeting of
baseball broadcasters. It came away with contracts to provide its images
for broadcasts in five cities. It also received $500,000 worth of
essential equipment from Silicon Graphics, for which the computer maker
receives on-air exposure.
By the time the Florida Marlins beat the Cleveland Indians in the
seventh game, Plumacher and seven QuesTec employees had shuttled between
the stadiums and monitored every minute of action from the company's
production trailers. As an interesting pattern of pitches developed, or
as a power hitter came to bat, Plumacher could describe the visual
possibilities to NBC's executive producer at the other end of a headset.
"The World Series was very important," Plumacher says. "It
established us as a credible production company."
Plumacher says contracts being negotiated could lift QuesTec's 1998
sales to between $1.5 million and $4 million, quite a leap from the year
ending June 30, for which QuesTec reported sales of $180,513 and a loss
of $1.2 million.
Playing a role at the biggest show in baseball had special meaning
to QuesTec vice president Ron Klimkowski, a pitcher in the '70s,
Plumacher says. "I said to Ron, 'I know you played for the Yankees and
Oakland A's, but it was QuesTec that got you to the World Series.' "
Copyright 1997, Newsday Inc. |
