• The New York Times, Friday, October 26, 2007 11:45 AM

In the bottom of the sixth inning of the World Series broadcast Wednesday night, Fox cut to the Boston Red Sox bench. It captured players Royce Clayton, who was wired, and Coco Crisp engaging in 40 seconds of taped, cheerful gab about how to get a free crunchy seasoned beef tacos promised in a "Steal A Base, Steal A Taco" promotion for Taco Bell. Earlier, game announcers Joe Buck and Tim McCarver had also touted the promotion.

Last night during Game 2, Jacoby Ellsbury's fourth-inning steal started the taco giveaway. Clayton, wired again, chatted up the taco deal, and Fox's Chris Myers interviewed Taco Bell COO Rob Savage, who looked like the happiest executive in America. Myers provided the ultimate gleeful coda for the fast-food chain. "We're thinking outside the bun," he said.

It was all part of unscripted hoopla for the promotion in which the first stolen base in the World Series would let anyone get a free taco at Taco Bell at a specified time. Tim Brosnan, Major League Baseball's executive vice president for business, says Fox was not required to extend the basic promotion into the call of the game, "but I think Fox wants to make the sponsors happy."

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