The Sports Media Thread

[Digby]

Even beyond the gross cruelty of the Bayless thing -- is this what he does now, making overwrought cornball Tiktoks on a platform that isn't TikTok? Is this the content that people want? I often find social media mystifying but that's next level.

[BBTV]

I'm in my early 40s.  In my lifetime, the Phila teams have only had (focusing only on TV):

 

Eagles: 1 PBP guy (Merrill Reese) and for the past 22 years, only 1 color guy (Mike Quick.)

Phillies: 2 PBP guys (Harry Kalas, Tom McCarthy)

Sixers: 1 PBP guy (Mark Zumoff) for the past 22 years (I can't figure out who was before him)

Flyers: 3 BPB guys (HOF Gene Hart, Doc Emerick (fired to bring back Hart), Jim "the referees are out to get us" Jackson for the past 26 years.

 

That's remarkable continuity - especially Merrill Reese.  Even the Flyers color guys and studio team haven't rotated too much, mostly being Al Morganti, Bill Clement, Keith Jones, Gary "pass me a beer" Dornhoeffer, and probably someone else I'm forgetting.

 

 

[WJMorris3]

22 minutes ago, BBTV said:

I'm in my early 40s.  In my lifetime, the Phila teams have only had (focusing only on TV):

 

Eagles: 1 PBP guy (Merrill Reese) and for the past 22 years, only 1 color guy (Mike Quick.)

Phillies: 2 PBP guys (Harry Kalas, Tom McCarthy)

Sixers: 1 PBP guy (Mark Zumoff) for the past 22 years (I can't figure out who was before him)

Flyers: 3 BPB guys (HOF Gene Hart, Doc Emerick (fired to bring back Hart), Jim "the referees are out to get us" Jackson for the past 26 years.

 

That's remarkable continuity - especially Merrill Reese.  Even the Flyers color guys and studio team haven't rotated too much, mostly being Al Morganti, Bill Clement, Keith Jones, Gary "pass me a beer" Dornhoeffer, and probably someone else I'm forgetting.

Steve Coates.

[BBTV]

35 minutes ago, WJMorris3 said:

Steve Coates.

 

Duh - yeah.  I started watching their games on channel 57 back in 86-87 (the year rookie Ron Hextall won the Conn Smythe despite losing in 7 games) and Coatsie was along side Gene Hart.

 

As a kid with no knowledge of hockey, Gene Hart is what got me hooked.  I'm not sure I've ever heard a better broadcaster for any sport, and we've been #blessed to have had HOF broadcasters for everything.  I was crushed when he moved to radio so Doc Emerick could take over, and thrilled when they canned Emerick and gave Hart his TV job back.

 

The current Flyers announce team - at least Jim Jackson - have turned me off completely.  I haven't heard any other teams' broadcasts, but I'd wager that the current Flyers team is close to the bottom.  I'm not sure I've ever heard broadcasters act like the home team is the victim of bad officiating just about any time the arm goes up.  It sucks, because other than JJ, Keith Jones is great, Coatsie is at least goofy, and Clement is a solid pro.  Not sure if Al Morganti still does the studio show, but while dull, he's a pro too.

[The_Admiral]

21 minutes ago, BBTV said:

I'm not sure I've ever heard broadcasters act like the home team is the victim of bad officiating just about any time the arm goes up.

 

It's pretty widespread in hockey, minus the TSN games where they still present regional coverage as if it were national. And then people don't like that either.

[BBTV]

43 minutes ago, the admiral said:

 

It's pretty widespread in hockey, minus the TSN games where they still present regional coverage as if it were national. And then people don't like that either.

 

I hardly watch hockey anymore, but even during the two playff games I watched this year, the Islanders goalie would sit on the puck after a lame-ass shot, and Jim Jackson would be like "oh my god, the Flyers just can't catch a break, the goalie is just standing on his head, it's unbelievable."  That's a bit of an exaggeration, because they did acknoledge that their powerplay was "struggling" (even that was very generous), but I find him nauseating to listen to - and I hate him even more that he weaseled his way into a few innings of Phillies radio broadcasting, interrupting my favorite duo of all time (Scott Franzke and Larry Andersen... though LA only does like half the games now, and they've been auditioning douchebag ex players to try and take his place.)  He's like the epitome of douchebag announcer, down to his manufactured 'catch phrase' "it's gone goodbye!" that I bet he spent years crafting.  Screw you, Jim Jackson.  Go to and burn in hell, you ing hole.  

[The_Admiral]

First NFL coverage map oddity of the year:

 

Who on the Jets or Bills has ties to Casper, Wyoming?

[RyanMcD29]

[The_Admiral]

But the university itself is down in the Fort Collins-Cheyenne corridor, so they're getting the Raiders game. Maybe no one actually lives there, I don't really know anything about Wyoming.

[neo_prankster]

On 9/10/2020 at 12:31 PM, JayMac said:

I lost my older  brother to suicide a little over 2 years ago. I can relate to almost everything that Dak said he has gone through, especially when he said he experienced feelings that he had never felt before. 

 

I am appalled at what Skip Bayless said. I know that he loves to play the heel but it was still shocking that someone can be so insensitive and downright crass. Dak's brother died tragically and basically Bayless told him to rub some dirt on it.

 

On 9/10/2020 at 12:43 PM, CS85 said:

I mean c'mon, JayMac.  It's America's Team we're talking about here!  Man up!  This isn't some trivial crap...this is Dallas Cowboys football, and we can't have a sissy leading the squad. 

 

23 hours ago, waltere said:

Skip Bayless is an outdated, stick-up-his-ass, moron whose entire schtick is "what if internet trolling, but on TV ". The sooner he goes away, the sooner literally everyone's life will improve.

 

Scumbags like Skip Bayless are the reason cancel culture can sometimes be a good thing.

[BBTV]

4 hours ago, RyanMcD29 said:

 

Make the "WYOMING" a lot smaller, get rid of the Mickey Mouse patches and advertisement, and then make the helmet match the pants (either color), and that's a really nice football uniform.  Where the hell is Wyoming again?

[Digby]

NBC is already pulling insidious nonsense for the first weekend of the premier league. Bumping games to the Peacock streaming service, as if they have anything better to show on NBCSN at 11:30 am on a Sunday or 3:15 pm on a Monday.

[JayMac]

7 hours ago, Digby said:

NBC is already pulling insidious nonsense for the first weekend of the premier league. Bumping games to the Peacock streaming service, as if they have anything better to show on NBCSN at 11:30 am on a Sunday or 3:15 pm on a Monday.

Comcast/NBC is really pimping their new product. It reminds me of when Disney+ was first launched last year. ABC had to promote it at every turn, even on the local news.

[Digby]

On 9/12/2020 at 12:50 AM, Digby said:

NBC is already pulling insidious nonsense for the first weekend of the premier league. Bumping games to the Peacock streaming service, as if they have anything better to show on NBCSN at 11:30 am on a Sunday or 3:15 pm on a Monday.

 

lol update on this, 8 out of the 10 games upcoming this weekend are on "Peacock". Thank goodness we're keeping NBC Sports open for flat track motorcycle racing.

 

I should mention that this isn't an issue for you if you have Xfinity internet, in which case you get Peacock for free (though heaven forbid you want to watch Premier League on your actual television). NBC and Xfinity, of course, share a corporate parent.

[JayMac]

I have Xfinity internet but I really shouldn't have to sign into Peacock to watch a game that I can normally hit two or three buttons to watch on NBC Sports.

 

Call me old-fashioned but streaming services have made things more complicated than they need to be.

[Digby]

With apologies to the Crystal Palace diehards of America -- if they want to air every single match on Peacock and ask $5/month for it, that's fine, I get it. It's a good price to pay for access to every match there is. But if you're only putting two matches of a matchday weekend on cable, that looks to me like deliberately sandbagging the cable product, making it worse than it's traditionally been since NBC held the rights, just so that you'll pay for the streamer. Or pay Comcast for internet service, which is even more cynical and infuriating! (Internet service should be a publicly owned utility, anyway.)

 

It's been the same with CBS's newly getting the rights to Champions League. At a time when US interest in European soccer has never been higher, it's profoundly cynical to say the games are worth less coverage on regular programming, and need to be part of a premium package. It's like the early 00s PPV channels all over again.

[Kramerica Industries]

43 minutes ago, Digby said:

With apologies to the Crystal Palace diehards of America -- if they want to air every single match on Peacock and ask $5/month for it, that's fine, I get it. It's a good price to pay for access to every match there is. But if you're only putting two matches of a matchday weekend on cable, that looks to me like deliberately sandbagging the cable product, making it worse than it's traditionally been since NBC held the rights, just so that you'll pay for the streamer. Or pay Comcast for internet service, which is even more cynical and infuriating! (Internet service should be a publicly owned utility, anyway.)

 

It's been the same with CBS's newly getting the rights to Champions League. At a time when US interest in European soccer has never been higher, it's profoundly cynical to say the games are worth less coverage on regular programming, and need to be part of a premium package. It's like the early 00s PPV channels all over again.

 

I just took a look at the TV listings for NBC and NBCSN for this weekend...I'll tell you what - if this ends up reoccurring beyond this weekend, I'll think you're onto something. As it is, this weekend is the final stages of the Tour de France and also the third and fourth rounds of the US Open. Things that, in normal years and normal circumstances, would never conflict with the Premier League. Fox ditched their US Open deal because they couldn't reconcile it with the NFL. 

 

So I understand the optics, and some of their MD1 shenanigans don't give them much benefit of the doubt, but this weekend looks like they have other properties that, I'm guessing, have higher priority/contract stipulations that force their hand. Why not just use USA Network? Good enough question and one I can't really answer. But I can see why their national network and sports network have their hands tied. For this weekend. I haven't looked any further ahead than that.

[The_Admiral]

5 hours ago, Kramerica Industries said:

Why not just use USA Network?

 

You can't preempt their hottest new original programming, Attractive Young People And Uh They Work In Some Professional Office Setting I Dunno.

[monkeypower]

44 minutes ago, the admiral said:

 

You can't preempt their hottest new original programming, Attractive Young People And Uh They Work In Some Professional Office Setting I Dunno.

 

Does OLN want to get into live sports again?

[Kramerica Industries]

1 hour ago, monkeypower said:

 

Does OLN want to get into live sports again?

 

I don't know if you're joking - I know you're Canadian so you don't get American networks - but, just in case you aren't, NBCSN now is what OLN used to be two names ago.