Weathermen have a pretty interesting job. They get a first row seat on what is going on in the world and get to watch it happen. Sometimes though, weathermen get bored. Take Florida for example. How many different ways can you say each and every day that it will be partly sunny today and 89 with a chance of afternoon showers? It's no wonder then that they get all excited about a hurricane. Weathermen love hurricanes like firemen love fires. They get beside themselves with giddiness at the projections and possible paths the storm might take. Of course, they do the obligatory duty of telling people to get out of harms way, but you understand and get the feeling that secretly, they hope a big one hits so they can be a part of it. Meanwhile, the viewers...the ones that rely on those weathermen are fraught with concern and watch with impending doom hanging over their heads and drape themselves over every word the weathermen say.
Wait. You thought this was a baseball blog. It is! The first paragraph is a simple English ploy called an analogy. What the first paragraph set up was the idea that the ESPN announcers tonight, O'Brien and Sutcliffe, were the weathermen. The storm they were watching was A. J. Burnett. They dragged up the dirty numbers and pored over all the data. They watched for every indication that Burnett might turn into a fury of base runners and runs for the Oakland Athletics. You could almost sense their anticipation. They were hanging on every Burnett pitch. Sutcliffe was the senior weather guy like that guy they go to in Florida with the bald head that always has the charts in his hand. Sutcliffe was just waiting for the perfect storm to blow onshore.
Yankee fans, meanwhile, were those viewers fraught with concern and were watching with impending doom hanging over their heads and cringed at every statistic and every base runner. Was another game with Burnett pitching going to go down the drain? And you can't blame the fans a bit. Burnett had such a bad August (and June) that the worst could only be expected. Imagine the hope that built inside them after the first two scoreless innings. But then the storm started veering back in dangerous waters. Kouzmanoff hit a two run homer. Burnett walked the guy after that. A few innings later, he again got in trouble and allowed a third run to score making it a 4-3 Yankee lead. The weathermen were ready to sound the warnings. They were ready. The viewers were tied up in knots.
And then a funny thing happened. The storm passed over. Somehow the storm called Burnett got through the sixth inning and the Yankees were still ahead. The viewers looked up at the skies and saw stars instead of clouds. It was a miracle!
But you could tell some of the wind had gone out of the weatherman's sails. They said at the end of Burnett's night that he struggled for six innings. They didn't understand how the storm didn't hit the mainland. But knowing the fine line between taste and poor taste, a weatherman would never state that he was disappointed that the big storm didn't happen. They trot out the old line of, "dodging a bullet." But you can tell that they were deflated a bit. Senior weatherman, Sutcliffe, did, somewhat begrudgingly mention at the end of the game that Burnett can build on the victory.
For the viewers, it was akin to walking out of the in-ground shelter. The blinked and saw that the house was still standing.
Showing posts with label ESPN television. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ESPN television. Show all posts
Thursday, September 02, 2010
Monday, June 21, 2010
Manny's Lawyer Should Have Been Present
Don't know about you, but watching the ESPN Sunday Night Baseball game on ESPN irked this writer with its public skewering of Manny Ramirez. Manny, as many of you know, returned to Boston with the Dodgers for an interleague series. No matter what you think happened during Manny Ramirez's last season with the Red Sox, was it necessary to bring in Curt Schilling whose opinion on the subject has already been so public?
There are two things that disturb this writer about allowing Schilling to come into the booth and pull no punches on what happened with Manny during his last year with the Red Sox. First, isn't Schilling the first one to talk about the sanctity of the clubhouse if someone violates it? And here he is airing things all out there in public without allowing Manny to defend himself. It was a public execution. As far as the Fan knows, Manny has never aired his opinions on what happened in Boston. Schilling took great pride and enthusiasm in publicly skewering Ramirez and that doesn't seem right.
The second thing that bothered the Fan about the whole thing was ESPN allowing and probably encouraging the public flogging to take place. It would have been natural to bring Schilling into the booth at the scene of his heroics. Sure, bring the old workhorse in and talk about those heroics. But Jon Miller allowed the questioning to go right to Manny and allowed Schilling the opportunity that Schilling handled with relish. If the Fan was in charge of the telecast, the directive would have been not to publicly hang Ramirez during a telecast that the man couldn't defend himself against. It was ugly, that's what it was. And it was mean spirited.
The Fan isn't sure that Manny doesn't deserve the negative take on his last year in Boston. That's a question for history and reflection. If you want to debate the issue, put Manny in an interview room with Schilling and let them go at it. But geez, to allow a former teammate to come on a telecast and bury the guy which then allowed Orel Hershiser to continue the character assassination was just wrong. You could tell that Joe Morgan was uncomfortable in the situation. But Jon Miller seemed to enjoy what he had created.
It was uncalled for and in this Fan's opinion, unprofessional. And in another final aside, was Orel Herschiser really irritating during the telecast or what? From his baiting of Joe Morgan to his multiple references of "studying," he came across as the little kid who tries harder than everyone else and has to make sure everyone knows it. Worse than anything Steve Phillips used to do...
There are two things that disturb this writer about allowing Schilling to come into the booth and pull no punches on what happened with Manny during his last year with the Red Sox. First, isn't Schilling the first one to talk about the sanctity of the clubhouse if someone violates it? And here he is airing things all out there in public without allowing Manny to defend himself. It was a public execution. As far as the Fan knows, Manny has never aired his opinions on what happened in Boston. Schilling took great pride and enthusiasm in publicly skewering Ramirez and that doesn't seem right.
The second thing that bothered the Fan about the whole thing was ESPN allowing and probably encouraging the public flogging to take place. It would have been natural to bring Schilling into the booth at the scene of his heroics. Sure, bring the old workhorse in and talk about those heroics. But Jon Miller allowed the questioning to go right to Manny and allowed Schilling the opportunity that Schilling handled with relish. If the Fan was in charge of the telecast, the directive would have been not to publicly hang Ramirez during a telecast that the man couldn't defend himself against. It was ugly, that's what it was. And it was mean spirited.
The Fan isn't sure that Manny doesn't deserve the negative take on his last year in Boston. That's a question for history and reflection. If you want to debate the issue, put Manny in an interview room with Schilling and let them go at it. But geez, to allow a former teammate to come on a telecast and bury the guy which then allowed Orel Hershiser to continue the character assassination was just wrong. You could tell that Joe Morgan was uncomfortable in the situation. But Jon Miller seemed to enjoy what he had created.
It was uncalled for and in this Fan's opinion, unprofessional. And in another final aside, was Orel Herschiser really irritating during the telecast or what? From his baiting of Joe Morgan to his multiple references of "studying," he came across as the little kid who tries harder than everyone else and has to make sure everyone knows it. Worse than anything Steve Phillips used to do...
Monday, September 28, 2009
ESPN Forgets What Made Them
As mentioned in the Game Picks post, the Fan spent the weekend at a trade show. As such, there was no opportunity to watch the games either in baseball or football. After missing the games, the Fan was hoping to catch up on the action during Baseball Tonight and then the football pregame show that used to be so good every Sunday night. What a terrible disappointment.
Pure and simple, the Fan has had a very hectic, chaotic and busy summer. So there hasn't been much time to watch ESPN and their highlight shows. So it was an awful surprise to see how terrible these shows have become. They used to be so good too. They were the best and they radicalized sports news. The Baseball Tonight formula was to have a snappy announcer in Ravy and a couple of succinct and occasionally humorous color guys and tons of highlights and late breaking highlights of games still in progress. They still have the guys in place, but the show has become about them and not about the highlights. You may actually get a highlight once every ten minutes. The rest of the time they, "tawked, tawked, tawked."
Do the producers and the leaders of this network really think we tuned in all those years to hear those guys talking? Not at all. We tuned in to WATCH THE HIGHLIGHTS! The more the better. In the good old days, the highlights took up 80 percent of the show and the talking and special features took up 20%. Us business guys like the 80/20 rule. Now it's 35/65 with the 65 percent being talking and special features. It's terrible and frustrating and sad. We still have Ravy and Gammons and Kruk and Winfield is pretty good too. But they were our guides through what we were seeing, not the mess we have now.
The Football "highlight" show was even worse. Chris Berman was the host. Some love him. Some hate him. Count the Fan in the former column. And the show started out with the end of a game whose last play was a desperation lateral-happy fiasco. Berman did some of his patented sound affects and the Fan was smiling in recognition and good humor. Then the show went into the worst pits of hell possible. For the next 25 minutes (before the Fan just got disgusted and turned it off), three games were covered from the whole day. An average of two highlights of each of those games were shown. The rest of the time was four guys talking and talking and talking. Much of them saying the same thing the other guy said. When they hadn't said enough, they switched it to some other talking head in the studio who is all by himself and he talks some more, basically repeating what the other guys just said. Who is he? Why is he there? Never seen him before and he added NOTHING. Just more talk. And he had a really bad tie.
What happened? Where did they get lost? If we want analysis, we'll go to the blogs and to the major sports sites. THIS FAN WANTS H-I-G-H-L-I-G-H-T-S!!. The Fan wants video. The Fan wants to see the exciting plays. How did the game play out? Who made great plays? Why was the pitcher effective? Instead, we get endless blather about what happened, which is about as exciting as watching a United Nations session.
Bloody awful. How can something as successful as ESPN totally lose their way? How can they not understand what got them to be so successful in the first place? They made their money with their commentators commenting on the highlights. It was fast, it was hip, it was cool. Now it is monotonous to the max. When did they get the idea that watching evasive professionals during contrived press conferences is fun to watch? It's a shame because it was once the wonder of the television world.
What just occurred to this writer is that ESPN has gone the way of MTV. MTV was cool when it was all videos with just a few special events. It was about the music. Now it's one piece of schlock after another. Totally ruined. And ESPN has followed MTV right down the same rabbit hole.
Pure and simple, the Fan has had a very hectic, chaotic and busy summer. So there hasn't been much time to watch ESPN and their highlight shows. So it was an awful surprise to see how terrible these shows have become. They used to be so good too. They were the best and they radicalized sports news. The Baseball Tonight formula was to have a snappy announcer in Ravy and a couple of succinct and occasionally humorous color guys and tons of highlights and late breaking highlights of games still in progress. They still have the guys in place, but the show has become about them and not about the highlights. You may actually get a highlight once every ten minutes. The rest of the time they, "tawked, tawked, tawked."
Do the producers and the leaders of this network really think we tuned in all those years to hear those guys talking? Not at all. We tuned in to WATCH THE HIGHLIGHTS! The more the better. In the good old days, the highlights took up 80 percent of the show and the talking and special features took up 20%. Us business guys like the 80/20 rule. Now it's 35/65 with the 65 percent being talking and special features. It's terrible and frustrating and sad. We still have Ravy and Gammons and Kruk and Winfield is pretty good too. But they were our guides through what we were seeing, not the mess we have now.
The Football "highlight" show was even worse. Chris Berman was the host. Some love him. Some hate him. Count the Fan in the former column. And the show started out with the end of a game whose last play was a desperation lateral-happy fiasco. Berman did some of his patented sound affects and the Fan was smiling in recognition and good humor. Then the show went into the worst pits of hell possible. For the next 25 minutes (before the Fan just got disgusted and turned it off), three games were covered from the whole day. An average of two highlights of each of those games were shown. The rest of the time was four guys talking and talking and talking. Much of them saying the same thing the other guy said. When they hadn't said enough, they switched it to some other talking head in the studio who is all by himself and he talks some more, basically repeating what the other guys just said. Who is he? Why is he there? Never seen him before and he added NOTHING. Just more talk. And he had a really bad tie.
What happened? Where did they get lost? If we want analysis, we'll go to the blogs and to the major sports sites. THIS FAN WANTS H-I-G-H-L-I-G-H-T-S!!. The Fan wants video. The Fan wants to see the exciting plays. How did the game play out? Who made great plays? Why was the pitcher effective? Instead, we get endless blather about what happened, which is about as exciting as watching a United Nations session.
Bloody awful. How can something as successful as ESPN totally lose their way? How can they not understand what got them to be so successful in the first place? They made their money with their commentators commenting on the highlights. It was fast, it was hip, it was cool. Now it is monotonous to the max. When did they get the idea that watching evasive professionals during contrived press conferences is fun to watch? It's a shame because it was once the wonder of the television world.
What just occurred to this writer is that ESPN has gone the way of MTV. MTV was cool when it was all videos with just a few special events. It was about the music. Now it's one piece of schlock after another. Totally ruined. And ESPN has followed MTV right down the same rabbit hole.
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