0.0 rating for Astros game: Bigger news would have been if someone watched

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The Houston Chronicle reports that nobody watched Sunday’s Astros game in Houston. Can you blame Houston?

According to television’s official scorekeeper, nobody in the 20-county Greater Houston area watched the Astros’ game Sunday at Cleveland.

The score was 9-2 in favor of the Indians on the scoreboard and 0.0 for Comcast SportsNet Houston — the regional network owned by the Astros, Rockets and NBC Sports Group — in the daily report compiled by the Nielsen Co., which measures television viewing levels.

It was the first time in Houston, where games have been broadcast on cable outlets since 1983, and perhaps the first time in the history of Major League Baseball that an MLB game had no measurable viewership in its home market.

By comparison, Nielsen reported that the Texans’ loss at Baltimore had a 23.0 rating, which equates to an average audience of 526,553 of Houston’s 2.28 million TV households, on KHOU (Channel 11).

Nielsen’s figures are, however, subject to challenge on a number of fronts. For one thing, the company’s business is based on the concept that Nielsen can measure what millions of television viewers are watching by monitoring the behavior of hundreds.

On Sunday, Nielsen had reports from 581 meters in Greater Houston. In any given quarter-hour between noon and 3 p.m. Sunday, anywhere from 47.6 to 52.6 percent of those meters (roughly 270 to 300) were in use by viewers watching television.

But not a single, solitary Nielsen household tuned in for as long as a few minutes in any given quarter-hour to watch the Astros lose to the Indians for their 105th defeat of the year.

 

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Why did NFL put Raiders on Monday Night Football?

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I know the league jumps at any opportunity to showcase Peyton Manning, the No. 1 show in primetime.

But really, against the Raiders?

This game had mismatch written all over it when the schedules were announced in April. Oakland was 4-12 in 2012, and there was no superhero rookie coming in to rescue the Silver & Black. The Raiders had terrible written all over them.

Sure enough, the Broncos were up 30-7 in the third quarter. I only stayed with the telecast because my fantasy opponent had Manning. He completed a pass late to beat me by a point. Yet another reason why I’m ticked off today.

Scheduling the Raiders was a disservice to fans who truly look forward to a good game on Monday night. That the game still managed to do a 10.3 rating is a testament to the draw of Manning. However, imagine how much bigger the rating would have been against a quality opponent.

Mike Tirico and Jon Gruden were put in a tough spot.They tried to make the most of a lopsided game. I’m sure Tirico went in with plenty of blowout material.

And Gruden really likes, “This Terrelle Pryor.”

Hopefully, the next time Gruden sees Pryor, the Raiders will have a team worthy of playing on Monday night.

 

 

 

 

Olbermann: Forget about Billy Goat; Cubs cursed by ‘Merkle’s Boner’

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Ah yes, I should have known this was coming.

When I wrote the 100th anniversary story of “Merkle’s Boner in 2008 for the Chicago Tribune and ESPN.com (links below), I knew exactly where to go: Keith Olbermann.

Olbermann has made it one of his life’s missions to vindicate Fred Merkle, the poor New York Giants player whose unfortunate base running incident (note Keith, not blunder) in a game against the Cubs has lived in baseball infamy.

Sure enough on the 105th anniversary of that fateful game, Olbermann weighed in again on poor Mr. Merkle last night. And forget about the “Billy Goat Curse” at Wrigley Field. Olbermann ties the Cubs’ title drought to what happened on Sept. 23, 1908.

From my ESPN.com story:

But was Merkle truly at fault? Keith Olbermann is among those who say no.

Olbermann, formerly of ESPN and now the host of “Countdown” on MSNBC, has been interested in Merkle’s case for more than 30 years. He has proposed Sept. 23 be a national day of amnesty in Merkle’s memory, but not because he did something wrong.

“I was struck by the finality of it,” Olbermann said. “He does something everybody did, for their own safety, as a game ended. He was the first player on whom the rule was ever enforced and he never lived it down.”

Indeed, the real goat might have been O’Day, the umpire. No less than Hall of Fame umpire Bill Klem delivered a stinging indictment.

“Evers talked a great umpire into making the rottenest decision in the history of baseball,” Klem said.

The damage, though, was done. Olbermann doubts Merkle will ever be vindicated.

“The goat story is still easier, and more compelling, than the story of the poor rookie victimized by a rule that was never enforced,” Olbermann said.

From my Chicago Tribune story:

The Cubs and Fred Merkle are linked by history. It has been a rough century for both.

Tuesday marks the 100th anniversary of the controversial play that landed Merkle on the short list of baseball’s all-time goats. The beneficiaries were the Cubs, who without “Merkle’s Boner” almost surely would not have gone on to win the 1908 World Series.

If not for the young New York Giants infielder, the Cubs’ last title would have come in 1907, and their century of futility would have been acknowledged, if not exactly celebrated, last year. Instead they have played the 2008 season against the backdrop of a century without a championship, which attaches a certain urgency to the playoff campaign that gets under way next week.

Merkle was an early version of Steve Bartman, a young man vilified for supposedly costing his team a pennant.

 

Michelle Beadle: ‘Realize we’re on network that is struggling and we don’t get a lot of promotion’

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You don’t hear much from Michelle Beadle these days, at least on the sports side. Her move to NBC Sports Network has been a struggle.

The first version of her show, The Crossover, was blown up; bye-bye Dave Briggs. Now going solo, she plays to a fraction of the audience that once watched her daily at ESPN.

Beadle did a chat with the guys at Sports Media Weekly last week, and Sports Business Daily published some of the highlights.

“I love what we’re doing now, but then again I’m not an idiot. I realize we’re on a network that is new and struggling and we don’t get a lot of promotion. So I kind of battle with that every day. Do I fight the good fight and promote the show on my own? Do I just give up and act like a whiny person? It’s interesting, but we have such a good crew and they work hard.” She added, “I look at Twitter now and I think, ‘You know what, I’ve got more followers on Twitter than the network gets viewers. There’s got to be a way to turn that into eyes on the show.’ So that’s kind of where I am now. I hate it because it’s going to be so self-promoting, but I’m starting to realize if you don’t do that then it’s hard to complain after the fact.

I’m not sure why people in the media are so shy about promoting themselves and their content. She hardly is alone there.

Isn’t that one of the great reasons for using Twitter?

Beadle has more than 800,000 followers. Tweet away about the show, Michelle.

 

 

ESPN’s new SportsCenter ad: Who’s who of big names does Da-Da-Da thing

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ESPN is out with a new SportsCenter ad. Judging by all the coin the network spent to get all these athletes to say Da-Da-Da, it looks like another attempt by the network to reinforce the notion of who’s No. 1 to Fox Sports 1.

What do you think? A highlight: Patrick Kane getting taken out after his Da-Da-Da.

Official rundown below:

From ESPN:

On Saturday, Sept. 21, ESPN launched a new campaign in support of its flagship program, SportsCenter.  Entitled “DaDaDa DaDaDa,” the campaign focuses on the iconic sound all fans associate with the show, and with great sports moments.  The 60-second launch spot features a range of athletes – from professionals to little leaguers – who subtly and not-so-subtly call out their “DaDaDa” moments.  Wieden+Kennedy New York is the creative agency.

“This campaign grew out of research we did in order to better understand the role SportsCenter plays in fans’ lives given all the access points for sports news, information, and highlights provided by new technologies,” said Aaron Taylor, senior vice president of marketing.  “Fans have a strong emotional connection with the show.  And, what we realized is that ‘DaDaDa’ is emotional shorthand for, not only the great moments that happen in sports, but how SportsCenter presents those moments – giving context to them with perspective and personality.”

The TV campaign is running across ESPN networks and beyond, and will include halftime of Monday Night Football when the Denver Broncos host the Oakland Raiders.  Digital creative beings today as well and, after the initial launch phase, will be updated to highlight timely “DaDaDa” moments.  Outdoor digital billboards will run in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles, and can also be updated to drive fans to SportsCenter for breaking news and highlights.

Athletes featured in the spot include:

Chris Chester, Robert Griffin III, Kory Lichtensteiger, Will Montgomery,  Alfred Morris, Tyler Polumbus, Trent Williams – Washington Redskins

Stephen Curry – Golden State Warriors

Landon Donovan – Professional soccer player

Sam Gagner – Edmonton Oilers

Jimmie Johnson – NASCAR driver

Patrick Kane – Chicago Blackhawks

Clayton Kershaw – Los Angeles Dodgers

Andrew McCutchen – Pittsburgh Pirates (highlight called by Greg Brown, the voice of the Pirates)

Jason Pierre-Paul and Justin Tuck – New York Giants

Paul Rabil – Boston Cannons Lacrosse

Maria Sharapova – Professional tennis player

Bubba Watson – professional golfer

Russell Westbrook – Oklahoma City Thunder

Chicago news: Martellus Bennett signs on with WSCR; will appear on Boers and Bernstein on Mondays

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Undoubtedly, my Chicago readers are very happy with the Bears sitting at 3-0 thanks in part to the strong early play from Martellus Bennett. As a result, Bennett’s profile and unique personality are about to become much bigger in this town.

I’m not saying he’s different, but last week the tight end compared Marc Trestman to “Willy Wonka” in an interview at ESPN 1000. However, he did clarify what he meant.

“I always say Coach Trestman reminds me of the first Willy Wonka. Not the Johnny Depp one. The Johnny Depp one was really cool, but the first one before that, the 1943 version.”

Actually, the adaptation Bennett referred to is the 1971 film “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” starring Gene Wilder. Depp starred in another adaptation of the movie in 2005.
“He’s a genius,” Bennett said of Trestman. “A lot of times when you’re around really, really smart people, you don’t really understand them.

“I thought Willy Wonka was brilliant. He had all kinds of candy. Who doesn’t like chocolate and candies? Everybody wanted a Gobstopper. I just think he’s brilliant.”

From this point, it will be WSCR’s turn to make sense of what Bennett means. He has signed on at the station. Here’s the official announcement, which says Bennett will serve as “creative director” of his segments.

********

Chicago Bears tight end Martellus Bennett has been the talk of Chicago with his performance on the field along with his colorful personality. In what promises to be must-hear radio, Bennett will now bring his enticing persona to WSCR-670 The Score for his only regularly scheduled radio appearances during the football season.

Listeners will be able to interact with Bennett when he appears on the Boers and Bernstein Show Mondays at 5PM. On weeks the Bears play on a Monday or Thursday, Bennett will join the afternoon duo the day after the game. In addition, fans will be able to meet the star in person as Bennett will join the Miller Lite Top Draft Show with host Laurence Holmes at various locations across the Chicago area starting Tuesday, October 1.

Listeners of Chicago’s dominant sports talk radio station can expect original content as Bennett will serve as creative director of his segments, thus providing a unique forum for his thoughts on football.

“We are thrilled to welcome Martellus to our terrific roster of football experts at The Score,” noted WSCR Program Director Mitch Rosen. “Given his role as creative director of his segments, matched by his unpredictable personality, we know his appearances will be immensely entertaining. Fans will have many opportunities to interact with Martellus and will get to know what he thinks about the Bears, the NFL and anything else both on and off the field.”

Bennett will have a strong presence across The Score’s vast digital assets including CBSChicago.com and multiple social media platforms.

A good read: Paul ‘Bear’ Bryant on his 100th birthday; still all-powerful at Alabama

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ESPN.com’s Ivan Maisel was a natural to write this story. Even though he lived elsewhere his adult life, the Mobile-native never strayed from his Alabama roots, which included a certain football coach.

The occasion of Paul “Bear” Bryant’s 100th birthday prompted this excellent reflection from Maisel. More than 30 years after his death, the legendary coach remains front and center every day at Alabama.

Bryant is a presence on the Alabama campus in the ways that an iconic figure is remembered. The stadium where he won games for those 25 seasons carries his name. So does a main campus street, dormitory, conference center and, of course, the museum, which displays and stores the artifacts and history of his career (admission today is free). Paul W. Bryant High School is nearby.

The Paul W. Bryant Scholarship, set up by its namesake, is available to the children of his former players who enroll at Alabama. Over 40 years, some 800 students have been the beneficiaries, 79 of them in the current semester.

“He laid his fingerprint down here,” Alabama offensive left tackle Cyrus Kouandjio. “It’s easy to see.”

A statue of Bryant stands outside the north end of Bryant-Denny Stadium, literally the central figure of the five Crimson Tide coaches honored for taking the football team to a national championship. The 9-foot-tall Bryant stands straight, wears a jacket, vest, tie and his trademark houndstooth fedora, and carries in his right hand the rolled-up manila folder on which he made his game notes. The folders from his 315th victory, the one that broke Amos Alonzo Stagg’s career record, and his 323rd and final victory, are framed and hanging in the office of Paul W. Bryant Museum director, Ken Gaddy.

Maisel writes on Bryant’s impact on him. Mind you, he attended Stanford, not Alabama:

Forgive the personal nature of this story. For those of us who grew up in Alabama in a time when our state was viewed as a cauldron of hatred, Bryant told the rest of the nation that we could produce success and character. He inspired a level of loyalty unlike any coach before or since in any state in any sport.

I can tell you where I was the day he died, and not just because it was my 23rd birthday. I know where I was because that was the first time a death ever made me cry. The notion that he is just a football coach to the 80 million millennials estimated to live in the United States makes me want to cry again.

From Gene Stallings, his former player at Texas A&M who went on to win a national championship as coach at Alabama.

“One of the reasons of his great success over an extended period of time was, we all wanted to please Coach Bryant,” Stallings said. “The players wanted to please him. The assistant coaches wanted to please him. The alumni wanted to please him. The administration wanted to please him. The president of the university — Coach Bryant just had that little something about him that people wanted to please. We’ll do anything just to hear Coach Bryant say, ‘You did a good job.’ He didn’t say it too often. But we wanted him to say it.

“You know, there was a little fear factor, and I don’t think there’s anything wrong with fear factor….whether or not you were doing your job well enough to please Coach Bryant.”

Random baseball card: Gene Alley, former Pirates shortstop

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With Pittsburgh finally in contention again, I thought I’d run a card from its past. Aside from the obvious stars (Clemente, Stargell), whenever I think of those old Pirates teams, Gene Alley keeps popping in my head.

Why? I don’t know. But I decided to pay tribute to Gene today.

For the record, Alley played 11 years for the Pirates and was a two-time All-Star and two-time Gold Glove winner.

Here’s to you, Gene…and the Pirates.

Weekend wrap: SI editors discuss Oklahoma State series; McManus on vision for CBS Sports Network

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Spanning the globe to give you the constant variety of sports media…

Oklahoma State: Gina Minzell of NewsOk.com has the transcript of the live chat Sports Illustrated editors Chris Stone and Jon Wertheim conducted on Deadspin about their Oklahoma State series.

Question: If your goal was to expose college athletics, why did you feel the need to sacrifice Oklahoma State at the altar of the NCAA in the process? Why not pick five or 10 different schools to highlight

Chris Stone: The goal of the series was not to sacrifice OSU, but present what happens at OSU as the symptom of much greater systemic problem. The investigation was not about rules violations or sanctions or NCAA Bylaw 12.5.2.1 It wasn’t about OSU players smoking pot; it was about the institutional sham of treatment programs that aren’t interested in treatment or counseling. It wasn’t about OSU recruits getting laid. It was about raising the question of whether a hostess program is intended as a sorority in service to the football program. It wasn’t about players as the sole agents of corruption. It was about asking whether college football programs are set up to develop any other future skills than being a football player.

CBS Sports Network: John Ourand of Sports Business Daily talked to CBS Sports Chairman Sean McManus about the state of the network:

This year, CBS opted not even to kick the tires when Fox Sports and NBC Sports Group agreed to pay NASCAR a combined $8.2 billion for rights through 2024. It remained on the sideline as Fox outbid NBC for the rights to golf’s U.S. Open. Its executive team also opted not to match ESPN’s $75 million-a-year bid to swipe U.S. Open tennis rights, an event that CBS has produced since 1968.
These moves — or, rather, the lack of them — have caused some industry observers to scratch their heads, wondering why a broadcast network that runs an all-sports cable channel wouldn’t be more involved.
“We’ve said all along that we’re not currently in the marketplace for hundred-million-dollar deals,” said CBS Sports Chairman Sean McManus. “But we’re trying to improve our programming, which I think we’ve done dramatically by doing smart deals.”

GameDay: Richard Sandomir of the New York Times writes about ESPN’s GameDay going on location.

Some colleges are veteran hosts. Some have never done it and might get about barely a week’s warning that “GameDay” wants to visit. For all, the national exposure to about two million viewers on Saturdays, augmented by reports from the set on Friday, is irresistible. Because of the interest in the Alabama-Texas A&M game, those reports began Thursday from College Station.

“It’s one of the things you can’t say no to,” said Van Hilderbrand, an associate athletic director at Clemson, the “GameDay” host on Aug. 31, the first Saturday of the season. In 2006, Clemson received the standard five-day notice that ESPN wanted to take “GameDay” to its campus. But this year, it was told of its selection on Aug. 1. Both times, the show emanated from the university’s front lawn.

Nickname controversy: Michael Bradley of the National Sports Journalism Center lauds columnists who no longer will use the nickname for the Washington football team.

Those who have taken a public stand against the use of a racist slur are helping a relatively disenfranchised section of the American population gain dignity. By setting a standard that excludes the use of hateful words in their work, these media members are encouraging their peers to do likewise. It’s no different than a newspaper’s calling out a slumlord who refuses to provide safe shelter for his tenants. Or a TV station’s launching a news series directed at a corrupt official. In all cases, the goal is to help the people without power gain some influence over those who have it. That it is done in a very public way makes it highly effective.

Dick Vitale:The New York Post has a nice story on how Vitale helped assist a player in getting a transfer.

Okoro, a 6-foot-5 Bronx product and St. Raymond graduate, credited ESPN announcer Dick Vitale for a huge assist.

“I’d also like to give a shout out to the great @DickieV for his voice on my waiver!” Okoro tweeted. “Truly honored and it is heavily appreciated!”

Okoro’s 72-year-old father, Stanislaus, died last December of a stroke. Then two months later, his 28-year-old brother, Idiongo, died of colon cancer. Okoro came home to be closer to his mother, Eno, and older brother Freddie, 26.

When hearing Okoro’s story, Vitale took to Twitter in support, calling on NCAA president Mark Emmert to change the ruling.

“I’m thrilled, excited, I just [sent] a tweet congratulating the kid,” Vitale told The Post in a phone interview. “It was common sense. I’m so happy the NCAA saw that. It was a no-brainer.”

NFL Roundtable: Richard Deitsch of SI.com asked various media writers to weigh in on the current state of NFL broadcasters. Typically, Deadspin’s John Koblin was bright and cheery.

A. Which NFL pregame show is the most effective and why?

Koblin: I really think they’re all terrible. Points to [ESPN’s Sunday] NFL Countdown for being on a couple of hours earlier, and for having Sal Pal [reporter Sal Paolantonio], Suzy Kolber and Ed Werder, and notable/reliable faces at the stadiums (Stadium reports are fun!). But, I suppose, given the ridiculousness of the format, Fox remains the most tolerable. I’m still confused how CBS’s crew remains intact.

ESPN vs. Fox Sports 1: Steve Lepore of the Puck the Media writes about ESPN touting a ratings increase since Aug. 17, the date Fox Sports 1 debuted.

The network sent out a pointedly-addressed press release citing their ratings as being “up 13 percent since August 17.” That would be the exact day that Fox Sports 1 debuted, and NBC premiered it’s EPL coverage. ESPN is saying that its full-day average (1.21 million viewers) is up 13 percent “compared to the same four weeks a year ago (1.07 million).” Meanwhile, in primetime, the network is averaging 2.89 million, up 20 percent from that time period in 2012 (2.41 million).

Podcasts:

Jason McIntyre Show: Greg Bedard of MMQB.

Awful Announcing: Bruce Feldman of CBSSports.com

Sports Media Weekly: Michelle Beadle.

Sports-Casters: Dan Wolken, USA Today, and Michael Woods, thesweetscience.com/ESPN Magazine.