Monthly Archives: August 2012

Crying games: ESPN exec defends coverage of Little League World Series; Francona says cool event

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ESPN coverage of the Little League World Series now is in full swing. The event has become more than a cult.

The small kids pull in big ratings.

“There are Little League World Series games that do higher than college basketball,” said Mark Gross, ESPN’s senior vice-president and executive producer for production. “We have games rate higher than MLB games. The kids are doing a 1.2 rating, while MLB is doing a .6.

“The thing about Little League is that the game is quick. It moves along. The game can be over in an hour, 90 minutes.”

That’s barely the top of the fourth for a Yankees-Red Sox game.

Invariably, though, during every Little League World Series, ESPN gets knocked for showing the little kids crying after a tough loss.

Bill Plaschke of the Los Angeles Times wrote last year:

I’ve written this column before, and I’ll write it again, and nobody will listen because more than 1 million people are usually watching, but the truth is as clear as those rivulets running down a strikeout victim’s cheeks.

Allowing the public viewing of pubescent angst under the guise of a baseball game is opportunistic, offensive and just plain wrong.

The 69 Little League World Series and qualifying games that are currently being shown on ESPN and ABC are the worst sort of reality television, turning 11-to-13-year-olds into adults, turning adults into kids, turning my stomach.

Gross has heard it all before. Here is his response:

“If the kid is crying his eyes out, we don’t dwell on it. We’re respectful of the kids and how they play. It’s not about dwelling on the negative. We’re not looking to embarrass anybody. We’re just looking to document the event. Do you see a kid crying? It is part of the game. Ten minutes later, you might see him running to an arcade game.

“That’s an easy thing that people like to pick on. In my opinion, they don’t watch closely enough to see how different things are being covered. It’s easy say, ‘Oh, there’s ESPN they’re showing a kid crying.’ The kid is upset. He just lost. He wanted to win. We document the event. That’s what people expect.”

Terry Francona is looking forward to working his first Little League World Series. From Michael Hiestand of USA Today:

When he first talked to ESPN executives, he specifically asked if his assignments could include LLWS. Their response, he says: “They laughed, of course, and said yes.”

So why the interest in kids? “It’s just such a cool event,” Francona said. “Every MLB clubhouse, I’d be willing to bet, is going to have the games on. It’s the way baseball is supposed to be.”

But what about the old criticism, that TV coverage puts extra pressure on the players? “I see that point. But (LLWS organizers) go out of their way to see the game stays the way it’s supposed to be. I have a feeling once the game starts, they’re not worried who’s watching.”

 

 

 

Podcasting: Latest Sports-Casters episode features yours truly; Beadle featured on AA; Ourand on Sports Media Weekly

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Just a shameless plug for myself. Wait a minute, it is my site.

I appear on this week’s edition of The Sports-Casters. I talk Olympics and other media stuff with Steven Bennett.

Also appearing are Luke Winn and Tas Melas.

Thanks to Steven for having me on.

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Michelle Beadle is featured on the latest Awful Announcing podcast.

From AA:

Michelle’s move from ESPN to NBC was the most talked about move in the sports media in 2012 and she just finished covering the Olympics for NBC in London. We talk about the transition to working sports and entertainment.

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Street and Smith’s John Ourand provided perspective on being in London on the latest Sports Media Weekly podcast. He was ticked off about Dick Ebersol giving an interview to Joe Posnanski. Like everyone else, Ourand had been told Ebersol wasn’t giving interviews.

 

 

 

 

 

The beat: No media 1-on-1 with RG3; TV big for new Big East commish; Esiason new role on CBS Sports Radio

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Apparently, the Washington Redskins don’t want to tax their new prize quarterback. Dan Pompei, a veteran NFL writer for the Chicago Tribune, writes:

Camp oddity: As the second pick in the draft, (Robert Griffin III) is one of the most coveted interview subjects in the NFL this summer. When he had his initial news conference at the start of training camp, three local television stations and NFL Network carried it live. But the Redskins have prevented him from doing any one-on-one interviews. He is believed to be the only high-profile player in the NFL who does not do one-on-ones. Instead, he does one weekly group interview. This week, he fielded 19 questions before media members were cut off.

I can understand the Redskins not wanting Griffin to be overtaxed. However, he seems to be plenty media savvy. Don’t think it will be Washington’s best interests to tick off the local media, especially when he starts doing one-on-ones with the network pregame shows once the season starts.

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Kudos to my old pal Mark Blaudschun of ajerseyguy.com for breaking the story of Mike Aresco being hired as the new Big East commissioner. Aresco’s background as an executive for CBS and ESPN shows how much television figures into the survival of the struggling conference.

Blaudschun writes:

There should be a sense of optimism about what will happen with the new television contract in football, whether it is with ESPN or NBC, which is looking for college football programming. Maybe each Big East school can get double the  $6 million annually from the present contract. Maybe they can get triple that amount.

Aresco knows that world as well as anyone. So does Bevilacqua, who brokered the billion dollar plus deal the Pac-12 signed last year.

If the Big East gets the money, maybe there is less of a reason for schools like Louisville and UConn and Rutgers to look elsewhere, as they are now doing. Maybe the Big East becomes aggressive again to re-establish its base turf in the East–would Maryland, strapped for cash, listen to a better offer?

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Boomer Esiason is going to have an increased role with the new CBS Sports Network. Already host of morning show on WFAN in New York, the former QB has been named as a contributor. He’ll provide commentary and updates for the “CBS Sports Minute” that will be distributed during morning drive to member stations.

From CBS:

Esiason will be heard weekday mornings near the top of the hour from 6:00-10:00AM on CBS Sports Radio stations, including premier outlets WFAN in New York, WSCR in Chicago, KNBR in San Francisco and WIP-FM in Philadelphia, among others. Audiences across the country will also hear directly from Esiason throughout the NFL season as he weighs in on players, coaches, upcoming match-ups, and the day’s trending topics. He will similarly be available to CBS Sports Radio stations as the news warrants in the pre- and off-season.

 

 

Finally, Posnanski weighs in on Paterno, book: Search for human being in the middle

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Joe Posnanski finally ended his silence in regards to Joe Paterno and his upcoming book on the now severely tainted coach.

With Paterno coming out Tuesday, Posnanski wrote a first-person piece in USA Today Thursday. Formerly with Sports Illustrated, he now is the senior columnist for the sportsonearth.com, a joint venture between the USA TODAY Sports Media Group and MLB Advanced Media.

Posnanski writes:

Joe Paterno, throughout his life, has been infused with superhuman qualities and inhuman qualities. He was called perfect for so many years, and he was called omniscient and all powerful too. He was none of these things, though. The first words of the book came to me all at once:

“This is the story of a man named Joe Paterno, who in his long life was called moral and immoral, decent and scheming, omniscient and a figurehead, hero and fraud, Saint Joe and the devil. A life, of course, cannot be reduced to a single word, but …”

But … what? That was my book. There was the bloated superhero of Nov. 4, the savage villain of Nov. 5 … and I searched for the human being in the middle. I believe most of us live somewhere in the middle.

Clearly, Posnanski intends to write about the all the “good” Paterno accomplished in his life. He writes:

Nobody would argue — and certainly my book does not argue — that the good Joe Paterno did in his life should shield him from the horrors of his mistakes. Some would argue, especially in the white-hot emotion sparked by the latest revelations, that Paterno’s role in the Jerry Sandusky crimes invalidates whatever good he might have done. My book does not argue that either. My book, I believe, lets the reader make up his or her own mind. When people ask me if Penn State was right in tearing down Joe Paterno’s statue in light of the Freeh Report’s conclusion, I ask a different question: “Should they have built a statue to him in the first place?” When people ask me if the NCAA was right in unleashing draconian penalties against Penn State, I ask a different question: “Should they have held up Joe Paterno as a paragon of purity and virtue for more than four decades?”

And he adds:

As a writer, I tried to take the measure of the man who was that head football coach. I believe I have written about his life with as much honesty as I have. I have reported as many of the facts of the Sandusky case as I could uncover (including some new ones). But I also objectively wrote about why so many people admired and idolized Joe Paterno in the first place. I wrote at length about his youthful idealism. I wrote at length about his unprecedented success as a coach. I wrote at length about the last 15 years of his life when he would not quit. I wrote at length about the end.

I wonder if people will be in the mood to read about the high points in Paterno’s life. It all seems so obscured, even irrelevant, in light of what he did in the Sandusky case.

Posnanski concludes:

No, I don’t feel about Joe Paterno the same way I did when I started writing the book. But I don’t feel about him the way his most blistering critics feel. He was a human being, filled with ideals and flaws, honesty and hypocrisy, charity and selfishness, modesty and the refusal to abdicate his throne. There was little simple about him. I chased the complicated story of a man and his long life. I hope that is the story I wrote.

That passage would suggest that Posnanski, while being objective, might have a more sympathetic tone than many people will be able to stomach.

Again, we’ll all find out more when the book is released on Tuesday.

 

 

Why isn’t Simon & Schuster doing more to promote Paterno book on its site? Posnanski not listed for any appearances

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Perhaps I’m reading too much into this, but I find it interesting that Simon & Schuster is doing minimal promotion on its site for Joe Posnanski’s Paterno book.

All that really exists is a separate page about the book. You have to do a search to find it on the site.

There is no mention of Paterno on Simon & Schuster’s home page. Curious, but maybe that’s because the book hasn’t been released?

Then I saw a tab for “Coming Soon.” Certainly, Paterno would be mentioned there, considering the book is coming out Tuesday.

However, under the “Coming Soon” highlights for Aug. 21, there were three books being promoted under non-fiction. None of them were named Paterno.

Simon & Schuster might have its reasons for not doing more to promote Paterno. I don’t know for sure because I’m still waiting to receive a return phone call from the book’s publicist.

However, it certainly seems strange, doesn’t it? This is a highly-anticipated book in which the high-profile author received a huge advance (reportedly in the $750,000 range). You usually pound the drum pretty hard for these kind of projects.

If the Sandusky crimes never happened, and the book was indeed about the legendary life of a beloved college coach as was first intended, I would imagine Paterno would be splashed all over the Simon & Schuster site.

Indeed, you could tell the publisher initially had big hopes for Paterno with this opening line to the blurb.

Joe Posnanski’s biography of the late Penn State football coach Joe Paterno follows in the tradition of works by Richard Ben Cramer on Joe DiMaggio and David Maraniss on Vince Lombardi.

All the ingredients were there for a bestseller, but it didn’t turn out that way. Instead, Simon & Schuster now is looking at a controversial book that could get panned big time. The backlash against Paterno is severe.

My local bookstore owner doesn’t have high expectations for the book. “Nobody wants to read about Paterno,” the owner said.

By going low-key on the site, it certainly seems as if Simon & Schuster is hedging its bets on Paterno. Perhaps, the publisher doesn’t want to get too far out in front if the book turns out to be a bust.

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Here’s another interesting twist. Simon & Schuster has an alphabetical listing for upcoming author appearances. For instance, Nick Faldo is going to be at a bookstore in New Jersey on Nov. 14.

One name is conspicuously absent from the list. You guess it: Joe Posnanski.

In July, a New York Times story quoted a representative of the Philadelphia library, where Posnanski was supposed to appear, as saying Simon & Schuster decided to hold off on a tour.

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Actor Joe Mantegna is the reader for the audio version of the book. He’s an avid sports fan and a long-time Cubs sufferer. It would be interesting to get his view of the book.

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I have said several times that I am a big admirer of Posnanski’s work. If anyone can pull this off, it would be him. For his sake, I hope he does.

I guess we’ll know more on Tuesday.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Paterno book excerpt: Sobbing coach says ‘name is gone’

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GQ posted an excerpt of the excerpts it is running from Joe Posnanski’s Paterno book in its September issue.

The post contains a weird illustration of Paterno holding a cell phone while talking to someone with long hair. That couldn’t be Posnanski, who, like me, is hair challenged.

The short excerpts reveal that Scott Paterno was the first person in the inner circle to realize the magnitude of the Sandusky mess. He told his father that he may have coached his last game.

It also discloses that Paterno had no pull left on the Penn State board to bail him out in an effort to save his job.

Then there was this passage:

On Thursday, Paterno met with his coaches at his house. He sobbed  uncontrollably. This was his bad day. Later, one of his former captains, Brandon  Short, stopped by the house. When Brandon asked, “How are you doing, Coach?”  Paterno answered, “I’m okay,” but the last syllable was shaky, muffled by  crying, and then he broke down and said, “I don’t know what I’m going to do with  myself.” Nobody knew how to handle such emotion. Joe had always seemed  invulnerable. On Thursday, though, he cried continually.

“My name,” he told Jay, “I have spent my whole life trying to make that name  mean something. And now it’s gone.”

GQ said it will post the entire excerpt on Monday. Simon & Schuster will release the book on Tuesday.

Clearly, this short excerpt shows the access Posnanski had with the Paterno family. I’m all for access, and it will interesting to see what Posnanski writes about the inner circle’s reaction, leading up to Paterno’s death in January.

However, the book is 400-plus pages. Are you also going to be in the mood to read about Penn State’s great victory over Miami in the 1987 Fiesta Bowl? Probably not.

Again, can’t wait to see how Posnanski attempts to pull this off.

 

 

Update: Johnson saga results in huge rating for Hard Knocks; robotic cameras used in dramatic scene

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Update:

This isn’t a surprise. Just in from HBO:

This week’s premiere of HARD KNOCKS: TRAINING CAMP WITH THE MIAMI DOLPHINS Episode #2 delivered 984,000 viewers, up 34% from last week . Last night’s edition was the second most watched episode of Hard Knocks since 2002 (trailing only the season finale of the NY Jets series in 2010, which clocked in just over a million viewers – 1.009M).

You knew the Johnson saga would deliver. However, with Johnson gone, will Hard Knocks be able to continue the momentum for three more episodes?

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Incredible stuff on Hard Knocks last night. Even though you knew what was coming, I’m sure you squirmed while watching Chad Johnson meet his fate with the Dolphins.

The access happened thanks to NFL Films using robotic cameras. There wasn’t a crew in Joe Philbin’s office. If that was the case, we probably don’t see it.

Said HBO Sports spokesman Raymond Stallone:

“The installation of robotic cameras on this series was a turning point. It happened a few years into the series and put the coaches and management at ease.

“We install tiny robotic cameras and they don’t have to worry about a camera crew hovering around the room. There are no people from NFL FILMS in the coaches’ rooms. The use of robotic cameras has really enhanced the production of the series.”

Even with the robotic cameras in place, the Dolphins still could have prevented Hard Knocks from airing the scene. Ken Fang and Fangsbites.com points out that the Jets wouldn’t allow cameras in for a meeting with Darrelle Revis following the end of his holdout.

The Dolphins, though, allowed the ax meeting to be aired. Presumably, Johnson also agreed.

Johnson had to know other teams would be watching the scene. That likely accounted for the dignity Johnson showed, a trait not always seen from him. It seemed to me he already was auditioning for someone else.

 

 

Reinsdorf on Harrelson’s style: If up to me, there wouldn’t be homers in booth

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I covered the White Sox for three years in the late 80s. I spent a lot of time around Jerry Reinsdorf. I always found him interesting and extremely candid.

Nothing has changed on both fronts more than 25 years later.

I was driving in the car Saturday morning and heard the Sox owner on Talkin’ Baseball with Bruce Levine and Fred Huebner on WMVP-AM 1000.

The subject of Ken Harrelson’s broadcast style came up. Friday, he nearly fell out of the booth calling Jordan Danks’ walk-off homer.

As usual, Reinsdorf spoke with complete candor.

In fact, Reinsdorf said if it was up to him, Harrelson probably would have a much different approach to the Sox broadcasts.

From Reinsdorf:

(Harrelson is) a homer. There are a lot of people who don’t like that style of broadcasting. When I grew up in New York, there were no homers. We had Mel Allen and Red Barber. They played it straight down the middle.

I came to Chicago in 1957. I heard Jack Quinlan and Jack Brickhouse rooting for their teams. I thought that was awful, absolutely awful. There were a lot of people in Chicago who didn’t root for the local teams.

I remember saying to myself, ‘If I had the opportunity (to own a team), I would not have a homer in the booth.’

Reinsdorf did buy the Sox in 1981 and was subjected to one of the game’s great homers, Harry Caray, for a season. He eventually let Caray go to the Cubs after the season, a decision that’s still a matter of great debate in Chicago.

Reinsdorf continues:

We hired Don Drysdale and Ken Harrelson in 1982. We said, ‘We don’t want homerism. We want you to play this right down the middle, a network-quality broadcast.’

Our fans absolutely hated that. Chicago fans want their announcers to root for their teams.

I unleashed them. I said, ‘Go ahead and root.’

If it were up to me, there wouldn’t be homerism. It’s not up to me. It’s up to the fans and they get what they want.

Reinsdorf, though, somewhat compromises his argument when he brings up watching games on MLB’s Extra Innings package.

Reinsdorf said:

Most of those broadcasts are boring. They don’t have any exciting personalities at all.

Boring? Again appreciate the candor, Jerry.

I have to agree with him. There are a lot of dull telecasts out there.

But Jerry, doesn’t Hawk’s unique style make him more interesting? Would he be as compelling if he played it straight? I don’t think so.

You can say plenty about Harrelson, but nobody will ever call him dull.

 

 

 

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What’s wrong with you? 5.4 million people watch horrid NFL preseason game on ESPN

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I know it felt weird last night with the Olympics being over. Suddenly, we all had 3-4 hours of actually having to make a decision as to what to watch on TV. No, reading a book was not an option.

Even Luke Donald found the situation perplexing, noting in this tweet:

@LukeDonald  Missing my usual couple of hours of evening Olympic coverage. Not quite the same watching keeping up with the Kardashians!!!

Apparently, other people felt withdrawal. For some, it got so bad they actually tuned into the Dallas-Oakland preseason game on ESPN.

Incredibly, the telecast did a 3.8 overnight rating, which was higher than the total points scored in the 3-0 game. That translates into 5.4 million people who had nothing better to do than watch something that vaguely resembled football.

From Mr. Twitter:

@darrenrovell  Last night’s Cowboys-Raiders game drew 5.4 million viewers, beating Game 6 of this year’s Stanley Cup Finals (4.9 million)

Really, what’s wrong with you, people? Just because they trot out players wearing NFL uniforms doesn’t mean they are actually NFL players. You’ll never get those three hours back.

As for me, I watched American Triumvirate, the Golf Channel’s fine documentary on Byron Nelson, Sam Snead and Ben Hogan.

Hey, Luke, forget about the Kardashians. You should be watching Hogan, Snead and Nelson.

 

Update: HBO Hard Knocks will have footage of Philbin releasing Johnson

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Update: Just got this email from HBO:

There will be footage of Dolphins head coach Joe Philbin meeting in his office with Chad Johnson and releasing him from the team.

Should be some big ratings tonight.

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I can’t say that I was a big fan of the Chad Johnson segments during the first episode of Hard Knocks. As usual, he went out of his way to draw attention to himself. I didn’t get a kick out of it considering I think he’s washed up. If you can’t catch more than 15 passes with Tom Brady as your QB, you’re done.

Well, Johnson found a way to spice up what figures to be his last appearance on this year’s Hard Knocks (HBO, Tuesday, 10 p.m.). The Dolphins dumped him following an alleged domestic violence incident with his wife.

According to HBO, the Johnson saga will be included in Tuesday’s episode. However, it isn’t featured in this preview.

I’d look for it more towards the end of the show since it happened late last week. Should be interesting.