Tag: ESPN (Page 3 of 18)

      Eli Manning’s one-man press conference [video]

      December 22, 2010 /

      This clip is making the rounds, but this wasn’t as unusual as the Monday Night ESPN crew made it out to be. The footage shows Eli Manning waiting around for the media to arrive at his post-game presser.

      But, per ESPN, this was nothing unusual:

      But this wasn’t a slight by the media or a case of reporters ignoring Manning, who didn’t have to wait too long. And it was nothing unusual. Following every game, Manning and other Giants stars such as Justin Tuck conduct their news conferences at the same time as the rest of their teammates are talking in the locker room.

      Reporters in the locker room are alerted by the Giants public relations staff multiple times when Manning is heading to the podium. Although the players can walk directly to the podium area from their locker room, reporters have to take a roundabout route.

      And Manning typically walks into a near-empty room at the start of his postgame news conferences and patiently waits for reporters.

      Ok, so you’re straight — the ESPN Monday Night crew made a big deal out of something that wasn’t a big deal, per ESPN.com. Glad that’s settled.

      External Sports, Fantasy Football, NFL, Video

      Nothing at noon: Early college football slate has been boring

      October 9, 2010 /
      CHAMPAIGN, IL - OCTOBER 02: Terrelle Pryor of the Ohio State Buckeyes leads teammates including Justin Boren , Dan Herron and Mike Adams off the field during a game against the Illinois Fighting Illini at Memorial Stadium on October 2, 2010 in Champaign, Illinois. Ohio State defeated Illinois 24-13. (Photo by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images)

      If you like to sleep in on Saturdays (like, really sleep in), you’ve been in luck. The noon (eastern) slate of college football games this season has been both lacking big-time games, and any kind of surprises. It’s essentially the bad Big Ten and ACC games, and maybe lower-level SEC matchup.

      I imagine it has a lot to do with television, and the networks trying to get the biggest games in the prime spots (3:30 and 8). But in year’s past, I seem to remember there being some noon games that were worth watching. And even if they weren’t worth turning on at the start, there always seemed to be at least one game that you saw the score for that made you turn on the TV.

      Outside of Florida’s scare against Miami (OH) in Week 1, South Carolina’s win over Georgia in Week 2 and Miami’s win over Clemson last week, there really hasn’t been that much to watch early in the day. And really, none of those were all that exciting. This is surprising in a year where college football has had a ton of big games with a lot of hype. As a couch potato who loves to come home from my morning duties and take in some football right away, I’m very dismayed by this.

      Sure, the 3:30 and 8 time slots are great, but if you plan on focusing on one game, the others might as well not even be on. Plus, some of the bigger games get pushed completely off of television in different markets. For instance, last week’s 8 p.m. ABC game in Michigan was Notre Dame vs. Boston College. If you’re not a Notre Dame fan (or I suppose a BC fan, but there’s really not many of those in this state), that doesn’t do much for you. The mirror game on ESPN2 was Washington at USC, which turned out to be a good game, but really doesn’t draw that much interest in the Midwest.

      One of last week’s biggest games, Stanford at Oregon, wasn’t even on TV, and I’m not just talking about my crappy basic digital package at home. Buffalo Wild Wings, which has like 75 TVs, didn’t have the game on because it wasn’t available. You’re telling me Notre Dame at Boston College couldn’t have been moved to the noon time slot where people in the Midwest and East (the obvious major markets for that game) could have been awake and watching?

      Surely there are more pressing issues in college football right now, but this dearth of noon games seems to be the easiest to fix. So get on it, NCAA, because not only is this boring me early in the day, but it’s really making it hard to find things to write about before 3:30.

      College Football, External Sports

      USA/Lithuania on ESPN Classic? Thanks for nothing, Worldwide Leader.

      September 10, 2010 /

      All right, I don’t know how many of our readers actually get ESPN Classic, but I don’t. I’d have to pay an extra $50 a month for DirecTV’s Premier Package to get ESPN’s grumpy grandpa.

      The U.S. men’s basketball team plays Lithuania in the semifinals of the 2010 FIBA World Championship on Saturday morning and the game is only going to be broadcast on ESPN Classic.

      Of course, all of the main ESPN channels (ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU) are packed with college football on Saturday morning, so if nothing else, this is just poor planning by the network. They could have worked out a deal with NBATV to simulcast the game, but they didn’t.

      It does appear that ESPN3.com will stream the game for those that want to watch it live. Watching the game on the computer isn’t the same as watching it in HD, but it’s something. Of course, the game says it’s “subject to blackout,” so I’m not even sure that’s an option.

      Sigh.

      Saturday Update: Yay! ESPN2 will be broadcasting the game…13.5 hours later. You can catch a rebroadcast of the game at 1:30 ET Sunday morning on ESPN2. Way to step up, ESPN. (Sarcasm.)

      Saturday Update #2: ESPN3.com is only available to those who subscribe to an ESPN-affiliated internet subscriber, and my service — Time Warner — does not fall into that category. Woo-hoo!

      External Sports, Fantasy Basketball, NBA, News, Television

      ESPN removes story about LeBron’s party in Vegas

      July 29, 2010 /
      Basketball Player LeBron James hosts a night at Lavo on July 23, 2010 in Las Vegas, NV (Photo by DAP1 / Meet The Famous) Photo via Newscom

      Arash Markazi attended a party ‘hosted’ by LeBron in Las Vegas and lived to tell the tale. Well, sort of. Shortly after the story was posted, the Worldwide Leader took it down.

      Written by Arash Markazi of ESPN’s Los Angeles affiliate, the story recounted the author’s night out on the town with James and his entourage at the Tao nightclub at the Venetian hotel. While the majority of the piece, which is still online, contained several harmless vignettes such as finding James engaged in a dance off with Lamar Odom of the Los Angeles Lakers, a few parts cast the King in less than the best light.

      According to Markazi, copious amounts of champagne and vodka flowed over the course of the evening, and scantily clad women – or in at least one case, nude women – cavorted around the player and his friends who did shots of tequila while waiters floating on wires serviced the table.

      ESPN has issued a statement about the story:

      “The story should have never been published,” wrote Josh Krulewitz of ESPN in a statement to SportsBusiness Daily. “The draft was inadvertently put on the server before going through the usual editorial process. We are in the midst of looking into the matter.”

      You can read the entire story here. (Just click on the image and a bigger version should appear.)

      I would describe it as detailed, honest and unflattering.

      Update: SPORTSbyBROOKS has ESPN’s statement as well as a statement from Markazi.

      “ESPN.com will not be posting the story in any form. We looked into the situation thoroughly and found that Arash did not properly identify himself as a reporter or clearly state his intentions to write a story. As a result, we are not comfortable with the content, even in an edited version, because of the manner in which the story was reported.

      We’ve been discussing the situation with Arash and he completely understands. To be clear, the decisions to pull the prematurely published story and then not to run it were made completely by ESPN editorial staff without influence from any outside party.”

      Markazi:

      “I have been in conversations with ESPN.com’s editors and, upon their complete review, understand their decision not to run the story. It is important to note that I stand by the accuracy of the story in its entirety, but should have been clearer in representing my intent to write about the events I observed.”

      Well, the story is out there, and it might get more attention now that it would have had ESPN kept it published, but such is the current state of media.

      Markazi was operating in a bit of a grey area. He didn’t identify himself as a reporter who was going to write a story about the night, so he saw a certain side of LeBron that he otherwise wouldn’t have seen. Should journalists be required to identify themselves? If he had, he likely would have been denied access to the full evening. Of course, Markazi likely got access to the party in the first place because he is a reasonably well-known writer.

      The bottom line is that if LeBron doesn’t want to look like an a-hole, then he probably shouldn’t act like an a-hole when in public.

      External Sports, Fantasy Basketball, NBA, News, Rumors & Gossip

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