I enjoy watching sports on the television as much as the next man.
I have said, on occasion, that I do 85% of my television watching during football season. I have already watched some Canadian Football League games and I will be glad when Thursday night gets around in a couple days so I can tune into another CFL game. That three down game is pretty nice in contrast to the four downs we will be seeing later. The chronology of it is all rather quaint.
The other sports I pay a modicum to perceptive view are as follows:
Baseball: The game has lost its relevancy on the national stage. Sad, but true. I still watch the World Series. I still watch All-Star game. I don’t think I have watched a game this year from out number one to out number fifty-four.
Golf: The Masters, The British Open (my favorite), The RBC in Hilton Head…just because I stood by the 18th green around this past New Year’s.
I always look for the TPC at Sawgrass and anything that is played a Pebble Beach, because I like to look at the courses on television.
Basketball: The college tourney in March is awesome. The NBA playoffs ate too long.
CAR RACING: I’m a first ten and last ten man….unless it is the I-5…that would Indianapolis 500 to you novices.
Right now I am indeed gearing up for College Football season.
The air in Southern Indiana today resembles something like burnt pea soup. I went out the door a few minutes ago and I can tell you that I don’t think I have EVER felt air so hot, thick, and nasty! Because of this, I did my exercising inside today. I am blessed to have a nice collection of exercise equipment at my disposal. This evening I spent twenty minutes on an elliptical and rode three miles on a stationary bike. There is a television in the air-conditioned room where I exercise indoors. I made the mistake of turning it to ESPN..and then the NFL Network. Both were talking about how National Football League Commissioner, Roger Goodell, upheld the four game suspension of New England quarterback Tom Brady for his actions revolving around the inflation, or lack of inflation, of a collection of footballs.
As I moved my legs up and down and pumped my arms forward and back, I wished I had found a Bugs Bunny cartoon or a rerun of Gunsmoke instead of listening to a few talking heads of sports television pontificate about Bradygate. It is a sad commentary in itself.
With all these sports shows…you know…the “NETWORKS” like NFL Network and ESPN…it seems that sports reporting and objective idealism about the positive connotations of sport has gone the way of the dodo to a degree. These days when I turn on a sports television show fraught with experts, non-experts, and a few folks that have trouble pronouncing some of the names of the players they are supposed to know so much about, I feel like I am watching yet another divisive “news network”. You know what I am talking about. Fox News caters to the Republicans and CNN favors the Dems. These two networks have become the bastions of thought for each respective (that’s a stretch) political party and thus politics has in large part been relegated to sound bites and politicians hoping for face time on television instead of value time aimed at helping their constituents. Call me old fashioned. Even the sports shows are politically motivated. Who is at fault? Did he or did he not? What a bunch of whooey. How about these questions: Was the pass complete? Did he score?
I do know with each new year I watch less pre-game shows and just tune in about the time they kick the ball off. I am that way with the Super Bowl. I don’t listen to the super hype before the game. I want to interested when the game starts.
Though as a kid I loved pro football, my favor is truly with College Football. The confines of the NFL “shield” don’t cloud college football. The PAC 12, The Big Ten, The SEC, The ACC, CUSA, all these leagues have the autonomy that allows their regional fans to love them like no one can enjoy the NFL.
The NFL has become a machine that is running out of control. One day it will implode. We’ll yearn for Lindsey Nelson calling a Chicago Bear-Green Bay Packer game and we will be sad, though I doubt the whippersnappers in charge of the NFL will remember Lindsey Nelson by then.
Speaking of out of control. ESPN…Endless Sorry Pathetic Nonsense.
A few days ago I caught wind that ESPN had put a muzzle on a guy named Colin Cowherd. Cowherd had a show on ESPN…and I think it was simulcasted on radio. I have never been impressed. Colin Cowherd said a few disparaging words about baseball players from the Dominican Republic. I’m not going to relive his comments here. You can look them up. That is what I did. I looked on an internet search engine. I typed in “ESPN removes Colin Cowherd from the air”. Where did I find the best information about the story? Where do you think? ESPN.com that is where. How screwed up is that?
ESPN is disapproving of the guy enough to take him off the air. I suppose that means television. You see, I live out in the country. Some of us in America still don’t get a good cell phone signal or high speed internet without the benefit of a satellite dish. I fall in that category. So that means I got ESPN’s story about removing him from the air (television) via the air (satellite). Oh… it was a story in great detail. So much so that ESPN.com allowed you to watch the gaffe that spelled curtains for Colin Cowherd…you could watch it over and over again. That my speaktherights.com friends is a shame…and pathetic on the part of ESPN.
It’s like this:
We’ll get rid of him…but we’ll get a three pegged stool out first and milk his demise like a cow on the internet and see what it will do for ratings.
This is a network that has done some very weird things lately.
Maybe if Brett Favre decides to take up the harmonica ESPN will petition the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame to offer him an award for being courageous out of his musical comfort zone. Maybe not. Perhaps ESPN has something against harmonica players.
Speaking the rights…
Danny Johnson