Posted on 07/16/2013 10:10:07 PM PDT by nickcarraway
It has been a long flirtation, but after 14 months of "intense discussion" between Keith Olbermann and ESPN, the network reportedly plans to announce Wednesday that it's taking the anchor back provided he stays away from politics. Apparently Olbermann's stint hosting Countdown on MSNBC made him nearly too politicized to hire, The New York Times reports: "On his new show, Olbermann will be free to discuss matters other than sports, including pop culture and current events, but not politics, the two-year pact specifies." But he's a draw, so they're trying him out. Not everyone at ESPN will be glad to hear it. After Olbermann left 16 years ago, "he didn't burn bridges, he napalmed them," an executive there said. But those bridges didn't reach current president John Skipper, who told The Hollywood Reporter last month: "I wasn't here when Keith was here, but he is very talented." And buzzy.
I read that not that long ago Olberpunk bought a $4 million place on the Upper West Side of Manhattan.Assuming he didn’t pay cash for it I’ll bet the monthly “nut” is pretty substantial,even at 3.5%.Hey.he’s gotta eat.
I’m now a lot less sorry that I’ll be losing ESPN this winter when my DirecTV contract expires and I cut the cord completely.
NBCSN has the NHL contract, I think. They're also going to have English Premiere League soccer starting next month. Looking like a serious budding competitor to ESPN, who shows popular sports like MLB, NFL, and NBA, but have no more exclusives.
“Will Fox Sports 1 cover hockey?
NBCSN has the NHL contract, I think. They’re also going to have English Premiere League soccer starting next month. Looking like a serious budding competitor to ESPN, who shows popular sports like MLB, NFL, and NBA, but have no more exclusives.”
The new network has already indicated it would make a big push into lacrosse.
Given it’s tie-in with Fox you could look for the channel to be another outlet for football broadcasts - maybe be able to show more than one game in a time slot on Sunday. Probably also looking at NASCAR for increased coverage. With all of the regional Fox Sports channels around the country you could see them featuring a game of the week type format of a college game that wouldn’t be available to many markets.
I have never understood the need to listen to someone analyze or otherwise talk about sports or the players’ lives and how much they make. Just watch the game, which I usually do with the sound turned off. Their opinion is usually full of shiite muslim anyway and they are less informed than my 13 year old about the ins and outs of the sport.
They’re exclusives but boring.
That's an opinion that's not universally shared. I'd much rather watch either NHL or EPL than the NBA.
Take EPL, for example. Interest is growing in the US (Manchester United is opening two marketing offices here in the US, for example), and not only is the NBCSN deal exclusive, they're going to be (from what I understand) offering something that's never been available in the US before - every EPL game will be made available to US viewers (combination of TV and online).
The big deal is the exclusivity. There's little incentive to watch ESPN for MLB, NBA, NFL, or college sports unless a particular matchup interests you -- there are other channels to watch the same sports. But there's only one place - the NBC family of networks - to watch NHL, EPL, or the Olympics.
Considering that ESPN started out as the "ping pong and lacrosse network" back in 1979, I would take NBCSN very seriously if I were in Bristol.
I am about as sick of ESPN as a human being can get. They have strayed way off the sports base and have become a spokesmouth piece for the dimocrat party and the homo agenda. I watch as very little of them any more as I can. I am sick of them. I watch much less sports now days than I used too. If it was sports I was watching. Now I am down to a little college football, NFL football, cycling on NBCSN, and a very little baseball. I am basically sick of all of the so called sports networks and their homo pushing agendas. I now watch less TV than I have at any point in my life. By 6 p.m. each night I am in my bedroom, reading at my desk or on the bed. I read tons more now than ever before and my nightly bible study and reading articles. To heck with ESPN.
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