Lesley Visser, a pioneer both among women in sports journalism and newspaper people who transitioned to TV work, was voted the No. 1 female sportscaster by the American Sportscasters Association.
She was named from a list of 36 finalists that included Andrea Kremer, Robin Roberts, Michele Tafoya and Hannah Storm.
No. 1 overall NFL Draft pick Matthew Stafford delivers the top 10 list on "Late Show with David Letterman" Monday night.
Click below to read it.
Continue reading "Matthew Stafford parlays No. 1 pick into Letterman visit" »
Even when you're Dick Enberg, hearing Vin Scully on the other end of the phone is an attention-getter.
"It was a month ago," Enberg said. "I was driving into my garage, and I hear that mellifluous voice: 'Dick, this is Vin Scully. I have marvelous news for you.'"
The news was that Enberg had been chosen to receive the second annual Vin Scully Lifetime Achievement Award for Sports Broadcasting from Fordham's WFUV - joining Scully himself on the list of recipients.
Enberg, 74, said he is honored by the company. "He's the poet laureate of our profession," he said of Scully.
"He’s endeared himself, and he’s endured. And he still has his fastball. It is poetry when he’s behind the microphone. He hasn’t lost a beat. I'm honored to have my name in the same sentence."
Enberg obviously has his own impressive body of work, and like Scully still is hard at work, including calling NFL games for CBS and working all four of tennis' majors.
How long does he want to do this in a profession where it is common for play-by-play men to slip in the years beyond their 70th birthdays?
"I’m asked that, and it’s natural," he said. "People love change. We tire even of those we admire at one time. But I didn't tire of Keith Jackson. I never tired of John Madden. When I find the preparation is labor and not something I enjoy, that will be the first clue."
Enberg said if he retired, he just would end up calling games while watching on television, thus annoying his wife.
"She doesn’t even like going to games with me," he said.
Enberg will receive the award at a fund-raising event at the Puck Building in Manhattan May 6, along with fellow honorees Paul Simon (who is expected to perform) and Jim Lehrer.
Last year's gala raised $700,000 for WFUV, a public station whose alumni include the current voices of the Yankees (Michael Kay), Knicks (Mike Breen) and Giants (Bob Papa).
For ticket information, call (212) 245-6570, extension 18.
Continue reading "Fordham's WFUV honors Enberg with Scully Award" »
"60 Minutes" loves to feature sports figures on Sunday nights when it has just gotten through televising a major sports event. Hence, NCAAs=LeBron!
With 1:18 left in the Clippers-Knicks game Wednesday, MSG replayed Al Harrington's T for hanging on the rim Feb. 11 against the Clippers. Less than a minute later, he did it again, live, probably costing the Knicks the game. Now THAT'S TV production, people.
Ron Darling and Keith Hernandez will work Friday night's Mets-Nationals game on SNY . . . without a play-by-play man. Just an experiment. It's spring training. Why not?
Darren (Roslyn) Rovell eats a 5,000-calorie burger.
Interesting stuff from a Lighthouse project rally Thursday night. Momentum is building, Long Island. This thing might yet come to pass before DiPietro's contract expires.
Big weekend of St. John's and Manhasset High lacrosse action, available for viewing on the Internet. Check it out here.
Nice profile here of CBS' Bill Raftery by my friend/competitor Sandomir of the Times.
Raftery is among the most likable figures in sports media - both on and off the air.
I got several emails over the weekend regarding CBS cutting away from the Wisconsin-Florida State game with the potential game-winning shot in mid-air.
Chris Russo asked CBS executive VP Mike Aresco about that and other matters on Sirius XM Monday.
Click below for his answers, including that the Wisconsin-FSU incident was a "control room error."
Continue reading "CBS dumps Wisconsin in mid-air in 'control room error'" »
Here are the tip times and announcers for the NCAA Tournament regional semifinals.
Not sure officially which games the New York market will get, but I'd bet on the UConn, Duke, Syracuse and North Carolina games.
Thursday:
7:07 p.m. Glendale I (Connecticut vs. Purdue) Enberg/Bilas
7:27 p.m. Boston I (Pittsburgh vs. Xavier) Lundquist/Raftery
Glendale II (Memphis vs. Missouri) Enberg/Bilas
Boston II (Duke vs. Villanova) Lundquist/Raftery
Friday:
7:07 p.m. Indianapolis I (Louisville vs. Arizona) Johnson/Elmore
7:27 p.m. Memphis I (Oklahoma vs. Syracuse) Nantz/Kellogg
Indianapolis II (Kansas vs. Michigan State) Johnson/Elmore
Memphis II (North Carolina vs. Gonzaga) Nantz/Kellogg
-Photos: Click here to relive highlights from every game
For all the nice things I wrote about March Madness on Demand in my newspaper column, I should mention I intensely dislike the latest iteration of the popular Boss Button, which last year inspired 2.5 million clicks.
Now what used to be an amusing, fake spreadsheet designed to trick your boss into thinking you are not goofing off during the NCAA Tournament instead is a not-very-amusing, Comcast-sponsored, multi-colored thing full of . . . basketball stats?
Whatever. Gotta go. Action about to begin on MMOD from Boise.
(UPDATE: CBS announced there were 1.5 million clicks on the Boss Button Thursday alone - more than half the total for the entire 2008 tournament! Also, Thursday's 2.7 million unique visitors to MMOD was up 56 percent compared to Day One last year.)
Speaking of complicated NCAA decisions (see post below), I figured many Binghamton alums would be annoyed with CBS for dumping the game against Duke so quickly.
Having waited since the dawn of time to see their team in the tournament, it was an unsatisfying stay on the TV screen, no doubt.
What happened? As in the case of the LSU-Butler game (see post below), remember that to accommodate the many Binghamton alums in the New York area, CBS would have had to force not only Ch. 2 to stick with that blowout in the making but also the rest of the 35 percent of the nation assigned to that game in the "flex" group.
That would have included a swath of the country from Boston to Miami to New Orleans, where few fans have an emotional attachment to Binghamton.
Again: March Madness on Demand is your best solution for such problems.
Click below for one more coverage map wrinkle for those who can't get enough of this stuff.
Continue reading "Remember, Binghamton has few alums in Mobile, Ala." »
Yes, I thought about dedicating more of my Friday newspaper column to the interesting matter of why CBS did not dump the LSU-Butler game Thursday in favor of a brewing upset of Memphis by Cal State-Northridge that had massive bracket implications for millions of fans.
I opted against it because:
1. That decision not to switch to Memphis worked well with my original plan to write about March Madness on Demand. 2. As it turned out, Memphis pulled away late, lessening the impact of CBS' decision. 3. Fully explaining the reasons for not making the switch would have required more space than I had in the newspaper, and would have caused a dangerous number of readers to fall into a trance-like sleep state.
That's why God created blogs! Click below for an explanation, complete with comments from executive VP for programming Mike Aresco and VP for production Harold Bryant, whom I talked to between enjoying diet Cokes, sliders and oatmeal raisin cookies at the annual first-day-of-the-tournament viewing party at the CBS Broadcast Center.
(Parental discretion: Only hard-core NCAA programming geeks should advance beyond this point.)
Continue reading "CBS' game-switching decisions are quite complicated" »
The main element of my Friday newspaper column concerns the rise of "March Madness on Demand," which enables fans with a decent broadband connection to watch, say, Memphis-Cal State-Northridge or Duke-Binghamton even when CBS executives decide not to show such games on your TV.
MMOD was a lightly subscribed pay service from 2003-2005. In 2006, it became free, but you had to register, and only 56 games were available, and in-market games were blacked out.
Eventually, the registration was dropped, all 63 games were made available, in-market games were not blacked out and 300 Web sites were used to direct people to the service.
CBS expects ad revenues from MMOD to top $30 million this year, up more than 700 percent from '06.
Games also are available on cell phones.
And DirecTV still has its "Mega March Madness" (for a fee) for those who prefer out-of-market games on a TV rather than a computer.
And CBS College Sports offers two out-of-market games, such as Mississippi State-Washington Thursday, which was unavailable on Ch. 2.
(Who's the guy in the picture? Name him and win the admiration of your fellow man and woman. He played in an NCAA final in the pre-MMOD era.)
Photo: Getty
Saturday's second-round NCAA Tournament schedule:
1:05 p.m. Philadelphia I (Villanova vs. UCLA) Enberg/Bilas
3:20 p.m. Kansas City I (Memphis vs. Maryland) Brando/Gminski
Philadelphia II (Connecticut vs. Texas A&M) Enberg/Bilas
5:40 p.m. Portland I (Purdue vs. Washington) Harlan/Bonner
5:45 p.m. Greensboro I (North Carolina vs. LSU) Nantz/Kellogg
Kansas City II (Oklahoma vs. Michigan) Brando/Gminski
Portland II (Gonzaga vs. Western Kentucky) Harlan/Bonner
Greensboro II (Duke vs. Texas) Nantz/Kellogg
Some people study Sanskrit. Some study the Talmud. I prefer CBS' NCAA Tournament coverage maps.
Friday's breakdown, with the percentage of the United States scheduled for each game both in "flexible" and "constant" markets:
Early afternoon
Stephen F. Austin-Syracuse (28 percent flex, 4 constant)
Tennessee-Oklahoma State (28 flex, 5 constant)
North Dakota State-Kansas (7 flex, 3 constant)
Utah State-Marquette (22 flex, 3 constant)
Late afternoon
Temple-Arizona State (19 flex, 5 constant)
E. Tennessee State-Pittsburgh (19 flex, 2 constant)
Dayton-West Virginia (32 flex, 4 constant)
Cornell-Missouri (15 flex, 4 constant)
Early evening
Arizona-Utah (14 flex, 3 constant)
Morehead State-Louisville (19 flex, 1 constant)
Southern Cal-Boston College (42 flex, 13 constant)
Portland State-Xavier (5 flex, 3 constant)
Late evening
Cleveland State-Wake Forest (9 flex, 3 constant)
Siena-Ohio State (22 flex, 5 constant)
Robert Morris-Michigan State (2 flex, 5 constant)
Wisconsin-Florida State (49 flex, 5 constant)
Here is the percentage of the nation in each pod (see post below) for Thursday:
Thursday early afternoon:
Butler-LSU (flexible): 53 percent
Butler-LSU (constant): 3
CS Northridge-Memphis (flex): 11
CS Northridge-Memphis (constant): 6
Texas A&M-BYU (flex): 18
Texas A&M-BYU (constant): 9
Thursday late afternoon:
Northern Iowa-Purdue (flex): 19
Northern Iowa-Purdue (constant): 3
Radford-North Carolina (flex): 25
Radford-North Carolina (constant): 5
Maryland-Cal (flex): 12
Maryland-Cal (constant): 14
Chattanooga-UConn (flex): 21
Chattanooga-UConn (constant): 1
Thursday early evening
Minnesota-Texas (flex): 17
Minnesota-Texas (constant): 11
Michigan-Clemson (flex): 26
Michigan-Clemson (constant): 6
American-Villanova (flex): 14
American-Villanova (constant): 7
Akron-Gonzaga (flex): 15
Akron-Gonzaga (constant): 4
Thursday late evening
Binghamton-Duke (flex): 35
Binghamton-Duke (constant): 4
Morgan State-Oklahoma (flex): 14
Morgan State-Oklahoma (constant): 2
VCU-UCLA (flex): 9
VCU-UCLA (constant): 12
W. Kentucky-Illinois (flex): 16
W. Kentucky-Illinois (constant): 8
There are benefits to not having any teams from the immediate New York area in the NCAAs, by the way.
It means that CBS is not compelled to stick Ch. 2 with a game that stinks just because it is of local interest.
Here's the way this works:
When there are four games going on at once, there are eight pods of markets CBS identifies.
Four of them represent the markets of the teams involved, and are labeled "constant."
The other four groups of markets are assigned a primary game, but are eligible to "flex" if their game is a dud.
That is the category New York will be in for all eight first-round windows.
It's sort of like living in L.A. during the NFL season and not having to worry about being stuck with an inferior matchup just because it involves a local squad.
So . . . enjoy.
The NCAA schedule for Ch. 2 in New York, according to the station's Web site:
THURSDAY
Noon: Butler vs. LSU, followed by Chattanooga vs. UConn
7 p.m.: American vs. Villanova, followed by Binghamton vs. Duke
FRIDAY
Noon: Stephen Austin vs. Syracuse, followed by Eastern Tennessee State vs. Pittsburgh
7 p.m.: Morehead State vs. Louisville, followed by Siena vs. Ohio State
Kind of Big East heavy. Not that there's anything wrong with that. And nice to see three of the four upstate New York teams will be seen downstate.
One is missing, though. Hmm.
(By the way, Newsday intern-to-be Evan Drellich looks at the dark side of Binghamton's first trip to the NCAAs here.)
My Tuesday newspaper column concerns Clark Kellogg, the first Final Four analyst other than Billy Packer since most of you can remember.
Kellogg reveals that as of last week, he hadn't spoken to Packer since getting the job last summer, but he said he respects Packer and believes his predecessor respects him as well.
Anyway, let the games begin! My first bracket has Oklahoma winning it all, but I'll probably fill out three or four others with three or four other winners to maximize my chances of gloating about being right.
Photo: Getty
The two biggest non-sports-event sports events on the calendar are the NCAA Tournament selection show and the NFL Draft, both of which feature men sitting at tables and talking about stuff.
The former mercifully is much, much shorter than the latter.
CBS' "overnight" numbers in major markets for Sunday's selection show were a solid 4.8 percent of households, up nine percent from last year and the best since 2005.
Good job by CBS' Seth Davis and Greg Anthony, as well as Newsday's Arthur Staple, on calling out former Cornell AD Mike Slive and his NCAA Division I basketball committee for shamefully shortchanging non-power conferences in extending at-large bids.
Speaking of shameful plots to include as many BCS-conference schools as possible, the annual Tuesday night play-in game was, is and always will be a slap in the face to the two teams that play in it.
Get rid of that game, get rid of one of the at-large bids and go back to a 64-team tournament. Please.
(UPDATE: Jay Bilas and Dick Vitale go at it on the topic of St. Mary's exclusion, as Vitale plays the Duke card.)
Having said all that, the tournament was nice enough to give Cornell a No. 14 seed - one spot higher than it deserved - to balance last season's No. 14 - one spot lower than it deserved.
It would have been interesting to see whether CBS showed Binghamton's first-round game in New York, home to many, many of the school's alumni, if the Bearcats were playing a non-marquee team.
The fact Binghamton is playing Duke Thursday means there is approximately a 100 percent chance alumni will get to see the upset of the century in its entirety.
Photo: AP
What are the tip times and announcing teams for the first round of the NCAA Tournament?
Click below . . . and you will know.
Continue reading "Binghamton Thursday; Cornell, Syracuse, Siena Friday" »
Congratulations to Tony Kornheiser, Karl Ravech, Jenna Wolfe, Paul Reiser, Carol Leifer and all of the many Newsday readers, colleagues and friends who went to Binghamton upon the school's first NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament bid.
While downstate New York regularly carries the rest of the state economically and culturally, it is up to upstate to carry it through the NCAAs.
Syracuse, Siena, Cornell and Binghamton, the Empire State is counting on you! (And counting on CBS to show those teams' games in the first round.)
CBS Sports is mourning the death this Wednesday of long-time executive Doug Towey, who succumbed to cancer at age 61.
The Hempstead native and Lloyd Neck resident was directly responsible for making "One Shining Moment" the quasi-official anthem of the NCAA Tournament when he had it played after the 1987 tournament.
Click below for CBS' release on Towey's passing and the funeral arrangements, as well as the history behind "One Shining Moment."
(UPDATE: Here is the obituary from Thursday's newspaper.)
(UPDATE: Awful Announcing posted the very first "One Shining Moment" from 1987 in tribute to Towey.)
Continue reading "CBS Sports mourns passing of executive Doug Towey" »
Sunday's Duke vs. North Carolina game on CBS drew 3.4 percent of U.S. households, the network's best for a regular-season game since the same teams pulled a 3.9 on March 6, 2005.
The game did a 3.0 in the New York market, making it the weekend's highest-rated sports event in these parts.
The Suns-Spurs game rated a 2.7.
NASCAR: 2.1.
Bruins-Rangers: 1.8.
Auto racing over hockey?! Say it ain't so.
Here are David Letterman's "Top Ten Reasons to Watch the World Baseball Classic," delivered by members of Team USA Thursday night.
You can probably guess who got to read No. 1.
David Letterman's top 10 “Messages Left on Alex Rodriguez’s Answering Machine” from Monday's "Late Show" on CBS:
10. “Hey, it’s Mark McGwire. Want to get together this week and not talk about the past?”
9. "Joe Torre here – thanks for helping book sales.”
8. “Could you find a steroid that keeps you from choking in the playoffs?”
7. “Are you worried that this will taint all the championships you didn’t win?”
6. “Hi, it’s Bernie Madoff. Nice try, but I’m still the most hated man in New York.”
5. “Michael Phelps here. Got any snacks?”
4. “Hi, this is Sammy Sosa. Just pretend you don’t speak English.”
3. “Michael Phelps again. Did I call you or did you call me?”
2. “Hey, it’s Rod Blagojevich – I’ll say you’re innocent, if you say I am.”
1. “It’s Madonna. You got a phone number for Jeter?”
Photo: Getty
(Full disclosure: I watched the top 10 myself, but I stole the list from Sports Business Daily to avoid having to transcribe it.)
This has nothing to do with sports, but great job by Sully on "60 Minutes" Sunday.
There aren't many pure, truth-telling heroes left in our society.
We're pretty much down to Sully and Jose Canseco now.
Well, Joe Torre Book Tour Nation, I just screened his appearance on "Late Show with David Letterman" Wednesday night and, having seen or heard every interview Torre has done other than the group session Tuesday, I can announce the following:
The interviewer who came by far the closest to making Torre uncomfortable was Bob Costas of the MLB Network, whose sitdown premieres Thursday night.
The operative word being "closest." Joe still looked pretty darn relaxed.
Click below for excerpts from the Costas interview, as well as an appearance by Larry Bowa on the MLB Network Wednesday in which Coach Bowa creatively rationalizes Torre telling locker room tales.
Continue reading "Joe Torre survives Letterman in final round of tour" »
CBS College Sports suggested I check out this video of Sammy the Owl being ejected from Wednesday's Tulane-Rice game. Not sure whether PETA will get involved.
Joe Torre will appear on CBS' "Late Show with David Letterman" Wednesday, thus confirming what had been a tentatively scheduled visit.
This will be Torre's seventh time on Dave's show, seven more than me.
I was highly critical of CBS for never getting around to soliciting analyst Bill Cowher's thoughts on the Super Bowl matchup after the AFC title game Jan. 18.
Better late than never, sort of. CBS sent quotes from Cowher about the big game.
Click below to read some of them.
Continue reading "Bill Cowher weighs in on former team, former assistant" »
Even though ratings for the AFC Championship Game were down relative to its prime time equivalent last year - the Giants-Packers NFC title game - the numbers still were predictably massive.
The national figures released Tuesday showed that on average 22 percent of homes and 40.64 million people overall watched the Ravens-Steelers game, making it the highest-rated and most-viewed show of the current television season.
It was the most-viewed TV show since Super Bowl XLII.
I'm assuming more than 40 million people watched the White Sox-Fan-in-Chief's speech at noon Tuesday, but that's another story.
Ratings for the conference title games in major markets were down significantly compared to comparable time slots last season, Sports Business Daily reported.
Eagles-Cardinals attracted 24.0 percent of homes, down from 27.4 for the Chargers vs. Patriots game last season.
Ravens-Steelers drew 23.8 percent, down from 31.4 for Giants-Packers.
Two TV quote guarantees from Sunday:
NFL Network's Deion Sanders on Donovan McNabb: "He wants out. I guarantee it.”
ESPN's Keyshawn Johnson on Jon Gruden: "Jon is the type of guy that will tell you one thing and then the next thing you know will say, I need to go get a guy like Tim Brown. He was a like a used car salesman in this situation. A great X’s and O’s coach but he wore out the welcome. I may have been the first to say it, but I won’t be the last. I guarantee that.”
I could try to write something clever to make fun of CBS' post-game show after the AFC Championship Game, or I could just present the sorry facts:
End of game until Nantz/Simms signoff: 38 seconds. Nantz: "We'll see you shortly, folks, for the trophy presentation." (Or maybe not.)
First commercial break: 2 minutes, 42 seconds, ads for Subway, Sprint, "The Mentalist," NYSC, Under Armour.
Back to studio: 30 seconds, James Brown promotes "The Mentalist," mentions the Super Bowl matchup, as studio analysts look on silently.
Second commercial break: 2:34, ads for Subway, Best Buy, a movie called "Push," SONY, NFLShop.com, The Masters.
Back to studio: 30 seconds, Brown promotes "The Mentalist," shows score of game.
Third commercial break: 2:36, ads for Prilosec, Dish Network, Liftmaster, EAS, SONY.
Back to studio: 28 seconds, Brown promotes "The Mentalist," shows score of game.
Back to Pittsburgh: "Guess what, James Brown, no one has left!" comes the shocking news from a frozen Nantz at Heinz Field. 2:55, for interviews with Dan Rooney, Mike Tomlin, Ben Roethlisberger.
Back to studio, 10 seconds for Brown to promote "The Mentalist."
Fourth commercial break: 18 seconds for ad for Southwest Airlines.
End of official football portion of broadcast day.
Fifth commercial break: 1:50 for ads for Verizon FiOS, Lend America.
Then . . . "The Mentalist!"
Total ad or promotional content from end of game telecast to "The Mentalist": 11:38.
Total useful content: 2:55.
Speaking of my list of best all-time sportscasters (see post somewhere below), in which Jim McKay finished second, his son, CBS Sports and News president Sean McManus, is preparing for an interesting few days.
Sunday, CBS Sports will broadcast what will be its most watched event of the year: the AFC Championship game.
Tuesday, CBS News will cover what could be the most watched news event of the year: the inauguration of Barack Obama.
How does he juggle? Here is what he said on a CBS conference call Tuesday:
"It’s about compartmentalizing your day and compartmentalizing your attention. When we are talking about the Inauguration I am completely focused on that. And when we are talking about the AFC Championship I’m focused on that game.
"It’s a lot of fun but I do find myself sometimes mixing up words and mixing up descriptions. I don’t want to talk to the CBS News folks about blitzes and everything else, then talk to the Sports guys about security for our correspondents down there (in Washington).
"So it’s fun, but the two do sometimes get mixed up a little bit."
Newly elected Hall of Famers Rickey Henderson (odd numbers) and Jim Rice (even) join forces Tuesday night to present Letterman's "Late Show" Top 10.
A sneak preview from your friends at WatchDog:
Top 10 "Highlights of My Hall of Fame Baseball Career”
10. Winning the MVP in 1978, and a Tony in 1983.
9. I designed the first vibrating jock strap.
8. During the 1981 season, I lost my glove and played an entire West Coast road trip using a small box.
7. All the free gum.
6. I caught a squirrel in the outfield and the umps let me eat it.
5. Being a Met, a Blue Jay, a Padre, a Dodger…hell, even I can’t remember all the teams that I played for.
4. Before every game, I ate the same meal: pancakes smothered in pine tar.
3. Sleeping with Madonna.
2. Sleeping with Madonna.
1. I played with Jose Canseco and never got to inject anything in his ass.
Speaking of Rickey, he was on the MLB Network tonight demonstrating an activity for which he had a particular knack: stealing bases.
Adam (Pacman) Jones did not come off particularly well in his interview with James Brown before the Ravens-Titans game, but it certainly made for good television, especially his take on strip clubs, which as he noted are just like regular clubs . . . well, except for the stripping part.
Click below for a transcript, courtesy of CBS:
Continue reading "Strip clubs are like regular clubs, except for the stripping" »
Interesting comments from a call earlier today in which CBS analyst Phil Simms discussed Kerry Collins as the latter prepares to start his first home playoff game since goring the Vikings, 41-0, in 2001 at Giants Stadium.
Click below to read them.
Simms always was a big KC fan during Collins' days with the Giants and, like me, was skeptical of the 2004 decision to deal for Young Eli, in effect bringing the Collins era to an abrupt close.
Continue reading "Simms on Collins: There but for a SBXXI victory go I" »
If you live in the New York area and do not have DirecTV's "Sunday Ticket" and are not currently in some sort of sports bar, you are watching the Patriots crush the snow-averse Cardinals on Fox and NOT Steelers-Titans on CBS.
Why is this happening to you? Because this is a Fox doubleheader week, and CBS is obligated to show us the Jets-Seahawks game at 4 p.m., thus making it impossible for CBS to show us the Steelers-Titans game at 1.
Look at the bright side: This sort of thing is infinitely more frustrating when the local teams are out of contention. At least the Jets game matters.
If you have any other questions leave them for me in the comments section.
Long-time SportsWatch/WatchDog readers know too well of my annoying obsession with uncovering media figures who used to deliver Newsday.
A couple of months back, I reeled in my biggest fish yet when I discovered that CBS President Leslie Moonves was on the job in Valley Stream in the early 1960s.
I asked him about it the other day, specifically what he did not like about the job:
"I didn't like collection days. You had to stop at the house, ring the doorbell, you’re afraid you’re going to get bit by the dog. At that point they gave you 35 cents in your hand, and if people weren’t home you had to go back. So it was the worst day of the week. I think it was Wednesday.
"But you know what? I didn’t mind the job at all. It was sort of fun. But I didn’t like days that it rained, when you had to do double work.
"Everybody who grew up on Long Island, that was the paper. There was the Long Island Press, but nobody read that, that didn’t count. It was Newsday and that was it. We used to get Newsday delivered. My father would bring home the Post, because it had a great sports section, and my mother read The New York Times because she was the intellectual. But it was Newsday for me, always."
I also asked Mr. Moonves about Craig Carton, who this morning on WFAN referenced my post from Wednesday about Tom Coughlin and Tiki Barber without credit.
That's not cool!
More on Moonves and Carton in due time.
Speaking of bad NBC shows at 10 p.m. (see post below), the network soon won't have to worry about such things, as it plans to plug Jay Leno into that slot five days a week starting next fall.
Newsday's Verne Gay suggested the next time I talk to CBS president/former Newsday paper boy Leslie Moonves I ask him what he thinks of NBC's move.
So I did. Here is what he said:
"It is intriguing and it sort of changes the ballgame somewhat. For NBC I think it was probably a smart move because they weren’t doing well at 10, and they had a big issue: What to do with Jay? I know it was a difficult one, because Jay has been winning the time period. I think at the end of the day, if I was [NBC Universal president] Jeff Zucker I would have done the same thing."
There you go, Verne.
How about a link from your almost-as-popular-as-mine blog?
The number of sports-themed pieces on "60 Minutes" has skyrocketed in recent years, and a disproportionate number have appeared on autumn evenings that just happen to coincide with weeks in which CBS has the NFL doubleheader game.
(That includes, sort of, the Barack Obama interview of a few weeks back, in which the President-elect famously weighed in on the college football playoff debate.)
This week it's former Jets coach Pete Carroll's turn, and from the looks of the clip above I'm guessing it will be quite the positive piece.
Continue reading "Pete Carroll is latest sports feature on '60 Minutes'" »
CBS just announced this breaking news regarding Sunday's "NFL Today" show:
"The secret is out as Victoria’s Secret supermodel Selita Ebanks joins the guys live on the set to help them with their NFL picks."
Umm . . . why?
Then again, why not?
Ms. Ebanks did date Osi Umenyiora for a while earlier this year. I don't think she still does, but I'm not sure. I don't cover the Giants anymore.
I remember Angie Harmon showing up at training camp one year and creating a bit of a stir. She is married to Jason Sehorn, who used to play cornerback for Big Blue.
(UPDATE: A loyal eader reports Ms. Ebanks has attended a number of Knicks games - she actually met Osi at one - and that the couple was spotted together at the Jones/Calzaghe fight at the Garden earlier this month. Hmm.)
(UPDATE: Just found this, in which Ms. Ebanks reports that she "loves Nate Robinson." There's also this bit of video. And this. Parental guidance suggested. Smelling salts might be helpful, too.)
Immediately following the Jets' spanking of the Broncos Sunday, Michael Phelps will talk on "60 Minutes" about how he won the 100-meter butterfly in Beijing.
Click above for a video excerpt, and below for a written account.
Continue reading "Michael Phelps discusses tightest race in Beijing" »
Phil Simms worked an NFL game involving one of his son Chris' teams for the first time Sunday. But Chris, a reserve for the Titans, remained on the sideline against the Jets, allowing Phil to avoid an awkward situation.
CBS did eventually show Chris on camera late in the game. Phil said Chris refused to give him inside information on the Titans.
Speaking of people who went into their father's profession, as
E-mail
Facebook
Digg
Delicious