And now a word from the other side:
John Ourand of Sports Business Daily chatted with Scott Van Pelt and SportsCenter Senior Coordinating Producer Michael Shiffman. It turns out it wasn’t a coincidence that Van Pelt and Steve Levy just happened to work Saturday on the same night as Fox Sports Live’s debut.
Van Pelt took a pretty good swing at the competition:
The easiest thing in the world to do is to talk a bunch of junk on Twitter. They’re really good at that – poking the bear with a stick. I would swing up, too, if I were them. That’s what they’re doing. The idea that they co-opted fun in sports and that ESPN and “SportsCenter” is some kind of a trip to the dentist is laughable. I have fun every single time I do “SportsCenter.” If they want to be fun, great. Go have fun. I encourage you to do so because we do it every day. That’s the one thing I found to be a head-scratcher, that they planted their flag on this fun hill, as if they discovered it. Like they’re the Christopher Columbus of fun in sports and they’re putting their flag down on that hill. Really? We’ve been living here since 1979. Welcome to the fun of sports.
Really, Scott, don’t hold back.
I think SportsCenter having “fun” is exactly what the problem is. “ZOMG the bat boy caught a real bat so let’s spend 3/4 of this highlight talking about it”. Is that what the fans came to the ballpark to see?
That sort of Disney touch (combined with beating story lines to a bloody pulp) is why I don’t find ESPN to be charming anymore. It reeks of overproduction more often than not.
Josh:
That’s what happens when the company that owns you thinks “entertainment” (i.e. broadest appeal) is more important than doing their job…reporting the scores, highlights and the issues in sports TO SPORTS FANS ONLY!