Guide to being a fan of Boston sports

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Socnorb11
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Re: Guide to being a fan of Boston sports

Post by Socnorb11 »

RC21 wrote:
Popeye_Card wrote:This is pretty much where I'm at. I watch it in the morning while I get ready, to catch up on the happenings in sports. I only really get annoyed when they've obviously beaten a subject to death. It isn't only the big name teams. I'm tired of hearing about how the Rockies have won 21 of 22 games--I know all of their highlights from the last month by heart. I know that the Patriots are still undefeated. What I'd like to see is longer highlights from games that are still going on. They show like 5 total minutes of NHL highlights, even though it's the only pro sport that's going on during the week these days when the baseball playoffs are on hiatus for days at a time.

So in short, instead of telling us again about the stories involving a few teams/players, use that time to show us more highlights of other games. I could also do with less "Is this team better?", "Is this player better?" analysis. More highlights please. Let us decide for ourselves.

--P--
I don't mean this in any smartarse way, but I wonder... had ESPN been as big in the 70's as they are now, would this same sentiment exist about their bias towards the Reds, Pirates, and Orioles? I'm just speculating if the "bias" is because those two particular teams are from the markets that they're from, or if it's because they're generally year in and year out two of the very best teams in the game?

I think it's because they're two of the best teams every year. The irritating thing is that they'll continue to be perennial contenders because of the revenue streams. I understand it's not their fault, but if I'm playing Monopoly and one guy starts with twice as much money as anyone else, he SHOULD win.

There's no NFL bias on ESPN (in my opinion) because all teams are created equally. In the 80's, the 49ers were the talk of the town. In the 90's, it was the Cowboys. This decade it's been the Patriots & Colts. In a few years, it'll be another team.

In baseball, it rarely changes.

Socnorb11
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Re: Guide to being a fan of Boston sports

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jim wrote:
Socnorb11 wrote:
jim wrote:
Socnorb11 wrote:
haltz wrote:
ghostrunner wrote:I don't think it's fair to say "don't watch ESPN" either. It's the pre-eminent national sports news outlet. If you want to follow sports and see game recaps, that's pretty much where you have to go.
Why not? I follow baseball just fine without turning it on. It has nothing to do with bias, it's just not good for my temper. If you don't like the product, then find an alternative. No use making yourself miserable.
Even if we don't watch, we'll still know that the bias is there. The bias IS what's annoying, and it's not going to stop simply because I change the channel.

Maybe I'm not as good at pretending that it doesn't exist......
It's the free market system. There are more people that care about the Red Sox and Yankees than the Devil Rays and Pirates. Networks want advertising dollars. Advertisers want people. Therefore Networks show more Red Sox and Yankees.

I totally get that.

I'm not overly annoyed by the ESPN bias. But I don't think a reasonable solution for those that are annoyed is to simply stop watching.
I don't understand why you would watch it if you don't enjoy it.

I think people enjoy ESPN in general, but would prefer not to have the bias. It's like the Cardinals.......I enjoyed them this year, but I would have preferred that they played better.

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Popeye_Card
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Re: Guide to being a fan of Boston sports

Post by Popeye_Card »

RC21 wrote:
I don't mean this in any smartarse way, but I wonder... had ESPN been as big in the 70's as they are now, would this same sentiment exist about their bias towards the Reds, Pirates, and Orioles? I'm just speculating if the "bias" is because those two particular teams are from the markets that they're from, or if it's because they're generally year in and year out two of the very best teams in the game?
I don't really think it's a bias thing. I think it's a broken record problem.

But I think they are slightly biased towards New England area teams (because of their location), and New York teams (because of being the biggest media market). A good example of that right now would be their non-stop coverage of all things Patriots, while barely mentioning the Colts.

One could call it "following the story". But the story isn't always winning. And sometimes you can do without 10 minutes of "highlights" followed by 50 minutes of "analysis". Let's see some more plays for all games. Sometimes a HR or touchdown isn't the biggest moment of a game.

Let me give you a case in point. The Blues-Ducks game the other night was one of the best regular season hockey games I've seen. They even said on ESPN when they started showing the highlights (45 minutes into the show) that it was an excellent game with a playoff-type atmosphere. Then they show highlights of 3 or so goals being scored. That's it? That showed me why it was a good game? I know ESPN doesn't have NHL rights anymore and they're being a bit snarky about it, but it really annoys me that they treat it like it's arena football.

--P--

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Re: Guide to being a fan of Boston sports

Post by Popeye_Card »

MDCardsFan wrote:
Popeye_Card wrote: Sort of like the Cards fans who can only say "1908!" to Cubs fans.

--P--

That would be wrong? :oops: :oops:
When that's the best thing you can come up with to "trash talk", yes.

I dislike trash talking between fans in general. It's sorta dumb, because it's not like you have anything to do with the team. It's just who you happened to start rooting for once upon a time (which may have been last week in some cases).

--P--

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Re: Guide to being a fan of Boston sports

Post by ghostrunner »

Popeye_Card wrote: But I think they are slightly biased towards New England area teams (because of their location), and New York teams (because of being the biggest media market). A good example of that right now would be their non-stop coverage of all things Patriots, while barely mentioning the Colts.

--P--
Interesting that you say this. I'm not a diehard Colts fan, but I live here and I feel like ESPN talks about them a lot. Not as much as the Patriots, but a lot. Especially ESPN radio.

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Re: Guide to being a fan of Boston sports

Post by Popeye_Card »

ghostrunner wrote:
Popeye_Card wrote: But I think they are slightly biased towards New England area teams (because of their location), and New York teams (because of being the biggest media market). A good example of that right now would be their non-stop coverage of all things Patriots, while barely mentioning the Colts.

--P--
Interesting that you say this. I'm not a diehard Colts fan, but I live here and I feel like ESPN talks about them a lot. Not as much as the Patriots, but a lot. Especially ESPN radio.
I'm only going off of what I see on SportsCenter in the mornings, mostly.

They do talk about the Colts, but they keep insinuating that no team in the league is as good as the Patriots. Yes, the Patriots have been blowing everybody out, but their schedule may be the easiest schedule in the history of the NFL. Half of the wins their opponents do have are against the other crappy teams the Patriots have beat (i.e., the only team the Jets have beaten is the Dolphins).

And the Colts are obviously still talked about a lot compared to, say, the Cheifs.

But like I said, I'd like to see less talking in general, and more highlights. I really don't tune in to see what Steve Phillips has to say about baseball. Even when he's talking about the Cardinals. I know Albert Pujols is good. I know the pitching is bad. Can I see some plays from the game please?

--P--

Socnorb11
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Re: Guide to being a fan of Boston sports

Post by Socnorb11 »

Popeye_Card wrote:
But like I said, I'd like to see less talking in general, and more highlights. I really don't tune in to see what Steve Phillips has to say about baseball. Even when he's talking about the Cardinals. I know Albert Pujols is good. I know the pitching is bad. Can I see some plays from the game please?

--P--
The problem is that once you've seen the highlights once or twice, they get pretty old. They can pretty much show all of the highlights within half an hour, and then what? Show them again. And again? And again?

I actually flip over to Mike & Mike in the Morning on ESPN2, because by 5:30 a.m., I've seen all of the highlights from the previous day on ESPNNews already.

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Re: Guide to being a fan of Boston sports

Post by MDCardsFan »

Popeye_Card wrote:
MDCardsFan wrote:
Popeye_Card wrote: Sort of like the Cards fans who can only say "1908!" to Cubs fans.

--P--

That would be wrong? :oops: :oops:
When that's the best thing you can come up with to "trash talk", yes.

I dislike trash talking between fans in general. It's sorta dumb, because it's not like you have anything to do with the team. It's just who you happened to start rooting for once upon a time (which may have been last week in some cases).

--P--

But it's the Cubs. Normal rules don't apply... :wink:

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Re: Guide to being a fan of Boston sports

Post by Popeye_Card »

Socnorb11 wrote:
The problem is that once you've seen the highlights once or twice, they get pretty old. They can pretty much show all of the highlights within half an hour, and then what? Show them again. And again? And again?
You really think the "highlights" they show is the best they can do?

There are many times when I see "highlights" of the previous night's Cards game, and I wonder, "They didn't show that good play by Rolen? They didn't show Looper's good performance?", etc. If I know they're not showing me what I think is important for my team, what aren't they showing me from other teams that I only see on ESPN?

Like I said about the Blues-Ducks game, I was at the game, and there was so much more to it than a few goals. Maybe that's all most people want to see, but not me. There were 3 full-fledged fights in that game. There was all kinds of hard hits that led to those fights. There were excellent defensive plays by both sides. There's more to most games than what they show as "highlights". I think the hardcore sports fans who watch ESPN most mornings would like to see some of that.

--P--

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Re: Guide to being a fan of Boston sports

Post by Arthur Dent »

Do you think a less glitzy, more in-depth national sports channel would be successful?

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