Off-Tube Commentary and the Pursuit of Happiness June 22, 2006
Posted by rosolio in Common Sense, TV, World.add a comment
Reasonably intelligent people all share the common trait of being in control of what they care about. Or at least can stay aware of it. Usually. Case in point, I was anti-Bloody Mary for my entire career, until tasting what was apparently a mediocre one at Corcorans led me to a totally new conclusion. I didn’t wake up a week and a half later and realize, “Holy crap, I like Bloody Marys now.” Same with entertainment. I knew right away that NBC’s summer test run show ‘Teachers’ was painstakingly awful. I didn’t try to rationalize anything (“Susan from Coupling is on it, and she was…uh…funny on that show…”), I just knew it. I knew I didn’t like the I.O. manual ‘Truth in Comedy’ around page 15 and I was fired up to buy the Oceans Eleven DVD a halfhour after stepping into the theater. You know right away.
There are only two scenarios that defy this trope (keep in mind this is for reasonably intelligent people. It wouldn’t surprise me if this list continued endlessly for people camping out for Larry The Cable Guy tickets. Ohhhhhhh!): 1) when you’re in love, and; 2) when you deeply care about a sport or sports team. Some people never experience one or both of these things, but hey I’m trying to make a point here. The former is obvious, and fairly universal. The whole ‘love at first sight’ thing isn’t reality. What happens is you wake up one day thinking about someone, realize you’ve done that a few times in the last few days, and before you know it, you come to the conclusion that you’re in actual, real-deal love and didn’t know it. Often, this realization can put you in a terrible spot, but that’s not the focus of this column, no no. We’re talking about the latter today, which was spent listening to the Off-Tube Commentary of the World Cup match between Ghana and the United States.
The Off-Tube Commentary to which I refer is one of the most simultaneously brilliant and ridiculous ideas in recent history. The World Cup is totally blacked out on the internet, at least in English, because audio and video rights were purchased by ESPN and BBC Sports. The BBC adheres so strictly to the rules that they will broadcast literally everything except the game itself. So you have all the pregame and predictions and analysis, and then the online radio player shuts off like the electricity at 1157 W. Diversey, Chicago IL, 60614 (see the previous article on this subject). So this tiny English newspaper (which I suspect is the New York Post of the UK, based on the number of headlines involving booze-induced embarrassments and injuries to celebrities) has a link to two guys sitting around watching the game on TV and giving the play-by-play themselves. No official color commentary, no sponsors, just two random fans telling you what’s happening on their TV. This idea is so good, that I’ll probably be trying it at some point during the NFL season. What if they did this for dramatic television as well? “And Michael is down in the hatch, yes, he just told Ana Lucia that he’ll kill Henry…yep, she gave him the gun…oh my! oh dear oh dear oh dear…”
(note: The potential for drinking games surrounding this is totally endless as well. My personal favorite is taking a shot every time one of the announcers describes a player as being “knackered”. Play with the word “quality” and you’ll be shitfaced before halftime).
So I’m listening to it, experiencing the typical ups and downs of a sporting event while still maintaining relative diligence at work. When the dust settled, and jesus, did it settle, Ghana defeated the U.S. 2-1, scoring the second goal off of a penalty shot drawn by the flopping Pimpong (great name). In fact, there was a lot of flopping, so much that the neutral British commentators were making fun of the situation. “And Pimpong goes down like he’s been shot in the leg. There wasn’t any contact. The Germans are awfully strict aren’t they?” The Ghanians basically made Shane Battier and Vlade Divac look like Abe Lincoln (who couldn’t tell a lie) and Dennis Haysbert (who could run for president right now as David Palmer and would win in a total landslide). Whatever, either way, the Americans lost and Ghana sealed the victory by acting as if there was a U.S. sniper on the roof picking them down one by one.
As the clock reached zero, I found myself overcome with simultaneous sadness and rage. I immediately went onto Wikipedia to find out the gross national product of Ghana, hoping to be able to make some comparison to their gutless play on the soccer pitch with their inability to compete in the world economy. I cursed Landon Donovan’s total disappearing act. I started with countless ‘what ifs?’ regarding Eddie Pope and Pablo Mastoreni’s card suspensions and Claudio Reyna’s injury. As I did this, I came to a strange conclusion: I really cared about soccer. I know these guys’ names. I really cared about this U.S. team. I overtly wanted to follow the event as much as possible, but my rooting for the Americans was more of an obligation than a decision. Somewhere along the way, I started to give a shit. It didn’t happen then, but I noticed it then.
This lightning bolt of an epiphany caused me to start thinking about the other times I felt this way. The only teams that I really, really bleed for are the Ravens and Maryland basketball, with the Orioles simply falling a little behind due to the miserable ownership of Peter Angelos, but then again I should include them.
The Orioles had won the first game I ever went to. They beat the Yankees 10-1, Randy Milligan hit two home runs, and I was mesmerized by the fact that at any moment, I could stick a finger in the air and get a hotdog. I wasn’t a fan just yet, though. I wasn’t a fan until my favorite player, the closer Gregg Olson, blew a save against Boston, and I was left crying on the floor, like I played for Ghana and was within 30 feet of an American player in motion. It was the first game I could remember them losing, and I felt like I lost. ‘Them’ became ‘us’, and I did nothing but care.
For the Ravens, it was an end of the season game against the Patriots in 1999, the first season we didn’t totally stink on ice. We were on the brink of making the playoffs, which is sort of like a validating moment for a team that was new to a city so starved for football that we watched minor leaguers running around on a 110 yard field with only three downs for four years. Doug Flutie converted a 4th and a million by scrambling, barely making it, barely sealing our fate. They ended up getting another cheap score and we were done. We had lost…hang on a sec…38 games, but that was the first one I was pissed about. It was the pain then that was counteracted by total psychotic jubilation the next season, when we game back to beat Jacksonville at home. There’s no way it would have felt that good if Flutie’s scramble didn’t hurt so bad.
The Maryland one is easy: Final Four against Duke. Even the total collapse against the Dukies at home earlier that season didn’t hurt as bad as this one. For one thing, I was sick at home and not there (I probably would have gotten sick if I was there). Maybe that 54 second meltdown contributed to this pain, but we had them on the ropes, and it was for a chance to play for a title. We were up 22 at one point, and it was the fucking Dukies. The moment of clarity for me was when Chris Duhon and Steve Blake dove after a loose ball and Duhon slammed his head against the ground harder than any crash test dummy has hit anything…ever. He was jacked up, not like paralysis jacked up, but totally dazed and rolling around like he was about to stand up claiming to be Joan of Arc. As this guy writhed in pain, I remember thinking: “Good.” My investment in this outcome and my total hatred for everything the Dukies stood for completely overrode any sense of humanity that I had. I honestly didn’t care that this guy whacked the hell out of his head. Nothing else mattered except for my beloved Terps (who went on to dominate the Dukies the next year and win a national title…had to get that in there) and the wave of disappointment that enveloped Cole Field House.
The moral of the story? You’re not a fan until you get totally wrecked over a team. A lot of people never experience that; the people who don’t like sports certainly haven’t, and think people who hyperventilate after games (the victorious Tim Rosolio after a Mo Vaughn walk-off in 1996) are out of their minds. You get the same impression of people who are in love. Often their decisions are totally ridiculous, their devastation totally beyond everyone’s comprehension. Am I saying that you need to get completely buried by someone before you can understand what love is? I don’t think I am. I think the better way of looking at it is that you can’t really appreciate the good without getting a brutal, lingering taste of the bad.
Without that hope, none of it would be worth it.
The Case for Fate…Or Not June 20, 2006
Posted by rosolio in Uncategorized.add a comment
Team Brasil…Joga Bonito…the beautiful game. This team, constructed of some of the finest athletes in the world, is better than even money to win the World Cup, which is rapidly approaching the Knockout Stage (a much cooler title than Sweet Sixteen or Elite Eight). They’ve looked incredibly mortal thus far in the tournament, there is no question. But everyone believes deep down that regardless what they see, what they think, that it’s going to work out for them. That they are going to win, without question.
They are a team of destiny.
This has also been said about the opposite kind of sports team: the cagey underdog’s luck. The 2005 Pittsburgh Steelers were saved by a quarterback tackling a player who not only inexplicably cut back in towards him instead of running cleanly down for a score, but was stabbed in the leg a week earlier by an enraged girlfriend. The 2004 Red Sox were given that label after coming back from unspeakable odds against the mighty New York Yankees. The 2000 Baltimore Ravens (which I insist on mentioning as many times as possible…jesus, we need to win again) beat archrival Tennessee with the help of a shanked field goal, and a blocked field goal returned for a goddamn score.
Teams of destiny, if you believe in that sort of thing.
But do people really? There is a clear cut choice in thinking here. There’s the ‘everything happens for a reason’ school of thought, inhabited by a fantastic number of people I know, all of whom claim to be optimists. The other side is the Terminator 2, ‘there is no fate but what we make’ group. Where do you stand? Where do I?
Everything can change in an instant. Forget the obvious examples of car accidents and convenience store robberies. Everything can change for the better in an instant as well. And sometimes, it can cut back on you, like that defensive lineman in the AFC Divisional game. When you experience something that really hits you, leaving you wondering what the number was on that bus that just hit you, how everything that was so great can, for one reason or another, totally disappear. When that sort of thing happens, you’ve got to make a choice: is this one of those ‘one door closes and another opens’ situations? Or is there something you need to do before you can get back to normal – feel normal, or just good – again?
Believing that there isn’t really tragedy, only opportunity gives a lot of people solace. It helps people accept things. No Fate appeals more to the control freaks of the world, a group of which I carry a fully laminated membership card. The trouble with that is accepting gets a little tougher. You want to fix it, but you can’t. You want to understand, but you can’t. Most importantly, you don’t want to give up. Even if every single strain of logic tells you that you can’t change anything, you find that microscopic, chromosome-esque thread that says you can.
So does everything happen for a reason? Is everything really going to be okay?
The verdict is still out. At least mine is. And so far, it’s one hell of a mistrial.
Follow the Worldwide Leader June 20, 2006
Posted by rosolio in Baseball, Basketball, Football, Hockey, TV.add a comment
First, we are going to open with a disclaimer: I am as addicted to ESPN as anyone else. I check the website a hundred times a day. Upon moving to the midwest and being out of the range of my beloved PTI, I’ve begun downloading the podcast and listening a day late. I have this weird feeling that watching a Stanley Cup Playoff game on OLN somehow isn’t as valid as if it was on ESPN, even though it’s the exact same people with the exact same haircuts. ESPN, a jewel in the crown of the Disney empire, has an absolute hidden monopoly on everything revolving around sports.
The term ‘Empire’ carries fantastically negative connotations. It feels weird to write ‘Empire’ and not capitalize it. This is due to the fact that most are not recognized as Empires until it becomes evil. ESPN has not always been bad, but it is this author’s intention to, at least in some way, shine light on a negative trend that is spiraling uncontrollably toward disaster. Picture a volkswagen on fire careening down a street in San Francisco toward a crowded intersection. A little intense, but so is Around The Horn.
Like it was written in Revelation, the sports apocalypse starts with a positive event (I clearly follow the bible intently…anyway). Pardon the Interruption features two of the greatest sports writers (frankly, two of the greatest columnists regardless of subject) this country has to offer: the Old Tyme [sic] sportsfan Tony Kornheiser and the plugged-in, X’s and O’s Michael Wilbon. The idea was that these two very different, but very smart, writers would address the various events of the sports day and argue their opinions. Part of the appeal was that these two colleagues are very good friends, and the dynamic in a way simulates any group of fans discussing the same topics. They don’t claim to be experts, but neither do we, really. I can get in a trench war over whether the 2000 Ravens or 1985 Bears had a more fearsome defense, but unless I’m arguing with Buddy Ryan, neither I nor my adversary has any actual cred that makes us ‘right’. It’s still fun to debate, however, and that’s why PTI is so great.
The problem is that ESPN, through the Nielsen ratings and internet buzz, saw that they had a gigantic hit on their hands; a lively, opinionated sportspage that contrasted directly with the objective, just the facts ma’am Sportscenter. The suits at Team Rodent completely missed the boat as to why PTI is so popular. Rather than seeing the everyday banter of the show, the producers instead took the ratings to mean that audiences wanted to see people fight.
Around the Horn soon premiered: the Game of Competitive Banter. Aside from being advertised as a competition and the constant ad hominem attacks from the ‘contestants’, the show’s real flaw was that through the assignment of points, someone was going to be decided to have been right. Former host Max Kellerman wasn’t shy about mentioning his New York bias, and it showed in his assignment of points. The show has improved with current host Tony Reali as it seems that points are assigned based on argument and stat inclusion. But there are three types of lies, and the show still yielded a winner.
Dozens of other headache-inducing shows and segments featuring talking heads yelling at each other soon followed, but that wasn’t the real problem. The charm of PTI was that Kornheiser and Wilbon would occassionally take ludicrously bold sides, because the idea was to facilitate discussion, and plus it can be funny. It was because of this reason that asinine segments such as the Budweiser Hot Seat came to pass. Dan Patrick would ask pointed and directly controversial questions to athletes and sports personalities, seemingly begging for the person to slip and say something controversial. A classic example occurred with Jeremy Roenick. After being asked about the fans who claim they’ll never watch hockey again after the lockout, Roenick answered very honestly, “Hey, if they don’t want to watch, whatever, good riddance.” Following the interview, a thousand online and televised segments announced that “Roenick does not care about fans!” Patrick claimed total ignorance of the situation, but he threw the bear trap down and Roenick stepped into it. It is also worth mentioning that the rise of PTI changed Patrick’s radio program, which went from witty banter between he and ex-pitcher Rob Dibble, to Patrick’s controversy-stirring rants defended oh so smugly with the “It’s just my opinion” defense.
Patrick is right, it is just his opinion. He’s just another guy, with no more cred than someone working at Walgreens. He’s never stepped on a field of any kind. And that’s why I cut him a lot of slack and listened loyally to his show. I also listened to Colin Cowherd, who followed a similarly abrasive formula.
And then it became clear to me. Cowherd was on one of his rants, screaming about why Americans love the frontrunners and hate underdogs. This is completely insane, of course, as anyone outside of the five boroughs would say that the Miracle on Ice was a greater event than the 2000 Yankees rolling over everyone on the way to a title. His logic was that more people watch when the Yankees and Dukies and Fighting Irish are playing. He also supports Rush Limbaugh, which is a great way to retain listeners, because he makes a lot of money. It’s debatable as to whether Cowherd even likes sports; he certainly hates athletes and reminds his audience daily of all the reasons you should hate them. The problem with The Herd, and it took a long time to decipher, was that Cowherd wasn’t telling you what he thought. He was telling you what YOU thought. And as I looked more and more, I saw a thousand examples all over the place where ESPN was dictating the sports world by telling people what they were thinking.
What?
There is a lot of great stuff on ESPN. Mike & Mike on ESPN radio is great, PTI is great, Chris Mortensen simply has more information than every other football reporter on the planet, and Bill Simmons relates to more fans my age than anyone else out there.
But ESPN waxes poetic about how outraged America is over Barry Bonds and then unleashes a Bonds reality show. They create the Minnesota Vikings Love Boat Scandal; you mean insanely rich people fuck insanely hot strippers on boats? Whaaaaat? Or the Randy Moss mooning incident, or the constant Terrell Owens coverage, or entire days dedicated to the Yankees and Red Sox who play 30 times a season.
ESPN does all of this under the guise of “We’re giving the people what they want.” The reality is closer to this, “We’re telling the people want they want and then giving it to them.”
That’s what media has become. We dreamed of it becoming more inclusive with added interactivity and all of that, but instead of us reaching to them, they’ve reached us. Through weblogs and focus groups and polls, they can monitor their progress. Based on the fact that I checked ESPN.com three times while writing this, they’re doing a pretty good job.
