It's March now, which means that we're at the absolute peak of the college basketball season. Small conferences have already started their tournaments, playing for the one shot those teams have of getting into the NCAA's. Big conference tournaments start next week, with the Big Dance the week after.
So, of course, ESPN and all its variants are devoting all of their energy to... speculating about Terrell Owens and Alex Rodriguez. Because, apparently, those two have signed-in-blood contracts with Satan ensuring that not one week passes without one or the other being the lead story on SportsCenter.
I've become resigned to the idea that ESPN no longer produces sports programming, but rather hour upon hour of people talking about sports. But is it too much to ask for them to talk about sports that are, you know, in season?
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Owens-related schadenfreude is about the only joy I get out of sports these days. You can't take that away from me.
ESPN is becoming almost like the Discovery Institute... They may mot lie outright like the DI, but all the rest of it - the empty rhetoric, the rah rah, the marketing all are similar, and voimit-inducing.
ps: Please tell me that Billy Packer is now retired or dead, so I can look forward to some games.
pps: Rugby 7s was on the TV last week - on a mainstream channel; unfortunately it was taped, Argentina won, and the show was overproduced. I was hoping that Obama could fix this too...
I agree with you. However, it is clearly in ESPN's business interests to do exactly what they are doing. The average sports fan doesn't give a single flying fuck about regular season or conference tourny college hoops. They will only give a shit when they start filling out their brackets.
There is also no question that college hoops has declined in interest as fewer and fewer of the top NBA prospects even go to college, let alone play four years.
Oh, and god help you if you like hockey.
"... ESPN and all its variants are devoting all of their energy to..."
The high school (Abraham Lincoln) where I'll be teaching advanced Math late March-mid June 2009 is very close to Dodger Stadium. All the local press has been talking about is Manny Ramirez. Actually, a forthcoming bio of him by a psychologist shows him as radically different from his image. Highly intelligent, hates conformists in suits, socialization issues from childhood lead him to act obnoxious to keep people away from him, when most others try to get more people into their social networks. This explains why he and Boston went sour on each other.
Championship Week is the default entry on the little Flash thingy at ESPN.com right now. That's something, I guess.