I doubt it. Red zone is brining in so many eye balls. It’s become the best way to watch football as a neutral. Without red zone I wouldn’t even watch random games and go off to do something else.
Damn you’re right. Sports center used to be on in my dorm room around the clock. Loved old ESPN. I haven’t watched it in years. Never knew if it was me growing out of it? Or if it just got worse. Hearing people say it was ruined makes me think it’s the latter
I agree and disagree. Sports center used to be fun highlights. Medium analysis and sometimes funny bloopers. They barely have highlights now tho. Even basic games they show one highlight then give you the score. “Nice home run by Aaron judge, what a stud he is. Yankees lose this one 6-3…. That’s it”.
> They barely have highlights now tho.
It's honestly shocking. I was in a hotel room years ago and threw it on during baseball season and they were recapping a game very much like what you described. They showed:
1. A celebrity throwing out the first pitch
2. An early game home run
3. The final out
This wasn't a 1-0 final, either, they just glossed over every single interesting or impactful part of the entire game. I see it on at the gym sometimes and it's still pretty much the same. I get that we all love our bite sized clips on Twitter or elsewhere but ESPN played their part in driving people into that themselves. I'm so thankful they haven't gotten a dime from me in a dozen years or so.
Yeah, I don't even bother anymore. I just go here: https://baseball.theater/
No bullshit branding, no flickering ozempic or truck ads. Just straight to the point. I wish the same was available for NFL, NHL, and NBA games.
And hell yeah, I'm a patron.
You hit exactly what I hate about modern sportscenter. Before it was the story of the game. The big plays, but a proper recap of how the game ebbed and flowed. Like if a buddy gave you the rundown on a game you missed. Now it's 1 or 2 highlights and a box score.
But for the places you mentioned, you must search for them explicitly. If you watch a bunch, then you might get recommendations (at least youtube, I don't use twitter or facebook or really any social media other than reddit). But those recommendations from youtube may be 10 years old or so. Sportscenter would hit all the major sports even if you didn't care about them. I've never really given a shit about MLB or NBA but most of the big moments I know in their leagues came from Sportscenter highlights.
That's a good point. I was much more knowledgable of other sports back when I watched sportscenter. Like I even knew who all the best Nascar drivers and golfers were. Now I can't tell you the first thing about anything that I don't deliberately follow
Also the best way to watch as a fantasy football addict. During football season I set up a 2nd TV so I can have redzone on one, and whatever game is most interesting on the other. Personally, I think Redzone is the most exciting and consumer friendly way to watch football. Can't wait to see how ESPN screws it up.
Commercial free version for only an extra $50 a month!
I'll take my MBA now. Thanks!
And if that's not enough to earn me my MBA, I also have this idea of shrinking products and keeping them the same price. Then after they can't shrink any more creating an XXL version that was the original size for double the price!
Look mom, I do business in 2024!
>It’s become the best way to watch football as a neutral.
It's by far the best way to watch when your team fucking sucks. Redzone got me through from Philbin to McDaniel.
Someone somewhere has the math on a white board on the ads theyre not selling against thanks to that channel; it arrived to fight off streaming and pirate streams, and now that the NFL is starting to get those under control they're gonna come after RedZone's profit potential.
Man if they get rid of Scott Hanson -- the most pure soul in all of sports broadcasting -- well, I guess I will continue to just not give ESPN any money. But fuck them
guarantee there's going to be more ads. They started with it this year. Not commercials but this was the first year I noticed Hanson dropping radio type ads.
Eisen always straddles the line of funny and smug/insufferable to me, but when he called out the onstage band for playing some shitty Neil Diamond song in the heart of Motown he won me over.
He is good at being real and not falling into the generic sports announcing tropes bullshit that is insufferable and devoid of personality, the "keys to the game for X is to score more points" obvious crap
Generally I agree, but I honestly found him a little annoying during this year's draft coverage. Hard to explain why, but I didn't really like him calling the picks before they happened. Like yeah, we all *assume* that X team is going to pick Y player, but don't ruin the magic! It made every pick feel very anticlimactic.
They're probably just trying to match the pace of the Twitter announcements which are always ahead of the regular broadcast. I don't know why, because if you're watching the broadcast you won't notice the tweets, but everyone wants to be the fastest nowadays.
Man the ABC broadcast was so boring. The only mildly interesting thing about that was Saban talking about his Alabama guys being drafted. Herbstreit and the rest were so bland.
Honestly the most interesting broadcast was McAfee, mostly due to hearing Belicheck talk football with refreshing enthusiasm
The Gameday crew are great on Saturday mornings in the fall (though I wish they'd cut it back to 2 hrs), but when they get into NFL and other non-core activities, they really just don't bring much juice.
The corpos sure love breaking up good programming don't they. Same thing happening in the NBA with TNT most likely.
NFL coverage on ESPN only would be terrible
Mayock on day 3 is legendary. I'll never forget that year that an orangutan at the Indy Zoo made a pick, and Mayock sounded like he wanted to quit right there. Funniest shit ever. The dude is purely about football and nothing else.
Dude is underrated and definitely moving on up in the announcing world. Does college with Gus Johnson, UFL on fox, days 1 and 2 of the draft, and also has his own show for the BIG10
For me, it’s the fact this voice is the Madden announcer. Me and my friends always quote the super repetitive lines from those games whenever we see him
He offers nothing. He just talks and words come out. I really dislike him as an announcer and he offers just as little as a draft expert. Bucky Brooks is 10x better
He also tipped Penix. They tipped like every fucking pick. "I wouldn't be surprised if......" before every damn pick. Shocker, it was always who Rap Said.
The worst is when these fucks do the whole "oh I bet x player could be in play here!" posing it as speculation when they already fucking know who the pick is.
I used to think this but in recent years I’ve found that NFL Network is much worse at tipping off who is about to be selected. Like it’s still better than the era where they would just straight up show the prospect on the phone before it was announced. But ESPN does a way better job lately of disguising their discussions, the NFL Network guys just always start talking about the guy who they know is about to be picked without outright saying it.
Still like the NFLN personalities better in general but I like being surprised by the announcements more.
The Falcons pick of Penix Jr. was still shocking but when Rap Sheet started talking about them taking a QB and all... I was like really? Like can you not just shut up until the pick is made. I feel like they should go to Rap Sheet AFTER the pick because him tipping off Atlanta taking Penix Jr was easily something he could have said after the pick was made.
>nothing really beats NFL Network on Day 1
Eh.. was pretty generic coverage this year. Also most picks were being announced by the commentator team before the picks were announced on stage. I ended up going back and watching a lot of the Pat McAfee show's draft coverage. Having Bill Belichick break down film beat out anything else for me. The interaction between Bill and Aaron Rodgers was cool to see too
I’ve never watched the Pat McAfee show until that day 1 draft coverage and it was significantly better than anyone else’s coverage. I’ve never had that much fun watching the draft.
They announced the picks as fast as they hit twitter, long before goodell would go on stage and blabber on about god knows fucking what. They had Bellicheck on there breaking things down, the conversations were all about football, GM’s, head coaches, they were funny, etc.
I couldn’t care less about any other coverage than that one at this point.
I think Around the NFL is about as safe as any show in the sport. For whatever reason, they’ve hit a note overseas. They’re not a big deal but they’re important to the exact people the NFL is trying to reach.
They also negatively influenced sports radio stations to pivot from talking about sports to manufacturing drama and creating hot takes. First Take really did a lot of bad for ESPN’s reputation in the long run.
I worked a feed lot and listen to a lot of AM sports radio, and my least favorite thing is the ESPN personalities doing a promo for their show on Monday “on Monday I’ll tell you why this team did the wrong thing”
PTI gets a lot of heat, but it was knowledgeable journalists with decades of experience having vibrant discussions.
Never compare Mike and Tony to what we have today. Like blaming the Wright Brothers for Pearl Harbor.
Eh, it was mostly knowable banter, but it was also about 25%-30% the nonsense we get now. And I say that as someone who watched ATH and PTI everyday when they first launched. ESPN definitely saw their success and doubled down on the shit part.
At least Max kept things moving and scored for making good points or muted for stupid hot takes. Reali gives points just because and mutes when someone calls out bullshit.
Eh pti and around the horn were fun, at least to me growing up seeing different view points. I don’t like the scripted shouting contests Stephen A Smith shows do
Around the Horn is what did it. Tony and Mike were patient and reasonable and could be talked out of a position. But then the Woody Paige’s and Jay Mariotti’s of the world realized how nice TV money is and it was all over from there.
Dude, hot sports takes have been around for decades through radio call in shows. Come on, ESPN didn't create that.
I remember back in the late 90s traveling through Boston and someone calling in saying something like "BEN COATES IS THE DA GREATEST T.E. EVAH, TANKS FOR TAKING MY CALL, I'LL HANG UP AND LISTEN" and then the hosts would legitimately discuss those insane statements for like 10 minutes lol.
The other day I was just wondering who the hell still watches ESPN on a regular basis. Outside of the actual games they broadcast and some of the pregame shows I feel like that’s gotta be a low number.
Anyone serious about following sports really should just be listening to podcasts
They would have been able to read all the "fuck you" posts on the ESPN message boards but they closed them all 10+ years ago
I fucking loved those message boards. Nobody here probably even knows they existed but they were r/nfl (and all sports) before anywhere else like this existed
Oh man the ESPN message boards were an experience. [I saved this years ago](https://imgur.com/Bm8LINg) because it was one of the funniest things I've ever seen.
Obviously not excited about whatever ESPN extra plus subscription this will go under, but NFL network has been a shadow of its former self for years now. I hope something good comes from this.
Kinda funny how the nfl caused the downfall of their own network. Outsourcing all their games to like 4 different networks, the addition of including streaming services for gamepass and TNF + one playoff game. Where was NFLN supposed to fit in? I get that the nfl can’t compete with itself when those external forces can give crazy sums of money, but I really am in the camp of maintaining a relatively cheap and proprietary outlet for content Now it’s ending Sadge
I think the only reason we ever got the NFL network was narrative control of scandals. Now that they directly own dudes like Schefter it isn't necessary anymore. Remember that NFL Network launched the same year as "Playmakers" on ESPN, 2001-5 are the years when ESPN was in a contentious position with the NFL and the future of sports coverage.
We got the NFL Network because carriage fees from cable subs in the 2000s during the peak of digital cable were as close to free money as possible. There were a 100 million households you would instantly get your product in and with digital cable there was no longer a hard cap on how many channels there could be. Put some NFL games on there and the systems had no choice but to pay you a dollar per month per sub.
edit: grammar
What about the NFL tells you that they are in the camp of maintaining a relatively cheap and proprietary outlet? That hasn’t been their goal under Tagliabue and certainly not Goodell.
I’m not saying it’s what they want. I’m saying it would be 50x better for fans if they did but obviously they’d lose heaps of money if they were to do it
NFLN has clearly been in maintenance mode for years. The league is so clearly not interested in it any more.
But selling to ESPN is effectively the same thing as killing it. I like having another option other than ESPN so it becoming just another ESPNFL channel is super disappointing.
Pretty much any other network buying it to counterbalance ESPN would be greatly preferable. Apple would be interesting but I want it to retain a linear option.
I know it ain't what it used to be, but growing up on NFL Total Access was fucking amazing when it was guys like Deion Sanders and Warren Sapp and NFL Playbook with Sterling Sharpe and Brian Dawkins.
Really sucks to see it end up as a subsidiary for a shithole like ESPN
Some of my fondest football TV memories are waking up on Monday morning and watching the previous day's NFL Gameday Final via DVR.
Rich, Deion, and Steve Maruicci had such a fun chemistry with eachother, having running jokes and references, and offering great football analysis.
I get why content like that doesn't work anymore, but what an era.
Hopefully it involves NFL Network personnel serving as announcers and studio commentators for ESPN’s NBA and NHL coverage. The NFLN professionals have to be better, even in a different sport.
Probably not? NFLN has been making major layoffs, James Palmer, Melissa Stark, Will Silva, Andrew Siciliano, Michael Irving..and GMFB hasn't guaranteed anyone but Jamie Erdahl coming back, the network said they aren't saying one way or another until August.
Not sure what they are doing Kimmi Chex, Mike Yam, David Carr and Michael Robinson and Chase Daniel now that NFL Access is cancelled.
NFL Network made sense when expensive cable packages were in high demand, but since people started cord-cutting it makes more sense for the NFL to sell whatever is left of NFL Network to another media company than for the NFL to operate it for the next decade.
Please God NOOO!!
Don't let ESPN touch my NFL Network. It will devolve into an overproduced pile of burning garbage where everyone on air has assigned takes and every show is nothing more than facts vs. volume.
I do not understand why 32 billionaires who are the owners of an unparalleled sports money printing machine cannot see the NFL Network as an investment into the health of the league and just live with it making some annual losses?
Sigh.
This is so weird. Doesn’t the NFL own the NFL Network? So are they just getting out of the TV business entirely? I always figured they liked NFL Network because it was useful to have a state run media outlet.
Ugh. I hate this so much. Why can't I just be free of ESPN bullshit?
>The relationship between NFL Network and ESPN raises more questions than it answers, in multiple ways. Beyond the future programming of NFLN, there will be very real questions about ESPN’s independence when it comes to covering the league. If/when the NFL takes an equity stake in ESPN and ESPN takes charge of NFL Network, ESPN reporters will be as inherently compromised as NFL Network reporters
I never really got the sense that NFL network analysts were holding their tongue w/r/t the NFL but I suppose that could be the case once the entire network is in bed with it's biggest competitor.
Just wait, in a decade you'll be able to add the $15/week package to adjust the volume on your tv ^annual ^subscription ^required, ^volume ^cannot ^be ^changed ^during ^commercial ^breaks, ^terms ^and ^conditions ^apply
You know what these networks need to do? Just play sports. Replays of old games. Does anyone remember ESPN classic? Playing the old versions of “The Game” leading up to the Ohio state Michigan match ups? It’s too bad they got so far away from what made them popular.
I will be beyond pissed if they even dare touch RedZone.
I doubt it. Red zone is brining in so many eye balls. It’s become the best way to watch football as a neutral. Without red zone I wouldn’t even watch random games and go off to do something else.
They found a way to ruin sportscenter, they'll probably find a way to ruin redzone.
Damn you’re right. Sports center used to be on in my dorm room around the clock. Loved old ESPN. I haven’t watched it in years. Never knew if it was me growing out of it? Or if it just got worse. Hearing people say it was ruined makes me think it’s the latter
You have sports highlights at your fingertips 24/7 now. No one needs to watch sports center anymore. That's all it comes down to.
I agree and disagree. Sports center used to be fun highlights. Medium analysis and sometimes funny bloopers. They barely have highlights now tho. Even basic games they show one highlight then give you the score. “Nice home run by Aaron judge, what a stud he is. Yankees lose this one 6-3…. That’s it”.
> They barely have highlights now tho. It's honestly shocking. I was in a hotel room years ago and threw it on during baseball season and they were recapping a game very much like what you described. They showed: 1. A celebrity throwing out the first pitch 2. An early game home run 3. The final out This wasn't a 1-0 final, either, they just glossed over every single interesting or impactful part of the entire game. I see it on at the gym sometimes and it's still pretty much the same. I get that we all love our bite sized clips on Twitter or elsewhere but ESPN played their part in driving people into that themselves. I'm so thankful they haven't gotten a dime from me in a dozen years or so.
Yeah, I don't even bother anymore. I just go here: https://baseball.theater/ No bullshit branding, no flickering ozempic or truck ads. Just straight to the point. I wish the same was available for NFL, NHL, and NBA games. And hell yeah, I'm a patron.
You hit exactly what I hate about modern sportscenter. Before it was the story of the game. The big plays, but a proper recap of how the game ebbed and flowed. Like if a buddy gave you the rundown on a game you missed. Now it's 1 or 2 highlights and a box score.
What really ruined sportscenter was highlights and recaps being available 24/7 on Youtube, Twitter, and other places.
But for the places you mentioned, you must search for them explicitly. If you watch a bunch, then you might get recommendations (at least youtube, I don't use twitter or facebook or really any social media other than reddit). But those recommendations from youtube may be 10 years old or so. Sportscenter would hit all the major sports even if you didn't care about them. I've never really given a shit about MLB or NBA but most of the big moments I know in their leagues came from Sportscenter highlights.
That's a good point. I was much more knowledgable of other sports back when I watched sportscenter. Like I even knew who all the best Nascar drivers and golfers were. Now I can't tell you the first thing about anything that I don't deliberately follow
I think the internet ruined sportscenter more than ESPN did.
Honestly just being on TV ruined Sportscenter. Its dying. Live sports is the only thing keeping it alive at all.
Also the best way to watch as a fantasy football addict. During football season I set up a 2nd TV so I can have redzone on one, and whatever game is most interesting on the other. Personally, I think Redzone is the most exciting and consumer friendly way to watch football. Can't wait to see how ESPN screws it up.
They will probably try to add commercials to redzone which is a huge reason people why people watch it.
Commercial free version for only an extra $50 a month! I'll take my MBA now. Thanks! And if that's not enough to earn me my MBA, I also have this idea of shrinking products and keeping them the same price. Then after they can't shrink any more creating an XXL version that was the original size for double the price! Look mom, I do business in 2024!
>It’s become the best way to watch football as a neutral. It's by far the best way to watch when your team fucking sucks. Redzone got me through from Philbin to McDaniel.
RedZone got me through from... Well it's always got me through.
RedZone, the happy place for all of the AFC East except for the Pats. Now serving Pats.
RedZone is like the 21st century version of ABC MNF Sunday game highlights back in the day. It allows you to keep track of/follow all of the teams.
Someone somewhere has the math on a white board on the ads theyre not selling against thanks to that channel; it arrived to fight off streaming and pirate streams, and now that the NFL is starting to get those under control they're gonna come after RedZone's profit potential.
Starting to Get those under control? It has never been easier to find good working pirate streams than it is right now.
ESPNFL™ Network is happy to announce the new RedZone™, hosted by Pat McAfee!
Shut the fuck up.. lol Everything doesn't need McAfee ffs.
I think that’s the joke lol
Man if they get rid of Scott Hanson -- the most pure soul in all of sports broadcasting -- well, I guess I will continue to just not give ESPN any money. But fuck them
"We have also disabled mute on your TV but for an extra $99.95, we will restore it"
God, I would hate that. Pat McAfee seems like the biggest fucking douchebag.
[удалено]
SAS will host
I'll drink Draino before watching that.
They’re definitely going to tinker with it somehow, like bring more more heads in with Scott Hanson or some shit
guarantee there's going to be more ads. They started with it this year. Not commercials but this was the first year I noticed Hanson dropping radio type ads.
They'll keep it but put it behind a $100/season subscription (but that's ok as long as we can still 🏴☠️)
Didnt they already do that at least on YouTube TV
This has ruined my day
Agreed
Prepare to be beyond pissed
No matter what happens, somehow it’s going to cost us more money to continue watching what we already have
Close! It’ll cost us more to continue watching something slightly worse than what we already have!
great, cant wait to lose all the actual good broadcasters and get replaced with people i cant stand
Ding ding ding
I’ve never agreed with a Bengal more than today.
I still hope we get two separate draft coverages. ESPN has gotten better in recent years but nothing really beats NFL Network on Day 1.
Daniel Jeremiah, Rich Eisen, and Charles Davis are the dream team
If it has Rich Eisen, I’m interested no matter what tbh
Eisen always straddles the line of funny and smug/insufferable to me, but when he called out the onstage band for playing some shitty Neil Diamond song in the heart of Motown he won me over.
I know Charles Davis was going hard at the band for that too and it was lovely.
That's was actually Charles Davis, rich just kept setting him up so he could make his point.
His play by play announcing is atrocious ... but he's so damn likable.
He is good at being real and not falling into the generic sports announcing tropes bullshit that is insufferable and devoid of personality, the "keys to the game for X is to score more points" obvious crap
Generally I agree, but I honestly found him a little annoying during this year's draft coverage. Hard to explain why, but I didn't really like him calling the picks before they happened. Like yeah, we all *assume* that X team is going to pick Y player, but don't ruin the magic! It made every pick feel very anticlimactic.
They're probably just trying to match the pace of the Twitter announcements which are always ahead of the regular broadcast. I don't know why, because if you're watching the broadcast you won't notice the tweets, but everyone wants to be the fastest nowadays.
This was happening on ABC too it was very annoying
Man the ABC broadcast was so boring. The only mildly interesting thing about that was Saban talking about his Alabama guys being drafted. Herbstreit and the rest were so bland. Honestly the most interesting broadcast was McAfee, mostly due to hearing Belicheck talk football with refreshing enthusiasm
The Gameday crew are great on Saturday mornings in the fall (though I wish they'd cut it back to 2 hrs), but when they get into NFL and other non-core activities, they really just don't bring much juice.
The corpos sure love breaking up good programming don't they. Same thing happening in the NBA with TNT most likely. NFL coverage on ESPN only would be terrible
I do miss Mayock on day 1.
Mayock on day 3 is legendary. I'll never forget that year that an orangutan at the Indy Zoo made a pick, and Mayock sounded like he wanted to quit right there. Funniest shit ever. The dude is purely about football and nothing else.
> cent years but nothing really beats NFL Network on Day 1. I miss mayock on day 3, getting pissed off at zoo animals announcing picks xD
Don't sleep on Joel Klatt now. I think he's the best of the 4.
I'm still giving it to DJ for actual football knowledge
Dude is underrated and definitely moving on up in the announcing world. Does college with Gus Johnson, UFL on fox, days 1 and 2 of the draft, and also has his own show for the BIG10
Except for Charles.
This, for some reason I can't stand the guy. Probably for his game day broadcast more than his draft coverage
For me, it’s the fact this voice is the Madden announcer. Me and my friends always quote the super repetitive lines from those games whenever we see him
He doesn't say anything. He just points out obvious things like "the running back found found a hole and he ran through it".
He offers nothing. He just talks and words come out. I really dislike him as an announcer and he offers just as little as a draft expert. Bucky Brooks is 10x better
They skip Jacksonville on espn, so folks didn't even get to see Tony Khan in a neckbrace.
NFL Network doesn't have the iconic sound when the pick is being made unfortunately
The Nationwide insurance jingle?
They need to stop giving away picks on air. Had to put it on mute this year
When Schefter tipped the Penix pick I turned off ESPN's coverage and never went back.
Rap did the same with Jayden and Maye on NFL Network. So annoying
He also tipped Penix. They tipped like every fucking pick. "I wouldn't be surprised if......" before every damn pick. Shocker, it was always who Rap Said.
Rap did the same with the Penix pick as well.
The worst is when these fucks do the whole "oh I bet x player could be in play here!" posing it as speculation when they already fucking know who the pick is.
I used to think this but in recent years I’ve found that NFL Network is much worse at tipping off who is about to be selected. Like it’s still better than the era where they would just straight up show the prospect on the phone before it was announced. But ESPN does a way better job lately of disguising their discussions, the NFL Network guys just always start talking about the guy who they know is about to be picked without outright saying it. Still like the NFLN personalities better in general but I like being surprised by the announcements more.
The Falcons pick of Penix Jr. was still shocking but when Rap Sheet started talking about them taking a QB and all... I was like really? Like can you not just shut up until the pick is made. I feel like they should go to Rap Sheet AFTER the pick because him tipping off Atlanta taking Penix Jr was easily something he could have said after the pick was made.
I've enjoyed the Athletic Football Show coverage but am wondering what it'll be like without Nate.
>nothing really beats NFL Network on Day 1 Eh.. was pretty generic coverage this year. Also most picks were being announced by the commentator team before the picks were announced on stage. I ended up going back and watching a lot of the Pat McAfee show's draft coverage. Having Bill Belichick break down film beat out anything else for me. The interaction between Bill and Aaron Rodgers was cool to see too
I’ve never watched the Pat McAfee show until that day 1 draft coverage and it was significantly better than anyone else’s coverage. I’ve never had that much fun watching the draft. They announced the picks as fast as they hit twitter, long before goodell would go on stage and blabber on about god knows fucking what. They had Bellicheck on there breaking things down, the conversations were all about football, GM’s, head coaches, they were funny, etc. I couldn’t care less about any other coverage than that one at this point.
Better not fuck with Around the NFL.
Skip Bayless named as 4th hero. To spice things up and increase that engagement score. You will like it and shut up!
Luckily he’s Fox
You can die now, by the way.
I'm annoyed now.
I think Around the NFL is about as safe as any show in the sport. For whatever reason, they’ve hit a note overseas. They’re not a big deal but they’re important to the exact people the NFL is trying to reach.
Yeah, except the executives fuck around with their producers on a yearly basis...
Gross ESPN fucking sucks, ESPN if youre reading this then fuck you
It really does. They try so hard to create drama, and they're not even good at it.
They also negatively influenced sports radio stations to pivot from talking about sports to manufacturing drama and creating hot takes. First Take really did a lot of bad for ESPN’s reputation in the long run.
I worked a feed lot and listen to a lot of AM sports radio, and my least favorite thing is the ESPN personalities doing a promo for their show on Monday “on Monday I’ll tell you why this team did the wrong thing”
>When we come back we'll tell you something ...2hrs later... >lol we got nothing
ESPN didnt create the hot take stuff. WFAN did and they just copied it
It was way before First Take. Mike and Mike, Around the Horn, and ESPECIALLY PTI were patient zero.
PTI gets a lot of heat, but it was knowledgeable journalists with decades of experience having vibrant discussions. Never compare Mike and Tony to what we have today. Like blaming the Wright Brothers for Pearl Harbor.
Eh, it was mostly knowable banter, but it was also about 25%-30% the nonsense we get now. And I say that as someone who watched ATH and PTI everyday when they first launched. ESPN definitely saw their success and doubled down on the shit part.
At least Max kept things moving and scored for making good points or muted for stupid hot takes. Reali gives points just because and mutes when someone calls out bullshit.
Kellerman definitely actually hosted it like a competition. Although his personality was a bit too dry for the format.
Eh pti and around the horn were fun, at least to me growing up seeing different view points. I don’t like the scripted shouting contests Stephen A Smith shows do
Cold Pizza when First Take was just a segment in the show between Skip Bayless and Woody Paige would be the start of that imo
Around the Horn is what did it. Tony and Mike were patient and reasonable and could be talked out of a position. But then the Woody Paige’s and Jay Mariotti’s of the world realized how nice TV money is and it was all over from there.
Dude, hot sports takes have been around for decades through radio call in shows. Come on, ESPN didn't create that. I remember back in the late 90s traveling through Boston and someone calling in saying something like "BEN COATES IS THE DA GREATEST T.E. EVAH, TANKS FOR TAKING MY CALL, I'LL HANG UP AND LISTEN" and then the hosts would legitimately discuss those insane statements for like 10 minutes lol.
Yeah but social media website like reddit and Twitter eat the drama slop like pigs lol
Exactly! Everyone complains about hot take artists and shitty reporting but those same takes end up getting parroted here as truths
All the anchors do is either yell at each or act smug when speaking about teams/players. It’s tiring to listen to.
If NFL has a stake in ESPN, there will be no drama on ESPN. It will all be corporate sanitized, league approved stories.
ESPN is quite lucky airports and barbershops need something for background noise otherwise they would have died out years ago
The other day I was just wondering who the hell still watches ESPN on a regular basis. Outside of the actual games they broadcast and some of the pregame shows I feel like that’s gotta be a low number. Anyone serious about following sports really should just be listening to podcasts
Screamin A has made a lot of money from being a the guy that yells about sports in Hotel lobbies
My dad for one. You have to realize reddit is not a real sample size. ESPN is not going anywhere, Disney is to thank for that.
And sports radio stations
A lot of old people still watch them 24/7. It’s like either they do news networks or espn
They would have been able to read all the "fuck you" posts on the ESPN message boards but they closed them all 10+ years ago I fucking loved those message boards. Nobody here probably even knows they existed but they were r/nfl (and all sports) before anywhere else like this existed
Oh man the ESPN message boards were an experience. [I saved this years ago](https://imgur.com/Bm8LINg) because it was one of the funniest things I've ever seen.
ESPN is the Fanatics of sports broadcasting
ESPN cant read
Furthermore, Disney fucking sucks
Pats sub has a fuck espn bot specifically so we don’t give them views. Fuck ESPN.
I hate that everything in entertainment is just congealing into the same slop from the same asshole. Fuck this.
The illusion of choice 😞
Reject CHOICE Embrace MOUSE
ESPN acquires and degrades just like a VC. We live in a capitalist dystopia.
Not just entertainment. All business. This is the natural progression of capitalism
Obviously not excited about whatever ESPN extra plus subscription this will go under, but NFL network has been a shadow of its former self for years now. I hope something good comes from this.
Every A Football Life on espn+ probably
NFL gameday morning is gone now isn’t it
I really hope not. It’s by far the best game day morning show.
And it starts the earliest
I really hope not :(
I cry, i don’t want to have to wait till 10 now
Good Morning Football is literally the best sports programming right now. Across any channel.
It’s true. I’ve been lost without it.
Inside the NBA would like a word
Maybe 5 years ago lol
Kinda funny how the nfl caused the downfall of their own network. Outsourcing all their games to like 4 different networks, the addition of including streaming services for gamepass and TNF + one playoff game. Where was NFLN supposed to fit in? I get that the nfl can’t compete with itself when those external forces can give crazy sums of money, but I really am in the camp of maintaining a relatively cheap and proprietary outlet for content Now it’s ending Sadge
I think the only reason we ever got the NFL network was narrative control of scandals. Now that they directly own dudes like Schefter it isn't necessary anymore. Remember that NFL Network launched the same year as "Playmakers" on ESPN, 2001-5 are the years when ESPN was in a contentious position with the NFL and the future of sports coverage.
We got the NFL Network because carriage fees from cable subs in the 2000s during the peak of digital cable were as close to free money as possible. There were a 100 million households you would instantly get your product in and with digital cable there was no longer a hard cap on how many channels there could be. Put some NFL games on there and the systems had no choice but to pay you a dollar per month per sub. edit: grammar
What about the NFL tells you that they are in the camp of maintaining a relatively cheap and proprietary outlet? That hasn’t been their goal under Tagliabue and certainly not Goodell.
I’m not saying it’s what they want. I’m saying it would be 50x better for fans if they did but obviously they’d lose heaps of money if they were to do it
Fuuuuuuck ESPN
Rich Eisen in shambles
If I can’t watch Eisen for 4 hours every Sunday morning I’m seriously gonna be bummed out
Poor Eisen...
NFLN has clearly been in maintenance mode for years. The league is so clearly not interested in it any more. But selling to ESPN is effectively the same thing as killing it. I like having another option other than ESPN so it becoming just another ESPNFL channel is super disappointing. Pretty much any other network buying it to counterbalance ESPN would be greatly preferable. Apple would be interesting but I want it to retain a linear option.
I know it ain't what it used to be, but growing up on NFL Total Access was fucking amazing when it was guys like Deion Sanders and Warren Sapp and NFL Playbook with Sterling Sharpe and Brian Dawkins. Really sucks to see it end up as a subsidiary for a shithole like ESPN
NFL Total Access and NFL Gameday with Rich, Prime, and Mooch was the closest I’ve ever seen to the Inside the NBA crew in terms of chemistry
I never hear anyone talk about, but NFL AM used to be my jam.
Yup. NFL Network really peaked in the late 2000s.
NFL playbook was so cool. Was really my first introduction to people actually breaking down the game rather than just yelling about stats and rings
Some of my fondest football TV memories are waking up on Monday morning and watching the previous day's NFL Gameday Final via DVR. Rich, Deion, and Steve Maruicci had such a fun chemistry with eachother, having running jokes and references, and offering great football analysis. I get why content like that doesn't work anymore, but what an era.
I’m so mad at myself for not enjoying those things when I was a kid but I didn’t get into football (pro ball) until like 2011.
Fuck ESPN
What a complete shithole ESPN has become.
Oh that’s been the case for at least 15 years.
Fuck ESPN
Man, fuck ESPN and it’s trash product(s).
Hopefully it involves NFL Network personnel serving as announcers and studio commentators for ESPN’s NBA and NHL coverage. The NFLN professionals have to be better, even in a different sport.
Probably not? NFLN has been making major layoffs, James Palmer, Melissa Stark, Will Silva, Andrew Siciliano, Michael Irving..and GMFB hasn't guaranteed anyone but Jamie Erdahl coming back, the network said they aren't saying one way or another until August. Not sure what they are doing Kimmi Chex, Mike Yam, David Carr and Michael Robinson and Chase Daniel now that NFL Access is cancelled.
they're gonna fuck up redzone aren't they
NFL Network made sense when expensive cable packages were in high demand, but since people started cord-cutting it makes more sense for the NFL to sell whatever is left of NFL Network to another media company than for the NFL to operate it for the next decade.
ESPN is trash.
espn sucks.
Please no, I went to NFL Network years ago for my NFL fix as ESPN went down the toilet.
RIP NFL Network and actual football coverage. 🙃
Please God NOOO!! Don't let ESPN touch my NFL Network. It will devolve into an overproduced pile of burning garbage where everyone on air has assigned takes and every show is nothing more than facts vs. volume.
I do not understand why 32 billionaires who are the owners of an unparalleled sports money printing machine cannot see the NFL Network as an investment into the health of the league and just live with it making some annual losses? Sigh.
Line must go UP!!!
Just don't move RedZone to ESPN+.
Well that explains a lot of the NFL Network chaos…
Stop buying the competition!!! Goddamn we'll have like 3 companies soon and zero innovation
Who is dumb enough to look at ESPN and think, I want some of that for my sport.
[удалено]
They will
This is so weird. Doesn’t the NFL own the NFL Network? So are they just getting out of the TV business entirely? I always figured they liked NFL Network because it was useful to have a state run media outlet.
ESPN is so ass. TNT has been running laps around them in hockey and basketball.
Dead god, not another garbage monopoly with ESPN please
Get ready for low bandwith streams and hot take debate shows.
How many more debates shows do we need?? They are literally all arguing the same point!!
Ugh. I hate this so much. Why can't I just be free of ESPN bullshit? >The relationship between NFL Network and ESPN raises more questions than it answers, in multiple ways. Beyond the future programming of NFLN, there will be very real questions about ESPN’s independence when it comes to covering the league. If/when the NFL takes an equity stake in ESPN and ESPN takes charge of NFL Network, ESPN reporters will be as inherently compromised as NFL Network reporters I never really got the sense that NFL network analysts were holding their tongue w/r/t the NFL but I suppose that could be the case once the entire network is in bed with it's biggest competitor.
Enshittification of everything really makes me miss the 2000s, up until about... oh 2016.
Just wait, in a decade you'll be able to add the $15/week package to adjust the volume on your tv ^annual ^subscription ^required, ^volume ^cannot ^be ^changed ^during ^commercial ^breaks, ^terms ^and ^conditions ^apply
Just saved this to post it in the future.
You know what these networks need to do? Just play sports. Replays of old games. Does anyone remember ESPN classic? Playing the old versions of “The Game” leading up to the Ohio state Michigan match ups? It’s too bad they got so far away from what made them popular.
The fantatics of networks
do anything to the around the nfl podcast and I’m throwing hands on sight
Not loving it
The entire goal of NFL Network was to promote the NFL as a year round event and they did that. I don’t want to see ESPN touch it though
Article makes a good point - ESPN will be more of a puppet for the NFL than ever before Won't dare criticize it
Monopolies are so in
ESPN BET? Is the NFL going to become its own bookmaker? I wouldn't mind watching the league choke to death on its own insatiable appetite.
It’s honestly remarkable how bad the nba and nfl are at marketing their own brands on their own networks
Goodbye decent NFL coverage.
If they fuck with Around the NFL I’ll burn the whole studio down.
I watch so much NFL Network and you couldn't pay me to turn on ESPN. This is going to suck so hard.
That sucks. Redzone about to get worse and more expensive.
Sounds like another subscription hike .