OT-ESPN

[Alsacs]

Wow has this network just become unwatchable beyond live games.
Beyond sports I can't watch 5 minutes of ESPN programming. I am the demo they used to live on 25-54.

Does anybody watch or enjoy ESPN programming anymore? What happened to the network?

 

[Cusefan0307]

Wow has this network just become unwatchable beyond live games.
Beyond sports I can't watch 5 minutes of ESPN programming. I am the demo they used to live on 25-54.

Does anybody watch or enjoy ESPN programming anymore? What happened to the network?

I listen to some podcasts(PTI/Russillo and Kanell/Lebatard occasionally), but sportscenter doesn't do it for me and I can't stand Mike Greenberg. I definately don't watch as much as I did say 3 years ago and not as much as I did 10 years ago. Some of that is other priorities in life and a lot of it is because their content blows.

 

[ssbriefcase]

Wow has this network just become unwatchable beyond live games.
Beyond sports I can't watch 5 minutes of ESPN programming. I am the demo they used to live on 25-54.

Does anybody watch or enjoy ESPN programming anymore? What happened to the network?

My friends and I had a few long discussions about this when Elin beat down Tiger Woods. It became the sports drama network then. 24 hr cycle of the same story for weeks. If you wanted scores I guess you had to go to ESPNews. All they are is TMZ sports, except worse. Their personalities aren't 50% of what made them back in the day.

 

[Guinness]

I turned into SC one night after the MNF game and it was watchable. It was VanPelt and some other dude from his old radio show talking like two dudes at the bar. I don't know why anyone would think we want to watch two dudes gab instead of replays and analysis.

 

[orangefog]

I agree, Sportcenter was the standard, now it is a joke. For some reason they are trying to make the sportscasters celebrities. I don't give a crap about them, I want scores and highlights. I don't want their opinions or their little quips. They are not funny and their high opinion of themselves dwarfs that of the athletes they are covering.

 

[Melancer46]

I listen to their podcasts (Russilo & Kanell, NFL Draft related podcasts, Bill Barnwell, occasionally Mike & Mike, etc.) I really love Scott Van Pelt but I'm always asleep by the time he's on. I used to watch First Take when Skip was on every once in awhile. I know he's garbage in terms of an analyst, but it was fun background noise to listen to him and Stephen A argue. I just don't listen to that stuff as much now that I've started my new job though.

And Sportscenter is simply unnecessary at this point since it's so much easier to see highlights online/on your phone. I know some here are still looking for Sportscenter to be a highlights driven show, but I'm fairly certain that their research has shown that most consumers no longer care to watch highlights on Sportscenter. That's why they've tried to morph it into something else.

 

[donniesyracuse]

I only listen to Dan Le Batard.

 

[MSOrange]

I've started watching My Two Dads reruns instead of Sportscenter when I eat breakfast. Enough said.

 

[NineOneSeven]

I watch it quite often, but just out of habit. Plenty of better ways to watch actual highlights. I do like PTI still, though.

 

[Bayside44]

Sportscenter changed when the focus went from informing the fans the things in a game that caused the outcome to showing flashy things that happened in a game.

The talk stuff is completely uninteresting to me. The documentaries are cool and the college sports coverage I think is really good.

 

[skurey]

Used to have ESPN on all day. Now I only watch live sports.

 

[br801]

I've started watching My Two Dads reruns instead of Sportscenter when I eat breakfast. Enough said.

That's one of the great lines in board history.

 

[longislandcuse]

I used to watch ESPN all the time. Don't watch it at all anymore. I actually don't mind the debate format of First Take (lost a lot of it's luster losing Skip Bayless) but everything else is a joke, aside from anything involving Dan Le Betard.

 

[djcon57]

It's interesting people keep suggesting Sportcenter is losing ratings because you can get highlights online (youtube, twitter, etc) yet I personally am dying for the old sportscenter format with some funny hosts. I think we're in the minority, I guess.

The First Take format of saying the wackiest thing is so boring and uninteresting to me.

 

[Briancuse]

I said this in the football board, but I will say it again, Is Espn trying to ruin the National Title game, why do they need to put the game on 56 different channels?

 

[victor]

I love the 30 for 30 documentaries. My favorite ones include the Jimmy Valvano run to the national championship, Requiem for the Big East, and the story of the escape from Cuba of the Hernandez brothers (Livian and El Duque). That one had me in tears because of what El Duque went through to get here and how hard people worked including the Catholic Church to get his family here as well. In addition to being a money pitcher, El Duque is a class act.

 

[MSOrange]

I said this in the football board, but I will say it again, Is Espn trying to ruin the National Title game, why do they need to put the game on 56 different channels?

I'm not a huge fan of what ESPN has become, but how is this ruining anything? Just more options for people to pick the format they will enjoy most. You can only watch one at a time, so you won't even know it's on so many channels, unless you flip around.

 

[OburgOrange]

I only watch College Gameday and any game I'm interested in. That's it. The rest is garbage

 

[Briancuse]

I'm not a huge fan of what ESPN has become, but how is this ruining anything? Just more options for people to pick the format they will enjoy most. You can only watch one at a time, so you won't even know it's on so many channels, unless you flip around.

You are hurting your broadcast, Fowler and Herbstreit are your number one team, and you are taking away from that.

 

[Briancuse]

I love the 30 for 30 documentaries. My favorite ones include the Jimmy Valvano run to the national championship, Requiem for the Big East, and the story of the escape from Cuba of the Hernandez brothers (Livian and El Duque). That one had me in tears because of what El Duque went through to get here and how hard people worked including the Catholic Church to get his family here as well. In addition to being a money pitcher, El Duque is a class act.

Those are the only good things to watch on espn.

 

[Alsacs]

You are hurting your broadcast, Fowler and Herbstreit are your number one team, and you are taking away from that.

I would agree with you if Bill Walton wasn't an option. Making Bill part of one of the broadcasts makes that one must watch.

 

[shandeezy7]

Sportscenter changed when the focus went from informing the fans the things in a game that caused the outcome to showing flashy things that happened in a game.

The talk stuff is completely uninteresting to me. The documentaries are cool and the college sports coverage I think is really good.

I don't have as much of a problem with the highlights showing the flashy stuff from games as I do when they only show highlights of one player or one team. There are other people in the game and there are other things that happened in the game. Show me that. The worst is when they spend a whole "highlight" showing "lowlight" clips from a game. Like, here's the Cavs missing 15 straight 3 point shots and they lose by 20, but we aren't going to show a single thing that the other team did. Dumb.

 

[OrangeDW]

Live sports is about it. Sportscenter is useless, and I hate all the shows where they just yell at each other and argue opinions that they probably don't even personally believe much of the time. Those shows are the worst.

I do like the 30 for 30 stuff, so I will watch that. I do like Jalen and Jacoby too, but liked it much better back before they were on ESPN, when they did a few podcasts a month. I listened to every podcast. Putting out more, shorter shows on ESPN has made me less interested and I only listen occasionally now.

 

[Cowtown]

Just watched the 30 for 30 on Gooden & Strawberry. It's almost always compelling programming, and this was no less. Maybe the greatest parallel waste of talent I can think of. Strawberry seems fairly solid today (it's a 2016 film), but Gooden still appeared really close to the edge.

 

[Briancuse]

Just watched the 30 for 30 on Gooden & Strawberry. It's almost always compelling programming, and this was no less. Maybe the greatest parallel waste of talent I can think of. Strawberry seems fairly solid today (it's a 2016 film), but Gooden still appeared really close to the edge.

Gooden is a mess, he needs serious help.