Don't just get your Score Atlanta Around the Dial fix here...go out to your metro area Kroger, Blockbuster or QuikTrip and grab a copy of Score Atlanta tomorrow. And PS, I've also started writing the Gwinnett County Beat in Score Prep. You'll have to get the paper to read that one. Enjoy!
FOX has done so much for sports since really deciding to get involved but two of their A-Team analysts have really fallen down on the job over the last few seasons. The network that gave us the glowing puck in hockey and changed how NASCAR was broadcast really needs to take a hard look at football analyst Troy Aikman and baseball analyst Tim McCarver. Aikman has recently stopped evolving as a color analyst. When he first joined FOX, Aikman was clearly rough around the edges, but FOX brought Aikman along slowly and he eventually earned his spot in the No.1 booth with Joe Buck after John Madden left for Monday Night Football. Over the past season and one half though, it seems Aikman’s maturation arc has stopped. He just isn’t offering the spot-on insight and for whatever reason it seems his knowledge of the game has slipped. Meanwhile on ESPN’s Monday Night Football coverage, Jon Gruden continues to impress with a combination of humor and knowledge that FOX produces probably hoped Aikman could bring the NFC broadcasts the network produces. Gruden has a Super Bowl ring and his phone will likely ring this off-season with job offers from Washington, Dallas or Houston. However, if Gruden decides to stay in the booth, ESPN might have found a diamond that the network can build its Monday Night Football broadcasts around for years.
As much as Aikman has stopped trying to grow, McCarver has stopped trying, period. McCarver belabored a point in last Monday’s ALCS game three into the ground and as the karma gods would have it, it came back to bite him. McCarver would not shut up about how he would have sent in a pinch-runner for Angels catcher Jeff Mathis after Mathis led off the tenth inning with a double. Even after Mathis beat out a throw to third on a sacrifice bunt, McCarver was still second-guessing Angels manager Mike Scioscia’s decision to leave Mathis in the game. Mathis was thrown out at home on a play that even Lou Brock would have been toast at home. As fate would have it, one inning later, Mathis would hit the game-winning double and Joe Buck would mention McCarver’s plea to replace Mathis and interestingly enough, McCarver failed to address that he was wrong. Last time I checked Mike Scioscia has a World Series ring as a manager and I can’t seem to find when McCarver managed a team to a title. I’ll keep looking though. Bottom line, McCarver acts as though he is the baseball expert and he believes he must explain EVERYTHING to the viewer because the viewer is not as smart as McCarver is. Um, Tim, we KNOW WHAT A FASTBALL IS. And my aunt Sandra isn’t watching baseball; I am. The casual sports fan doesn’t watch baseball. It seems only the hardcore fans do these days. We have a firm grasp on what is happening. Please treat us like we understand the game. We do.
Finally, if you’ve picked up your copy of ESPN The Magazine in a doctor’s office or at the local Jiffy Lube (since I’m not sure people actually get that in the mail anymore) you’ve likely seen a nude Serena Williams on the cover. ESPN has released its first ever “Body Issue,” with nearly nude pictures of multiple athletes, celebrating their bodies. Serena is on the cover and appears inside the magazine with some clothing on. Nelson Cruz and Zdeno Chara are shown from the waist up but do not appear to be wearing any clothing. The magazine also shows the first ever female Ironman participant with a prosthetic leg in the buff. As a guy, I don’t have a problem with what they are going for here. Serena is a powerful and beautiful woman. ESPN is going for a readership grab that Sports Illustrated mastered oh-so-many years ago with the Swimsuit issue. The only thing I hope for is that ESPN The Magazine doesn’t do what Sports Illustrated does by printing the letters it receives where readers, “cannot believe!” that ESPN would publish those photos. I always roll my eyes and wonder why SI prints those. And I also have to wonder, why people are still writing those letters. We get it; you don’t agree with the swimsuit issue. Ignore it. It will be interesting to see if ESPN The Magazine makes The Body Issue an annual thing.
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