Went out last night for my friend’s 40th birthday party and let me say it was a rather raucous caucus. Singing, dancing, drinking, yelling, screaming and fighting, a good time was had by all. Well, maybe no fighting, but the other parts did occur.
Anyway, late start on the links today. Let’s get to them.
Later today, I’ll do a review on the first three days of the World Cup coverage on both ESPN and Univision. Expect that sometime tonight.
To the links and we start with Mike Reynolds of Multichannel News who writes that Univision had an excellent start to the World Cup more than doubling the ratings of ESPN on the opening day of the event.
Mike adds that NBC’s excellent ratings for the clinching game of the Stanley Cup Final paves the way for the rights renewal talks with the NHL.
Rachel Cohen of the Associated Press writes the NHL’s rise in the ratings comes at a good time for the league’s TV negotiations.
TVbytheNumbers says more people watched the World Cup kickoff concert on Univision than on ESPN2.
David Bauder of the Associated Press says ESPN did not attempt to dumb down its World Cup telecasts.
Yinka Adegoke of Reuters says both ESPN and Fox Soccer Channel hope to reap the ratings benefits after the World Cup.
The Nielsen Wire blog notes that Nike is not an official World Cup sponsor, but has managed to get some recognition thanks to some guerrilla marketing.
Overseas in the UK, ITV was airing the USA-England World Cup match yesterday and inexplicably, the HD feed suddenly went to commercial in the 4th minute. That was when Steven Garrard scored his goal putting England ahead. When ITV came back, it was just in time for Garrard’s celebration. You can imagine the ire of the viewers. Those watching the Standard Definition feed did not have any problems.
Matt Lawless of the London Daily Mail chronicles what happened.
The Sun says ITV really screwed up.
Anita Singh from the London Telegraph writes that about a million and a half viewers were affected by the glitch.
James Meikle of the London Guardian says an on-air apology was met with anger.
UK World Cup co-rightsholder BBC is a public broadcaster and does not run commercials so had the game aired on that network, there would not have been any commercial glitch.
Bob Raissman of the New York Daily News says a holdout by Jets cornerback Darnell Revis is being played to the maximum for HBO/NFL Films which is airing Hard Knocks from the team’s training camp in August.
Friend of Fang’s Bites Steve Lepore at Puck The Media is writing the media column at SBNation’s New York site and he tells us five things YES Network does better than its counterpart, SNY.
Keith Gabriel in the Philadelphia Daily News writes that ESPN’s World Cup coverage is heavily slanted with a British accent.
Jeff Schuler of the Allentown (PA) Morning Call says MLB is trying its hand at a televised draft.
Jim Williams of the Washington Examiner talks with ESPN World Cup host Bob Ley about the network’s efforts to bring the event’s flavor to the United States.
Bob Wolfley at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel tries to temper the excitement into Stephen Strasburg.
KCTV in Kansas City is reporting that the Big 12 is proposing a new Big 12/Pac 10 TV network in an attempt to keep the Pac 10 from poaching the remaining 10 members of the Big 12.
John Henderson of the Denver Post says the conference shifts in the Pac 10 and Big 10 are all being done for television.
Chad Cripe from the Idaho Statesman writes that the Mountain West is hoping to increase its rights fees by bringing in Boise State into the conference.
Artie Gigantino of the San Francisco Examiner enjoys ESPN/ABC’s NBA broadcasting crew.
Joe Flint of the Los Angeles Times says NBC affiliates are worried they will lose big tickets sports events if the Comcast purchase of the network goes through.
Tom Hoffarth of the Los Angeles Daily News says Abby Sunderland and her family are rays of shining light.
Tom scolds the second guessers in the Abby Sunderland story.
Katie Baker at Deadspin looks into the media maelstrom that Abby Sunderland’s rescue has become.
The Sports Media Watch has its weekend ratings predictions.
SMW notes that ABC got big numbers for USA-England yesterday.
We’re done for today.
