Good morning. Quick report on the IAAF World Championships in Osaka, Japan. The US won two more golds with Jeremy Wariner leading an American sweep of the men’s 400 Meters and Allyson Felix easily beat 100 Meter gold medalist Veronica Campbell of Jamaica and the rest of the field in the women’s 200 Meters. Great to watch track & field just as I arrive at work. I’ll miss this next week.
Ok, time to give you links for today. This will be a mega-update so let’s get to them without further delay.
First, David Scott of Boston Sports Media Watch went to ESPN Thursday and recaps his visit. He also has progress reports from yesterday, part one is here, this is part two, you’ve got part three here, and this is the last one.
Susan Bickelhaupt of the Boston Globe talks with NBC Sports producer Tommy Roy who is part of the team bringing the Deutsche Bank Championship in Norton, MA to the airwaves this weekend.
Michael Hiestand of USA Today discusses ESPN’s college football weekend.
Richard Sandomir of the New York Times has a story on one of the best sports analysts on TV, John McEnroe, who is parlaying his angry teenage persona into some acting gigs.
In the New York Post, Phil Mushnick is usual grumpy self, going after ESPN for announcing that 50 Cent will be doing the open for college football on ABC. And NYP’s Justin Terranova has five questions for SNY’s Mets analyst Ron Darling.
The Bucks County Courier Times’ Laura Nachman writes about the on-going Comcast/NFL Network feud.
Doug Nye of The State in South Carolina writes about a new documentary on the South Carolina-Clemson rivalry. And Nye’s TV best bet for the weekend is Florida State-Clemson, another version of the “Bowden Bowl”, this Monday night.
Kyle Hightower of the Orlando Sentinel is warning University of Central Florida fans not to flock to their computers to see Saturday’s game at NC State on ESPN360 because their internet providers don’t have an agreement with the service. Also in the Sentinel, Dave Darling gives 10 reasons why the Bowl Championship Series works.
The Miami Herald’s Barry Jackson talks to former Miami coach Larry Coker who will call his old team’s season opener tomorrow on ESPNU.
David Barron of the Houston Chronicle talks about more high school football games being televised.
Teddy Greenstein of the Chicago Tribune looks at two books devoted to college football.
Bob Wolfey in today’s Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel says the Big Ten Network is hoping that cable subscribers will defect to DirecTV.
The Minneapolis Star-Tribune’s Judd Zulgad writes that Minneapolis Fox station, KMSP is hoping the Vikings’ home opener next Sunday is sold out.
In the San Diego Union-Tribune, Jay Posner writes about arch-enemies Ted Leitner and Lee Hamilton working together on San Diego State University football games. And Posner says there could be a new sports radio station in San Diego …. or perhaps not.
The North County Times’ John Maffei also writes about the odd couple of Leitner and Hamilton joining forces.
Larry Stewart in the LA Times talks about the opening weekend of college football on TV.
In the Ventura County Star, Jim Carlisle writes about former Dodger announcer Ross Porter returning to radio to give commentaries.
From the Sports Media Watch blog, Paulsen notes that for the 9th straight week, ratings for MLB on Fox are down.
CNBC’s Darren Rovell is off the Ana Ivanovic beat for now and is back on the David Beckham beat. Darren correctly points out that with Beckham out, with all this hype, the attendance numbers for his appearances have been overblown.
The Orbitcast satellite radio blog reports that NBC’s John Madden will return to Sirius NFL Radio for the 4th straight year as a weekly guest.
Sports Illustrated’s Richard Deitsch talks with CBS’ Boomer Esiason in advance of his new radio show which premieres on WFAN next Tuesday.
Up to Canada we go and the Toronto Star’s Chris Zelkovich says the Super Series between Canada and Russia is getting higher ratings than expected.
And the Toronto Globe and Mail’s William Houston reports that the Canadian Olympic Committee is looking into launching a cable channel devoted to amateur sports.
