1 - There will be a column up following the NEXTEL Cup race comparing the two broadcast teams this weekend. The Busch Series on ESPN2 and the NEXTEL Cup Series on ABC.
Brad Daugherty stepped into the booth for Rusty Wallace on the Busch Series race, and changed the dynamic of the telecast on ESPN2. We will see what changes ABC might have in-store for viewers as the pre-race and race telecast progresses.
2 - Beginning next week, there will be a live post during RaceDay on SPEED. This show has big plans coming up, and I would like your reactions to the broadcast as it is in-progress. Let me just tip you off that the RaceDay show at Homestead...is four hours long. Shhh...don't tell anyone.
3 - Also beginning next week, there will be live comments available to post during the practice and qualifying day. This will continue for the rest of the season. Many readers have emailed comments about these early sessions, and now they will have somewhere to post them each week.
4 - Finally, there will be a live post for in-progress comments about Inside NEXTEL Cup on SPEED. One hour before the show, The Daly Planet will open for comments and they can then be posted during and after the show. This program is under the microscope for a lot of reasons, and waiting until we posted a column is not fair. This will allow comments as the show airs, and immediately after.
5 - The John Force article on the NHRA accident is on hold because I am unable to find a copy of the total broadcast. Unless I can see the parts of the show other than the accident, its not going to be fair to get everyone stirred up. My feelings about the coverage of the incident itself remain the same, but without the earlier parts of the program I will not comment.
I can tell you that this incident, and the resulting comments I received, have 99% convinced me to branch out into the NHRA telecasts for next season. Somewhat ironic that Paul Page used to work for me at one time. Anyone remember This Week In CART? I didn't think so.
6 - UPDATE: Wow! What a great job by Bill Lester on the one hour edition of NASCAR Now. Hopefully, we will also see him on the late night review show. If he is still there for the Monday wrap-up program, it would really be great. Congrats, Bill!
Thanks again for letting me update things. Have a great race today and I look forward to your comments for the rest of the season. When racing is over, The Daly Planet has several special things planned to keep you busy during the break. Look for an announcement of those plans in a couple of weeks. Thanks everybody!
22 comments:
Concerning your NHRA article...
Did you tape it to see just the accident or to comment on the TV coverage?? It was taped, knowing this do you think they would have shown what they did with it had they not known the outcome of a broken ankle and deep abrasions was the outcome? At the start of the broadcast Paul Page updated Force's condition, showed the accident and told viewers that they were going to watch events taped earlier in the day. Your comments on the coverage seem to be really harsh, since I believe they had the chance to edit, if things had been worse. When the accident was shown later in the broadcast the network had already shown the accident and updated the condition of Force. I think this shows the "dignity and respect" that you said was in short supply.
My thoughts.
Why was there no column on the Fantastic NASCAR Now from Thursday night?
I hate to think that John is only covering the bad things on tv and not giving light to the good stuff that ESPN is doing.
THey did many of the things we've been asking for ALL year on that show: Covered the truck series, had a nice interview with Steve Park, interviewed a rookie truck driver.
Truly if we don't support them when they do well, how can we expect tehm to continue getting better?
Mr Anonymous,
I joined the coverage after phone calls and emails about the accident. I did not see the coverage from the top. Thank you for the recap, which I received after the original article.
Your email is exactly my point. Anyone who missed the open was treated to what I think was a tasteless display including cameras in the faces of Ms. Force, his daugher, and his son-in law.
Its easy in retrospect to stop-by and slam me, but my point is clear. If a fan of any age did not see the opening of the show, they were put in a position of believing Force might be dead from the crash.
Page said nothing, Dunn was lost for words. ESPN had no plan. Remember the old days of the NHRA on TNN? Steve Evans and Dave Mac? They would know how to handle this. You could hear the PA announcer talking in the background. Unless Page was also prepared to calmly offer words, they should have gone to break.
Hindsight is 20/20, and everone has a different opinion. Page knows nothing about the NHRA in the same way Kuselias knows nothing about NASCAR. This is the issue. Marty Reid's absence was really felt by all.
Thanks for your comment.
Catherine,
Please take a minute and go back into our archives. I have been the biggest fan of Ryan Burr since the network added him to the mix.
His two days of shows every week are the best to be seen. He has a style and pace that fits this show, and a way with interviews that I believe is fantastic.
His shows last week were exactly the same as he has been all year...awesome. ESPN will not promote him, they will not move him into the primary slot, and they have routinely treated him poorly.
I totally agree with your opinion of Mr. Burr, and hope to see him next year in a fulltime role on this show. The difference between Mr. Burr and the "other host" is the reason we have been referring to this show as "bi-polar" for the last six months.
Thanks again.
Ok, that tattoo freak is on Raceday so I am watching ESPN for 4 minutes...had some cool jazz music to open the show. :-)
John you DO have me intrigued about CHANGES to RACEDAY!?! Yikes
I did not see the film clip of NHRA showing family members reactions..just the wreck itself so cannot comment. Looked damned scary and glad Force is recovering well.
4 hours of Raceday??
ALso, are they practicing for HD or something? Some filmed elements are having that STRETCHED BIG LOOK across my tv screen (old fashioned 4:3 ratio) It's driving me crazy as it is intermittent.
Four HOURS of Race Day...and THEN the race?? goodness
SophiaZ123 said...
4 hours of Raceday??
ALso, are they practicing for HD or something? Some filmed elements are having that STRETCHED BIG LOOK across my tv screen (old fashioned 4:3 ratio) It's driving me crazy as it is intermittent.
Four HOURS of Race Day...and THEN the race?? goodness
September 30, 2007 1:18 PM
According to Direct TV, SPEED will be in HD by the end of the year.
Morons @ABC.... Take a freakin' commercial break while the leaders are darn near 3 wide..... then show us what we missed coming out of commercial..... morons!
Regarding a 4-hour Raceday show, I heard Direct TV is going to do a special Hot Pass edition where each of their 5 channels follows a Raceday personality. Wendy, John, Jimmy, Kenny and Riki.
Mr. Daly,
Thank you for the updates. I have a question regarding the end of season plans for the networks. Which network is going to air the Cup Championship Banquet? It's been on TNT for the last few years, with a red carpet show before the banquet on SPEED.
If that has changed with the new contract, or if the banquet is no longer airing on TV in December or is airing on ESPN, please let us know in a future column.
RaceDay has done an extended longer version of the show in Homestead for the last 4 years I have watched it. 4 hours is nothing new to me.
Kevin in SoCal
zowee! 4 hours, really Kevin? I would watch it if most of it was the day or night before the race. But my eyes and brain get tired watching 8 hrs of tv nonstop.
Sheesh.
:-)
Even today I watered flowers and made dinner during the two red flags so those breaks came in HANDY.
Ok...I have been listening to ABC today....how many times did Rusty say aero loose? I said if I heard it twice, i was going to get out the boombox ..I don't remember it once but do remember the dreaded over used DAFF TACKY TRACKER but felt lazy today and did not do so, drag out radio...bright sunny days make the station SOMEWHAT hard to tune in but I would've done it had Rusty been annoying. Now I wished I would've done it to hear the final line up before this second red flag.
Can you freakin' believe this? ABC is signing off from their broadcast so they can go to local news and putting the race on ESPN2. What about those fans who don't have cable, or who's cable doesn't have ESPN2? This just proves to everyone that Nascar isn't important to ABC/ESPN.
WAKE UP NASCAR----YOU'RE A SECOND CLASS CITIZEN TO ABC
RaceDay has done an extended longer version of the show in Homestead for the last 4 years I have watched it. 4 hours is nothing new to me.
Kevin in SoCal
Ditto. I didn't watch much of it, but I know they did a four hour raceday last year. I want to say the entire day was NASCAR programming of some sort. Dave Despain did a roundtable on the state of the sport early in the morning, which was the one show that day I watched all the way through.
@John--I woke up a bit after 9 and saw that NN hadn't started yet due to soccer still on so I fixed the DVR to run over and fell back asleep. But I did wake up off and on and did catch Bill, what I saw was very nice :)
On NASCAR NOW Monday, or maybe Tuesday, night AFTER John Force's wreck (and surgery) Erik Klueless reported toward the end of the show that Force had broken 2 legs - contrary to much earlier AP & NHRA reports of his condition.
PLEASE make your NHRA coverage a seperate blog so you don't dilute this one's content. Many of us couldn't care less about NHRA.
Based on what Fox's Artie Kempner has said about directing motorsports, if an ESPN production staff member saw Force talking either to the team radio or to the Safety Safari, family shots are probably legal.
Kempner admits doing racing is harder than an NFL game because he is in the garage area with the drivers and teams, and even participating in their race week charity events, and the same cast of characters is around them all 16 (now 13) weeks. One of his worst nightmares is a nasty crash such as Elliott Sadler's at Talladega. He was working an NFL game when his voice mail reported the crash, and he called Hermie and Robert Yates Racing staff to figure out what happened.
ESPNNews had reported the Force crash earlier in the day and said he was awake and alert.
As for today:
It is courtesy for important live Asian sporting events to be reaired on tape delay that afternoon or evening because of the 11-14 hour time differences in Asia.
ESPN2 was committed to reairing the Women's World Cup Consolation Game because of its start time, which was way too early for many at 5 AM ET.
The same thing happened with Speed reairing Saturday night's Fuji Television Grand Prix at Gotembe, Japan (started shortly after midnight GMT-5) and will be the same with next week's Sinopec Grand Prix, which has a 2 AM (GMT-5) start.
The Women's World Cup Consolation and Finals and the Sinopec Grand Prix are both in Shanghai, China (GMT+8).
In the past, when NBC or Fox had a race fall into prime-time hours, they pushed aside the prime-time programming to at least finish the race (or in 2006, NBC waited until 7:30 PM because of an NFL request that the pre-game show must start no later than 7:30 PM).
But the ESPN Broadcast Network jumped early after the rain delay, pushing the race to ESPN2 -- once again, one of the things I said was a problem struck. The "franchise tag" I said they put on Desperate Housewives reared its ugly head, and NASCAR lost.
Fox had a Busch race in 2005 at Talladega pushed into 8 PM and they showed the entire finish of the race and gave it the first 30 minutes of prime-time.
NBC had a Cup race in 2002 at Lowe's pushed into 7 PM and the entire finish was shown again, and it took the first hour of prime-time.
But here, the ESPN Broadcast Network had to give way to ABC's Sunday Night programming anchored by Desperate Housewives.
JD, Will you write a column about SPEED TV's expected switch to HDTV?
Sophia said:
zowee! 4 hours, really Kevin? I would watch it if most of it was the day or night before the race. But my eyes and brain get tired watching 8 hrs of tv nonstop.
at 5:54pm.
I usually work on Saturdays too, so if I miss the Busch or Truck race, I'm up early on Sunday watching my TiVo of those races, plus Nascar Now, RaceDay, Countdown, and the Cup race on Sunday. 8 hours non-stop? Try 16 sometime! :) Its a good thing my wife usually works Sundays so I have the place to myself.
Kevin in SoCal
Mr. Daly:
Could you, at the conclusion of this season, review the entire season's coverage and give us a "best & worst" column covering FOX, TNT and ABC/ESPN? So many posters are yearning for FOX coverage to begin, but some of your archived columns and comments show disappointments with some aspects of the FOX team (which are my favorites, but I'm telling you my bias...). I felt the coverage by TNT was so bad that it compelled me to buy two Sirius radios. My concern is that the folks who read and comment on this site may well be so incensed by the "new" ESPN's coverage that a fair end-of-season analysis may be slewed by the most recent coverage. We all want better coverage of the Cup races (and other racing)by the on-air media whether it be television, radio or other providers, and maybe, just maybe, a balanced discussion of the best and worse could help the providers of next year's NASCAR season get it straighter than this year (and at a hugh cost savings to go out and retain focus-group studies to discover the same feedback). Just a thought and keep up the fine columns!
thanks,
Tom in Dayton, Ohio.
Tom, I am laying out plans for the off-season that will rely on The Daly Planet readers to go back and reflect on their memories of the 2007 season.
During the two months of non-racing, we will use that time to talk about subjects that really got our attention in the first year of this new NASCAR TV contract.
In addition, I will also be offering some new topics for thought and comment that so far this season have not been addressed.
Make your plans to continue to stop-by even after the season and contribute. I think we will all need a bit of closure.
JD
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