Update: The rain-delayed baseball game between the Detroit Tigers and the Chicago White Sox will start on ESPN2 at 5PM and that will cancel the afternoon airing of the Monday NASCAR Now roundtable show. Originally scheduled for 5PM, NASCAR Now was moved back to 6PM and has now been cancelled.
The only airing of the Monday show will be at Midnight Eastern Time, 9PM Pacific. At 5PM Around The Horn and then PTI airs on ESPN. A college football game repeat started at 5PM on ESPN Classic for three hours.
Monday's program features Allen Bestwick hosting Rusty Wallace, Brad Daugherty and Ray Evernham talking about the Kansas weekend and previewing Talladega.
There will be a column up about this program on Tuesday. To add your comments about the schedule change, just click the COMMENTS button below. The rules for posting are located on the right side of the main page. Thanks for taking the time to stop by.
32 comments:
yeah! Now I can actually watch the beginning of the show since I don't get home until 5:30 at the earliest. I wish it was on later every night. It's not something I'm going to bother to record. I certainly don't have an issue with ESPN carrying a live sporting event and re-arranging, even though I have no interest in baseball.
Actually, the situation is now getting even messier... it's raining in Chicago, and will be most of the day, so who knows if there even will be an early edition of NASCAR Now, now.
Also, ESPN2 has a live WNBA playoff game at 7PM, so if the baseball game is delayed by 2 hours, I wouldn't expect NASCAR Now until the midnight repeat slot.
sonicad said...
"Actually, the situation is now getting even messier... it's raining in Chicago, and will be most of the day, so who knows if there even will be an early edition of NASCAR Now, now."
oh, well, just . . . hell's bells! even when espn tries to do the right thing, it blows up on their face.
as young mr busch is discovering. karma extracts a heavy price.
Looking at the radar right now, we're in for at least another hour of rain... the question now is if they'll do whatever it takes to get the game in today, or be willing to delay it until tomorrow. The forecast for today shows rain until 9PM Eastern.
If they really have to, they probably can postpone it until tomorrow, since the Rays/AL Central winner series doesn't start until Thursday (remembering that if the Sox beat the Tigers, they need another game with the Twins to decide the division), but there's also a chance of rain on Wednesday, so I don't think they want to take the chance of delaying the start of that series. I'm guessing they'll do whatever they can to get it in today.
I'll echo what everyone else is saying... I've been watching ESPN2 trying to see the baseball game. They've been doing updates every 10-15 minutes, so they're committed to the whole game.
This is ESPN's last baseball game of the year, since all playoffs are on TBS and FOX. They'll do whatever they can to make sure the whole thing is shown.
If there is a WNBA game later, it's possible that Nascar Now moves to ESPN Classic. Classic just has an old football game on, so it would make pretty good sense to put it over there.
On WGN, they've said the game is scheduled to start at 2:30 central, 3:30 eastern. If they start on time and it's a quick game, Nascar Now still has a chance.
Well, USA Today just said the start time is now 4:05 Eastern, so unless the game is still being rained on at 5, I say NASCAR Now is a wash... unless it's still raining from 5-6PM, where I expect they'd still show NASCAR Now at its scheduled time.
WGN just said another 45 minutes - 1 hour for the rain, then another half hour to remove the tarp and prepare the field for play. Looks like they'll start at 4:45-5:00, and even cut into the WNBA game. Oh well...
The tarp's off, start time right now is 5PM Eastern.
This from ESPN: The afternoon showing of NASCAR Now has been cancelled. The only airing of this Monday program will be at Midnight Eastern Time tonight.
There ya go folks! That was at 4:52PM.
JD
No problem then. I'm glad ESPN picked up this game nationally, since it's of such huge playoff importance (granted, WGN has it too and can be seen nationally anyways, but ESPN had the chance to grab it, so I can see why they did.). Would've rather watched it on FSN Detroit, but they decided not to carry it, probably since it's meaningless for the Tigers.
Guess we know where ESPN's priorities lie now, don't we? I know we live in a national league city, and don't know much about these teams even and is it a playoff game or regular season game, I don't know. I thought the season was over already I can't keep up with anything anymore. Nascar is way too late tonight for me to watch too. JD give us a rundown of it tomorrow. Thanks!
Vicky,
This is a big game. If the White Sox win, they'll be tied with the Minnesota Twins for the AL Central lead. The Twins will then have to play the White Sox tomorrow in a tie-breaker game. If the White Sox lose today, the Twins win the AL Central.
I'm a Twins fan and the last week has been kind of stressful. The Twins have had ups and downs during that time. Now I've got to sit through this game and potentially another game tomorrow.
I'm a NASCAR fan as well but I'm glad ESPN picked up this game.
I just checked out the NASCAR TV line up for this weekend and the only thing that ABC/ ESPN is covering is the race on Sunday on ABC. Practice and qualifying are going to be on SPEED. Great, wish it was that way all the time.
I guess again we should not be surprised at anything that the four letter network does to racing. It is abundantly clear that they hate NASCAR and really wish that the powers that be in Daytona Beach would find a way to end the contract with them. I hate this since I don't have dvr yet and will not stay up to see it and will just have to read the blog tomorrow to find out what went on there.
Majorshouse,
That had nothing to do with ESPN's like or dislike of Nascar. The game was scheduled for 2pm. Normally it would have been over by 5, and Nascar Now would have have gone on without a problem. This is exactly the same as when a Nascar race is rain-delayed, the network still sticks with it when it may go past the scheduled time.
And since the game had playoff implications, the channel needs to stick with it. Especially since they had advertised it all day. Maybe the rain hates Nascar, but not ESPN. (in this case, anyway.)
majorshouse:
This is like if a NASCAR race got rained out, and canceled other programming when it ran the next day. The game is a rain makeup that had to be held after the end of the season, (and as such, it was a very, very important game) and they still planned to play NASCAR Now afterwards, if this game hadn't gotten delayed by rain further today. Yes, they picked up the baseball game at the last minute, but that's not anything against NASCAR, they did not plan to bump NASCAR Now any further than to 6PM today, that's just how it happened due to rain. I totally agree with them on this one, it's going to happen occasionally on a network that has multiple sports contracts, and the same thing could've happened in reverse.
I can understand the schedule change. I usually only watch NN on Monday only. And I will either record it or watch it at midnight. No big deal. And I did watch the baseball game.
Perhaps, using ESPN Classic to show NASCAR Now might have been a nice touch.
The re-air of an early season college football game from Saturday vs. NASCAR Now was really the question.
We got the answer.
JD
Even tho alot of Nascar fans do not get Classic, I have to agree w/you here. At least a few of us would have seen it. Just shows once again we need a Nascar channel.
JD @ 9:25,
Actually, it wasn't even a replay of a Saturday game. It was a 1997 Nebraska game. So, less important than current games, yet more important than Nascar Now.
We just changed our cable provider so we could get ESPN Classic just on the chance Nascar would get shifted over there in a pinch.Also, we wanted to see the classic race they were showing the other day. I would have liked to have seen NN on it.
Since that was not even a current game, it goes back to what I said earlier about how the four letter network thinks about NASCAR. I don't see why they could not have used the classic channel to show NASCAR Now at 5:00, I really do not think anyone would have missed the game from 1997.
Honestly, I don't even care that it was bumped. I DVR it anyway and fast forward through most of it. I now get most my info from Jayski and TDP. I am down to basically watching the racing only on TV.
For those who are upset that NN got bumped for live sports, I hope that happens no matter what show is on. I want ESPN to show a live sporting event over a taped recap show.
As JD said, it would have been nice for them to move the show over to Classic.
I guess I should clarify my lack of caring...I have lost interest in the program...I understand for those who don't have a DVR that midnight can be late to stay up to catch the show, but for me the show simply does not provide any new info for the day.
I *could* tape at midnight but probably won't. Rain and such will always screw up a schedule, whether it's racing or baseball, I have no issue with ESPN other than the lack of using Classic. I'll never understand watching a game or race or match from 10 years ago. Who cares.
This wasn't a poor decision by ESPN and the decision to show the baseball game instead of Nascar Now is a good one.
However, since these types of things have happened all season long with ESPN and Nascar (usually for delayed Nationwide races or canceled prerace shows because of college football), the network loses a lot of the "benefit of the doubt" feelings from most fans.
I wonder if ESPN tries to reserve ESPN Classic for live overflow, though? The deciding game of the WNBA Eastern Conference Championship was moved to ESPN Classic this evening when baseball had the rain delay. When baseball was finished, WNBA came back to ESPN2. (Sound familiar, Nationwide Series fans?)
Just seems to be the way ESPN runs these days, and no fans are happy.
WNBA fans were just as upset tonight as NASCAR fans get when the races are moved to Classic, because so many people don't get that channel and it was a playoff game. ESPN is going to make everyone mad eventually until they officially turn ESPN Classic into ESPN3 and make it available in most homes. If they make Classic into the NFL Network instead as was rumored earlier this year, they'll just be inviting trouble.
What WNBA fans?
I kid, I kid....
What WNBA fans?
That's actually code for "the players' parents."
Anonymous said...
What WNBA fans?
That's actually code for "the players' parents."
September 30, 2008 9:54 AM
Laugh all you want, but realize that many people have the exact same view of NASCAR that you do of the WNBA - apparently including many at ESPN. Not a good time to be taking a superior view that your sport is better than another in the eyes of TV networks.
Fans of niche sports in glass houses shouldn't throw stones...
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