UPDATE: There will be no more "Your Turn" posts. Feel free to add your post-race comments right here.
The good news is that we can now use one post to host all the NASCAR TV comments on the day. The bad news is the reason why. Numbers are down all over the place for NASCAR, including online blogs like this one.
The day starts with Nicole Briscoe and NASCAR Now on ESPN2 at 9AM. She has Marty Smith on-site in Martinsville, VA. It should be interesting to see how much focus of this hour goes to the unraveling of RPM and the recent rumors of impending demise.
As we reported, Smith minced no words Friday in reporting that no mechanics had left RPM, that Roush-Fenway had been paid in full by RPM and that Kasey Kahne did not leave RPM being owed any money. These facts were completely the opposite of reports on Thursday from Race Hub's Bob Dillner.
NASCAR RaceDay is up next at 10AM with two hours of news and interviews. Saturday morning, SPEED telecast one hour of Sprint Cup Series practice avoiding the Kahne and RPM story entirely. Only in the last few minutes was it even mentioned.
While Race Hub is produced in-house by SPEED, the other programs from the track are produced for SPEED by the NASCAR Media Group. How else can it be explained that Kahne driving onto the track in the Red Bull car was not the first image viewers saw on Saturday morning? Instead, the TV team did everything possible to dance around the huge elephant in the middle of the room.
John Roberts hosts RaceDay, but the meat of the program is provided by reporters Wendy Venturini and Hermie Sadler. Since Sadler is driving in the race, he will be of limited value as far as news gathering is concerned. It's up to Venturini to provide an updated overview of the entire RPM story.
Perhaps the person with the most interesting perspective is going to be RaceDay panelist Kyle Petty. Teamed with the hootin' and hollerin' cheerleader Kenny Wallace, Petty actually hosted the RPM merger press conference live on SPEED way back when.
Petty has never been one to mince words and his feelings about the truthfulness of RPM and the current situation could make for the most memorable TV viewing of the day.
Allen Bestwick is next as once again the NASCAR Countdown show has been moved over to ESPN2 at noon ET. Along with Rusty Wallace and Brad Daugherty, Bestwick has a lot of ground to cover with all the news and silly season changes unfolding this week.
Marty Reid leads Dale Jarrett and Andy Petree into yet another Chase telecast over on ESPN at 1PM. On this tiny track, ESPN cannot use side-by-side video boxes for live racing or endless in-car camera shots. Reid cannot simply work off the TV monitor and needs to stick his head out the window and call the actual race as it happens. This week it has to be different.
It's all about pit strategy on Sunday and Dr. Jerry Punch and the pit reporters are going to have to play a major role in the telecast. The intensity is high at this track and there are no doubt going to be some upset drivers before the day is done.
ESPN will offer an extended post-race before the three hour block of The Speed Report, Victory Lane and Wind Tunnel gets underway on SPEED at 7PM.
This post is going to host your comments on NASCAR's Sunday TV from start to finish. To add your TV-related opinion, just click on the comments button below. This is a family-friendly website, please keep that in mind when posting. Thanks for taking the time to stop by The Daly Planet.
284 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 284 of 284Wow, they got some good coverage on Harvic and Burton, imagine that. I feel light headed.
I'm here! Just have no words left for this cluster.
The blog is the only thing keeping me awake.
Dale J is a good announcer! Glad he is on the broadcast team!
Isn't it just amazing that Nascar and ESPN can't figure out why ratings are down? Obviously, they don't ever have to watch the SNAFU that is race 'coverage', have they? Between that and the stupid chase, why bother?
Looks like Jr's regular pit crew just showed up!
Now that was 2 'chasers' going after heach other. do they each get a fine?
Yup. Jr. lost spots on pit road again.
The coverage isnt that bad compared to last week. Its still not very good though. Second half of the broadcast has been better than the first. Espn has definately had some issues today, but anything is still better than last weeks sorry excuse for a broadcast
Jeff Gordon's radio chatter was good as KUBu came to get him back. "Ooooo, he's gonna come and get us....Oooooo, wrecked!"
There's always the Dukes of Hazzard movie on USA netwwork, they are showing some good car chases. :) Cheer up JD it'll get worse before it gets better, but one day in the future it may get better.
Has the pace car completed more laps than any of the cars in the garage?
Yeah I agree that was not a good move on Kurt's part there. I'd love to see Ol Jeffy get up in Kurt's face big time. Maybe we will who knows what we'll see next on ESPN
I thought the #2 did exactly what needed toi be done. The 24 deserved what he got.
Pace car has completed 99 laps so far!
I thought Big Weed totally over-reacted to Jeff nudging him out of the way....and I don't even like JG.
I just can't believe ESPN thinks two cars at a time is the way to show a 500 lap race.
I guess we'll just hear filler instead of the race.
especially since they can just zoom out and we could see all the action on the whole track
So they just skip over the 6th and 7th place cars...because they aren't chasers. Lovely.
This is a nice run, but ESPN is giving me no context. Looit this car, Now, lookit this car, etc., It is a damn shame because this track is so fun to watch a race at
Othet than hardcore fans, who would watch this?
The race for 35th is a waste of time. It is pretty clear that several of the cars currently in the top 35 not be racing next year. Be interesting to see what NASCAR allows with the "selling" of the slots.
They waste more time talking about "what if" it's unreal. Here's a thought, talk about what is going on the track. QUIT SPECULATING!!!
If they pitted at lap 236 what lap are we on now. All I see is Laps to go. If I don't know how many laps make up this race or forgot, how does telling me the lap lasted pitted help me.
Sally, our little boy is growing up fast.
Yes, JD. He finally found the time to come play with the grown ups. I really wish he could expand his vocabulary.
You only need 4 cameras. One in each corner of the track. Then don't zoom in. Might work.
I guess that happens these days...so little imagination.
Waaaaaya too much split-screen use there.. They blew that big time
Man I can't believe that didn't throw the yellow
Where are the mice? Who at NASCAR was supposed to bring the mice this week?
We need a caution. Where are the mice?
Well I mean JJ needs a pit stop so I just figured yellow
No more "Your Turn" posts, just taking post-race comments right here.
Cutbacks. Cutbacks. Cutbacks everywhere even here
Probably a phantom debri caution coming up. That always gets Hamlin.
Thanks for hanging in. Worst ESPN telecast of the season.
ESPN just can't seem to figure out how to show a race so that it's interesting, and not just for the 'hallowed twelve'. They can even make a race at Martinsville seem boring. Showing one or two cars per shot, giving no feel for how the field is running...just can't get into the flow of a race. Thus, it doesn't make me feel as if I wan't to bother spending my time in front of the TV for an entire afternoon.
Welp, Diva winning means I don't have to watch any post race crap, including VL.
A poor broadcast at one of the two tracks, Bristol being the other, that IMO are custom built for a real "you are there" telecast. Cannot anyone get it through to the truck that in racing there is no ball to follow?
I disagree it was the worst TV race this year. I think Dover was.
We can't worry about no stinking finish, there are ESPYs to be won.
I really enjoed the middle 250 laps of the race. I rode through the mountain roads with fall leaves on my motorcycle. I left crappy race coverage and returned to the same. I didn't miss a thing.
He's not "sitting in the car taking it in", he's being told to sit in the car until the camera is on him. Standard Nascar policy.
Chase, chase, chase,.... sorry, I fell asleep.
So interesting that ESPN can cover the endless hours of that wonderful sporting event known as the World Series of Poker, but they can't handle Nascar. Tells you something, doesn't it?
Didn't watch very much of the race but what I did see was the old close tight camera shot, 1 or 2 cars in the shot, for the love of God, if they just pulled the cameras back, it would be 100% better coverage. And yet another weekend of poor NA$CAR coverage goes by. Who'd a thunk it. Do they enjoy shooting their self in the foot or what?!
Yeah Darcie, NASCAR is not the only sport ESPN butchers, there's bowling and drag racing too.
Hey John
I hear ESPN did another abysmal job. I did not watch it, thats for sure. It is oh so obvious that ESPN does not have a clue, nor does it apparently want to put together a good telecast. We all boycott the telecasts and all but it does no good until all of us not watch until ESPN has no reading whatsoever in their ratings, ZERO. Then it will scare them into putting together a decent telecast.
Lets get ESPN no rating points
As in 0.0
And no viewers
A good typical short track race but ESPN wasn't up to the task. One thing though, they do a good job of promoting Nascar.
Oh btw
Why aren't there no more your turn posts
I really enjoyed today's broadcast (especially the constant updates from pit road). I guess I'm the only one!
Vince Welch and Marty Reid do not know NASCAR nor do they speak the language. Having them in the PXP position just does not work. I have no hope that Marty Reid will improve. Judging by his recent Q&A, he doesn’t understand what he is doing wrong.
To the person responsible for calling the camera shots: I would like to invite you out behind the barn for a serious chat. Flogging paraphernalia will be involved.
This telecast was just horrible. I actually got dizzy during some of these camera shot choices and switches. For anyone who normally has a problem with dizziness, this race would have been unwatchable.
A good deal of this race was watched with mute button engaged. I don’t care what a pit reporter was told two weeks ago. I don’t want to hear Mr. Reid read off useless stats.
And finally, for the person who chooses graphics pop-ups: I ignore them. I also ignore the bottom scroll. I am forced to use the top scroll often during the race because of the poor camera selection and lost PXP person.
As always, thanks to JD.
That was as bad as Bristol. AWFUL!
It's so bad it's comical!
If the folks producing that CRAP think its a good telecast then they should be let go. If they DON'T KNOW it's bad, well when are they going to find out? Tomorrow? Next week? When???
Does anyone involved in broadcasting these races know it's horrible?
My fear is that maybe they don't thinks it's a bad telecast. Now that would be scary!
I have better things to do with my time than criticize professional TV folks every week who SHOULD know what they are doing. But, I love Nascar and I have been watching Nascar on TV since the early 80"s so I have to speak up and say that the telecasts are unbearable, unwatchable and childishly incomplete. Not this week, not last week, but every week since these clowns at ESPN showed up this season! It's unacceptable! It's helped kill this season!
I'll be very interrested to see the ratings for this race. Last year it was on ABC I think.
You wrote a post that you deleted yourself
Relax. Had a typo. Since NFL started, there are very few folks NASCAR chatting here on Sunday. Many have moved to Twitter for more race info.
Oh i see NASCAR is losing a battle that they cannot win and they seem not to care
Nothing changed before and nothing is changing now
THE END
That's because they cashed the TV check and are living off of it. What's to say?
Terrible job by the production team with the camera angles. The constant zooming in and out was awful. On top of that, they kept cutting to different camera angles each corner. It is a half mile track, is it necessary to use that many cameras? Booth was a bore today, but I must give Dale Jarrett credit for looking out the window
Sure am glad I missed Raceday --- sounds like KW had been hitting the catnip.
The camera work from ESPN drove me batty. Correction, the LACK of camera work drove me batty. How much talent does it take to follow 1 car around and around?
M'ville is such a wonderful, small track to watch a race. It could be covered adequately with just 3 or 4 cameras. Forget the incar, top of car, bumper car, and whatever car altogether --- not needed to enhance race coverage.
JD, thank you so much for this blog. This race fan appreciates your hard work.
Racing was good today-30 lead changes at Martinsville, and ESPN dropped the ball. One memorable point was when Hornish and Speed were rubbing into each other on screen and Reid was talking about something completely unrelated.
I actually fell asleep around the Lap 400 mark from boring announcing.
After Earnhardt Jr. lost the lead, never heard anything about him the rest of the race. The crowd reaction from when he took the lead shows that he is a driver the fans want in-depth knowledge on. This is more than the Jimmie Johnson show, especially with the tightest chase battle since its Inception.
Finally, I must complain about commercials, especially during the first half of the race. I was able to watch 3-4 NFL plays during those commercial breaks. I watched the race with my Dad today and he said at one point, "are we watching a race or paid programming?"
It was too nice in MI for a late Oct day for me to stay glued to the TV. Can't follow it much anyway, w/the camera shots they use. Radio kept me pretty well informed.
JD, as others have said, we fans really appreciate this blog. It helps to keep alot of us sane.
I am sick and tired of the ill conceived split screen that ESPN gives us. The colored graphics take up 1/3 of my high def. screen. Don't they get it?
Undercover Boss show on CBS will likely be a joke. NASCAR doesn't need to go undercover to find issues. They are all out in the open - they just refuse to take any action. 2011 shows no promise at all. They have zero momentum heading into the off season.
Well the Panthers finally won today! Just finished reviewing the
comments and see I didn't miss
much thanks to ESPeeN. Had to
laugh at the Kenny Wallace comments. I think his know-it-all
intelligence is provided from the
voices in his head. They got rid
of Spencer; we can hope KW is next.
Hey I am watching the 1988 First Union 400 on YouTube. An ESPN telecast with Bob Jenkins, Ned Jarrett and Gary Nelson. Dr. Jerry Punch and Larry Nuber covering the pits. What a difference from 1988 to today, all they show is the race and let the storylines come during the race. The majority of the race they cover battles throughout the field and uses the in car cameras minimally. They interview big name drivers and not so big name drivers. When Michael Waltrip's motor was dead, ESPN interviewed him. Why, because he was not a championship contender. WOULDN'T SOMEBODY WHO IS NOT IN CONTENTION FOR A TITLE ACTUALLY HAVE FANS WHO WAN'T TO KNOW HOW HE/SHE IS DOING. The 1988 First Union 400 had 32 starters, not 43. NASCAR then did not have that Top 35 rule and qualifying was done the old fahioned way, which i like, they earned it.
ESPN and NASCAR of today, call ESPN and NASCAR of the past.
They have the answers
I hope NASCAR and the tracks are preparing for a drastic revenue drop when the TV contract comes up for renewal. Based on the ratings and attendance this year, the value of the product will be far less next time. It sorta looks like all of the TV partners except TNT are working to devalue NASCAR coverage.
If there is not a performance clause in the current contract, I bet there will be one in the next one.
Finished just now watching race on Tivo. So much left out of the race story. All kinds of questions about what happened to drivers who disappeared from the track.
It looked like it was a really great race. Wish I could have seen it on TV.
For the rest of the week, we will be bombarded with the news that 'the chase is closer the ever!'. The question to ask is, does anyone really care?
@Sally
I don't care which pretty boy wins.
Mr. D:
Some observations.
There have been several nearly unwatchable ESPN broadcasts over the last two months and it makes no sense that that has to be. ESPN over the years has become much more entertainment-oriented than it was in the first two decades of it broadcasting. But it makes no sense that ESPN wouldn't draw on its history to keep improving the quality of its sportscasts, unless TPTB prefer an entertainment slant on not only a NASCAR broadcast, but also across all of their sports platforms. I've noticed this on football, baseball and coverage of other sports.
Over the past few weeks, I've rewatched many races I recorded on videotape from '98,'99,'00 and '01, and saw an entirely different approach to NASCAR races on ESPN and the quality of their broadcasts jumps out at the viewer. It simply makes no sense for ESPN to dull or dumb down their current broadcasting of any NASCAR race given what they accomplished in the not-so-distant past!
You (and most of the rest of us) bemoaned what SPEED had become until Mr. Hill and soon-to-be Ms. Wheeler may make it, possibly a return to a racing channel rather than an entertainment channel. Possibly ESPN is trying the same "entertainment" approach and, in the coming months, may revert to be the outstanding sports network(s) that they were and possibly could be in the future.
That being said, a simple experiment would have ESPN switch AB for MR for a race or two to determine if the quality of the PXP increases and settles the base viewership.
Second observation:
While reviewing those tapes of four years of races, I noticed that a constant and often repeated on air comment was on the "3". Dale was heavily featured as was Gordon, Martin etc. Goes around comes around when it's all JJ, Hamlin, Harvick or Kyle Busch - sportcasters always concentrate on the predominate leaders and always will, whether there is a "Chase" or not.
Third observation:
Kenny Wallace is horrible on the prerace shows but utterly professional on the postrace show. I know the Herminator and he'll fit into whatever role he's supposed to do, so I think he's just following whatever script he's been requested to follow.
Last observation:
I've been following this superb blog effort since JD began it several years ago. I've been around racing nearly all my life, but what John Daly has brought to an aspect of auto racing which is TV broadcasting has been an education of which, if given by a university, would have cost me thousands.
I would simply say, Mr. D, keep it up! I hit this site every day, comment little so as not to be repetitious and take up the bandwidth, regret that so many former posters are gone but new posters pop up, and always have a good thing to say about Digger...!
Seriously, I know you are respected in the shops among crew, drivers and owners and, as a hardcarded holder, are taken seriously in Daytona Beach.
My two cents on these matters...
Lather, Rinse, Repeat on all of it, but especially tight shots on small track. Come on! Widen the shot and hold it for more than 2 seconds so we can see more than first 3 or 4 cars!!!!!
Side note: Many years ago I was an avid SF Giants fan. Went to games by myself and scored games! Rotating players between teams/drugs/thugs/Barry Bonds chased me away.
On Saturday we did watch game 6 for old times sake. Grew very tired of split screen of pitcher/batter and close ups of spitting players. Yuck! Many commercials, but at least not during action.
Two positives:
The split screen was literally the entire screen on my TV split in two. NASCAR try it!
The other was, only the score, inning, count on batter and runners on base diagram were shown in small box in left hand corner. There was also a small box in right hand corner with the playoff games status. Totally unnecessary to be there all the time, but so small not really annoying. The rest of the screen was actually the sport being covered!! Again, please NASCAR pay attention!!
Kenny Wallace, the Waltrips, Larry and Hammond have worn out their welcome. It's obvious by reading here and other sites the NASCAR fans are craving more "Craven Like" professionalism . The sport needs to gravitate in this direction as the fans are deserving of better commentary. It's pretty simple.
John you know what, yesterday I went to Durham NC to watch the Duke Lady Blue Devils in their annual Blue/White game, since my wife and I know a freshman playing for them. Her name is Haley Peters and she will be GREAT. I didn't even think about the race, till on the way home and I listened to the last 30 laps. What a great time I had at the basketball game. There is something after NA$CAR, and after 40 some years I don't care if I watch or not, and I NEVER used to miss a race, either in person or on the tube. NA$CAR, and espn has run most of us old fans away.
JD, I hope you'll keep the blog up. It is my favorite way to keep up with NASCAR news and information. This is the only blog that has a brain behind it and that's you.
I was at the race in Martinsville so I didn't see much NASCAR on TV since if I'm there in person, I enjoy that experience.
We were out in the area where the Raceday broadcast was going on and I heard Kenny's last comment about his hope for JJ's 5th chase trophy win "because it will make you fans mad". And this fool wonders why people have tuned out? Let's see, the recipe for most successful business is to have HAPPY customers. NASCAR's and Racedays is to make them mad?
I can't stand the current coverage model. I did the usual of watching football live and Tivoing the race so I could fast-forward through the full screen commercials and Tim Brewer segments but they missed all the good stuff. The Gordon-Busch incident was the biggest moment of the race and all I got to see was the aftermath. I might as well only watch the highlights because it's the same difference. WE NEED SIDE BY SIDE COMMERCIALS!!!
sorry, I want to clarify since we are the races in Charlotte & Martinsville -- Kenny's comments about the fans have been a source of irritation for a while - so much so that it all blurs together for me, so I got my race dates mixed up since it was just one more stupid statment that came out of his mouth.
I'm an old fan, with a house full of young, enthusiastic fans, we haven't gone anywhere.
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