It's been a heck of a week for FOX and SPEED's Darrell Waltrip. At 11:30AM on Friday, SPEED announcer Rick Allen may well be the first to welcome now NASCAR Hall of Famer Waltrip back to the broadcast booth.
Waltrip begins his weekend of TV work with Nationwide Series practice at 11:30AM ET. Larry McReynolds will join Allen and Waltrip in the booth for that session.
SPEED actually kicks-off the day at 11AM with NASCAR Live. John Roberts and Jeff Hammond will set the scene at the track. Hermie Sadler and Randy Pemberton are the reporters. The full TV schedule for Friday is on the left side of this page.
Waltrip is now done with his FOX duties. The only reason he is still on TV is because he is filling in at SPEED for Kyle Petty during the six TNT races. This weekend finds Waltrip in the TV booth, on the Trackside panel and finally alongside of Kenny Wallace and Roberts on RaceDay.
Earlier this year we talked about the desire of senior FOX Sports executive David Hill to raise Waltrip's TV profile throughout the entire NASCAR season. In the past, Waltrip departed after the final FOX race. Elliott Sadler used to replace him on Trackside for the rest of the year. SPEED has no official update on what will happen with Trackside talent after the TNT races are over.
Waltrip has talked about wanting to be more involved in NASCAR TV coverage when the FOX races were done. He began appearing all over the SPEED coverage of the final weekend of racing in Homestead, FL. Things grew from there.
Now, he is with TV viewers all summer and by being around for Trackside and RaceDay he is also available to get into the TV booth for some practice and qualifying coverage. There seems to be a little trend developing here.
It should be interesting to see how Waltrip handles his new Hall of Fame status on the air. There is little doubt it will be a topic mentioned many times throughout the weekend. Life has truly changed for Waltrip and just like being a Daytona 500 winner or a Sprint Cup Series champ, things will never be the same again.
The twist in Friday NASCAR TV is the fact that SPEED is sneaking in live the ARCA race from MIS at 5PM ET. Rick Allen and Phil Parsons do a good job on this coverage.
This post will serve to host your comments about the Friday TV coverage from MIS by SPEED. To add your opinion, just click on the comments button below. Thank you for taking the time to stop by The Daly Planet.
28 comments:
I am going to get my counter ready.. Bet he will talk about him in the HoF over 20 times over the weekend.. I still think he should have not got in this year or next.. More people should have got in before him jmo thought..
Viewers will never hear the end of him getting in the HoF now.
All D.W. all the time.Just not interested.
I'm not going to listen to him or a few others in the booth. Nothing personal, but they've beaten me into submission. I just refuse to listen to the same old crap over and over and over. There must be 20 hours per week of Nascar on television. They play the same clips, the same interviews and say the same think over and over. Just listening to the race is torture enough!
Ah, the human vuvuzela returns. No, thanks. I prefer the police scanner over the sound of that man's voice. And, it is more relevant to the broadcast anyway.
I just hope he's careful and doesn't break his arm patting himself on the back. That would be embarrassing.
"It should be interesting to see how Waltrip handles his new Hall of Fame status on the air. There is little doubt it will be a topic mentioned many times throughout the weekend."
-- ya think?
Maybe this will push DW over the top enough that the management of Fox and other networks will see the real DW and take corrective action. They clearly don't watch or listen to what they allow to be broadcast so maybe they will tune in and see their hero as we see him.
I am setting here in my chair watching the action at Michigan and I just have to thank all the folks who voted for ol DW. The man can not finish a sentence with out mentioning he is in the HALL! Every sentence and his parrot is next to him cheering him on.
What a great way for a professional broadcaster to behave. Truly a representaative of the sport! THE FACE OF NASCAR!
I sure hope the newbies tunning in are really getting a good grasp of the history of the sport!
ALL WALTRIP ALL THE TIME!!!!
Congratulations to DW for being selected for the Hall of Fame. I think he and the other broadcasters should acknowledge the honor and then MOVE ON to covering the current season.
There will be TV coverage of the Hall of Fame induction and that should be enough coverage of it.
the weekend race coverage is NOT all about him.
If you think the amount of discussion about DW on TV is bad, imagine how these comment pages come off weekly.
He deserved to be in the Hall of Fame now. If it was about enshrining people in chronological order, then Dale Earnhardt Sr. shouldn't be in yet.
Maybe it will be a good thing for Darrell to be introduced on every show as a Hall of Famer. It will remind people that there actually is a Hall of Fame they can go visit. I'm sure they would appreciate the business.
OsbornK, sorry I had to stop myself from falling on the floor laughing. Fox get a clue about this? No way! TNT may know drama, but Fox doesn't know when to keep people from going over the top.
I've had Nascar on all day Friday on mute while I did other things and listened to a financial channel. It was so peaceful to watch Nascar in "mute". I could see DW with his silly HOF grin on his face, Larry Mac, Hammond, Kyle Petty,etc without getting frustrated. The same old faces saying the same old things.
One thing that bothers me about all the comments on here is that a lot of you are the same folks who have said you want to see Fox do more races next season instead of ESPN. Have you forgotten who DW works for?
DW has also invaded the ARCA series which is a real shame to have him chase us away from that series when they could use all the fans they can get.
actually...I didn't think DW was bad on the ARCA race. He was wrong a time or two, but he was also actually watching what was going on and seeing stuff as it happened. And not much of the 'land of way back.'
Another great tire from Goodyear - not
Toby Keith sings a song that describes DW perfectly. It's "I Wanna Talk About Me". He's going on and on and on and on and on and on.....................................................................................................................
Fireman17--I think DW has topped your prediction of DW talking about himself in the HOF and it's only Friday.
Benny or bust
starrcade76--it's not about chronological order per se, but many of us would like to see some pioneers in there & those who have a greater chance of passing before they're in there. Yes they may in the end live another 10 years, but those who due to health &/or age have a greater chance of passing than those seemingly in relatively good health.
OSBORNK--on IWC when Mikey wasn't getting enough attention that song was always brought up! When he was tired of talking about other people he'd be "like the Toby Keith song, I wanna talk about ME!"
I'm hoping it will change DW. Yeah, I know he gets on a lot of nerves, but if you grew up where he did and to accomplish what he has, is a pretty amazing feat. Now that he's made it, he has nothing to prove and he can chill out.
Seriously, all the bitchin on blogs about DW aren't going to make him go away anytime soon. FOX and Speed will always have a chunk of media contracts, that means DW will be there until he no longer wants to do TV anymore. That you can take to the bank.!
You just have to continue to be creative and listen and view as to your preferred methods.
Until NASCAR changes their CEO, it's pretty much the way it's going to be. For me that means deal with it or drop the sport all together. I don't watch many other sports aside from auto racing. Off to the electronics store to upgrade devices.
I DVR'd the ARCA race, and fast-forwarded through most of it, but DW was not bad in what I saw. He didn't dominate conversation, though I noticed he wasn't as astute at pointing out trouble as he sometimes is; when a wreck happened, he'd generally make only a little exclamation of surprise rather than annonce the wreck.
@Anon 6:59, ARCA runs Hoosier tires, do they not?
It's only going to get worse as his actual induction nears. Just think what will happen on Fox if two Waltrips are in the booth next year. Ugh.
Darrell Waltrip just got a congratulations and a congratulatory graphic during the MLB telecast on FOX. I guess the FOX mothership can't contain their pride for their "Hall of Fame" broadcaster.
DW was on every Friday telecast except the one that used the TNT talent. He then added himself to the ARCA race before running over to Trackside.
Nothing against the guy, but enough is enough already.
What ? No country singer doing
the Anthem ? A positive way to
start the day.
Argh. Adam just cant leave things
alone. He was reading a Promo
for some movie on TNT. Spielberg is
involved.
Adam says -- "If Speilberg is
involved you know it will be good "
Well maybe the PR people who wrote the ad copy .. used that line
But I have this feeling that it
was an adlib. The more I hear this
guy the less I want to hear him
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