The Campus Sports Guy
Where have all the Kenny Maynes gone?
By Corey Ryan, Sports Editor
July 8, 2007 | 10:40 a.m.
When I was a wee lad, there would not be a day where I would miss the morning installment of SportsCenter.
Craig Kilborn, Rich Eisen, Dan Patrick, Keith Olbermann, Chris Berman and the immortal Kenny Mayne have all contributed to my desire to get into the buisness just as much as Terry Pluto, Joe Tait, Rick Reilly, Mark Rice, Sandy Alomar Jr., Shawn Pompelia and my dad.
Now, I despise the everyday show, only turning it on for background noise.
It’s difficult to come up with a specific list of why the television program of my youth has become unwatchable, so the rest of this blog may become a confusing blob of complaints, but I don’t think I’m the only one who feels the same about the down hill progression of ESPN’s center piece. So here goes.
The match that lit this powder keg of anger is the latest SportsCenter gimmick “Who’s Now” where a panel comprised of Kirk Herbstreit, Keyshawn Johnson and Michael Wilbon talk about a 32-athlete bracket challenge in an attempt to determine who is the biggest sports star.
My initial reaction is who gives a shit? This isn’t even worthy of debate. I can understand people arguing if Curt Schilling should be in the Hall-of-Fame (yes) or if Tim Duncan is the best low-post player of the past 20-years (yes), but about who is the most popular athlete in the world? What is this, high school? Does the winner get a crown and the first dance with the prom queen?
Even if I were someone who cared, the discussion panel has zero credibility on the subject. It’s like ESPN put a bunch of names in a hat and picked out these three and made it the center topic of SportsCenter for two weeks.
Why not get some of the Page 2 writers, the guys who actually spend time thinking and writing about similar topics of entertainment, not fact, to debate this atrocious, meaningless popularity tournament? This has Simmons written all over. The guy from the USA Today who writes the column on sports television would be better than Herbstreit.
It seems like ESPN has so many employees now, but they don’t have the correct management to place them in the correct positions. It’s like they’re being managed and owned by George Steinbrenner, Brian Cashman and Joe Torre and they can’t remember what used to make them great. It wasn’t money, egos and steroids, it was chemistry, pitching and the greatest relief pitcher in the history of the game.
Side note, I hate the Yankees, but at least respected those teams at the end of the 90s. They were well put together, unlike the nearly $200 million bunch they have now.
No one epitomizes arrogance and ego like Skip Bayless. What makes him a credible resource? I realize his show is Cold Pizza or that First-and-10, but he epitomizes what is wrong with SportsCenter and with ESPN. He is never seen interviewing anyone, so I don’t even know if he is an actual journalist or just an opinion maker.
At least we know Bill Simmons is writing from a fan’s prospective and it’s for entertainment, not fact, but Bayless is just annoying, arrogant and extreme. Most importantly, we, the viewer, are led to believe he is a real journalist but with zero real proof. ESPN keeps Simmons on the web site and the magazine while Bayless is everywhere.
Opinions are like assholes, everyone has one but they don't deserve much attention. Bayless, you are an asshole.
Bayless isn’t an anchor, but he is the kind of contributor who makes me want to roundhouse kick the television. Stuart Scott is the longtime anchor who makes me want to punt the TV like Dave Zastudil on Sundays.
“Boo yah!” he screams like a complete idiot. He is the single most hated ESPN personality by members of the sports journalism community. I have been in three different sports newsrooms at three different publications, student and professional, old guys and young guys all agree Scott is annoying, loud and unfunny.
He’s like clown shoes. No one laughs because you’re wearing big shoes.
As badly as ESPN is managed, they did get one thing correct: Scott is the host for the "Who's Now" panel.
SportsCenter used to be funny because of subtle pop culture references, particularly popular male cinema references. Now, it’s filled with Paris Hilton and American Idol jokes that their audience doesn’t understand or care about. What happened to a good ole’ fashion Caddyshack joke?
Just like the Yankees are now without a healthy Mariano Rivera, a stellar pitching staff, Paul O’Neil and Tino Martinez, SportsCenter has lost some important players along the way.
They should have thrown a ton of money at Rich Eisen to keep him from bolting to the NFL Network. No one can replace him.
Second, why did the great, hilarious, Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods of SportsCenter Kenny Mayne take a three year hiatus from ESPN? Sure he was doing his occasional, goofball story and I think he was the horse racing guy, but that’s it? That is like keeping Jordan off the 1992 Dream Team.
The Mayne Event gets me up every Sunday morning to watch him on NFL Countdown. Recently, he made a return to SportsCenter, but I don’t even know if that is the same now. Plus, they balanced him off with boo-yah Scott instead of a better role-playing co-anchor. Scott is the Tracy McGrady of SportsCenter and if T-Mac would have been with Jordan instead of Pippen, the Bulls would have won half as many championships.
I may never go back to watching SportsCenter regularly. The ESPN web site along with certain newspapers and other web sites have steered me in a better direction. Maybe it’s for the best. The written word is more credible and induces more intellectual thought, which is why I’m not at WOUB.
I guess there is a way I would go back to watching SportsCenter: Monday morning shows with Charles Barkely and Mike Ditka. Now that's entertainment.