Sunday, September 02, 2001
Sports on TV-Radio
Channel 19 provides more coverage
By John Fay
The Cincinnati Enquirer
The sports guys at Channel 19 have no qualms about filling up a half-hour Sports Wrap show Saturday nights.
“We used to have five minutes on Saturdays,” said weekend anchor Dan Hoard. “Between college and high school football and a feature, it was almost torture to decide what to leave out. There's plenty of material.”
There's plenty of sports material to fill the show. But, as far as comedy material for the campy sketch that opens the Sunday Sports Wrap, the fellows at 19 know they've met their limit.
“There's a finite numbers ideas the human brain is capable of,” Hoard said. “We've reached our number.”
The Saturday Sports Wrap, which debuted this week, means WXIX is doing 75 minutes of sports over a three-day span. That's almost as much time as the other three stations in town get for the week.
Saturday's extra time meant 19 could do a two-minute preview package on today's UC-Purdue game. It meant one minute instead of 30 seconds on the Elder game.
“We're able to devote more time to the local stuff than the other stations,” said Ron Millennor, the Wrap producer.
Sports director Greg Hoard will co-host with Dan Hoard. The plan now is for Greg to go solo when Dan is away doing UC football or basketball.
JOHN ON THE SPOT: Reds chief operating officer John Allen will appear on WLW's SportsTalk Monday after the Reds game. Marc Amazon will host. It should air about 5 p.m.
“We've going to do about an hour,” Amazon said. “A state of the Reds. He's going to take calls and answer any questions.”
NEW-LOOK NEWS: ESPNews, the 24-hour sports-news outlet, is being revamped. The network debuts the new-look Friday.
The make-over will be similar to the one CNN Headline News went through a couple weeks ago. Basically, that means more info on the screen. You'll get in-game box scores and more stats than you ever need. It will include a constant ticker on the bottom of the screen.
It sounds like a great thing for fantasy-league players.
My problem with ESPNews always has been, I can get what I want from SportsCenter almost all the time. The only reason I ever tune in is to catch day baseball scores.
IT'S BOXING: Was the Lennox Lewis-Hasim Rahman brawl on ESPN's Up Close real?
Probably not.
But it was fun to watch. I heard them early on The Jim Rome Show. They were doing the same act, but never tussled.
It seemed to be semi-staged to promote the pay-per-view fight. Let's hope there are a few more blows in the fight.
LITTLE LEAGUE FALLOUT: ESPN/ABC has a huge stake in the Little League controversy. Now that it's been confirmed this year's World Series — or at least most of what was televised — was a fraud because pitcher Daniel Almonte was actually 14, will people watch next year?
FRIDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL: A few observations on this week's Friday night football coverage:
• Give us more football and fewer shots of TV guys eating hot dogs, leading cheers and delivering game balls.
• The Channel 5 helicopter, like Channel 9's helicopter two years ago, gives a unique view point. Not necessarily good, but unique. Land the chopper, let the videographer get out and you'll get better shots.
• Got to admire Kathrine Nero's honesty. She started one segment for WCPO by saying, “When we got here, it was 35-0. ...”
E-mail: jfay@enquirer.com.
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Channel 19 provides more coverage
