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Very true.
I actually get tired of ABC/ESPN with their slanted analysis (Greg Anthony, Stephen A. Smith and Scottie Pippen) and the endless hyperbole (Bill Walton)
or is TNT's NBA broadcast by far and away better than ESPN's and ABC's. I especially love the halftime shows and the fact that the announcers/analysts have credibility and know what they're talking about.
Very true.
I actually get tired of ABC/ESPN with their slanted analysis (Greg Anthony, Stephen A. Smith and Scottie Pippen) and the endless hyperbole (Bill Walton)
no its not just you at all. tnt has better announcers, and better halftime shows. i love when kevin harlin screams.
yeah bill walton changes his mind every ing second! one minute the team is good and the next they suck.
Same here, it's so emphatic.no its not just you at all. tnt has better announcers, and better halftime shows. i love when kevin harlin screams.
Same here, it's so emphatic.no its not just you at all. tnt has better announcers, and better halftime shows. i love when kevin harlin screams.
oops.
the only one i cant stand is reggie miller. he belongs on espn.
oh i so agree TNT is far superior, and it's so refreshing to have cameras that are in focus.
Old news to me.
Marv Albert, Steve Kerr, Kevin Harlan, Doug Collins, and when the Czar was still around are great commentators. Include Craig Saiger, Cheryl Miller, Charles Barkely, Kenny Smith, Reggie Miller, Magic Johnson and Nick Van Exel and that's a star studded cast.
and bill waltons voice.. ugh.
his voice is awful. dont even get me started on that.
ESPN's goal is to get a sports fan to watch. TNT's is to get a basketball fan to watch their program. To me, that's the sum total of their quality difference.
The guys on TNT seem like they like each other and have more fun, I think it begins with Kenny Smith more than any other, then Barkley, even better with Magic on there. Marv Albert has always been the best basketball announcer...he's the best ever, pervert or not. Adding Kerr to that mix was a good move.
I like Ernie Johnson to an extent..but sometimes he kills funny segments.
The guys on ESPN and ABC come off as wannabes, and when they try to argue with each other it comes off as forced....actually most of what ESPN and ABC do comes off as forced.
TNT OTOH is like the Chris Berman, Robin Roberts and Tom Jackson NFL show used to be in the 90's. It's a lot more fun to watch people having fun...that's why TNT works IMO.
It's pretty simple actually...the guys on TNT won championships(cept Barkley and Miller)...they act like winners and don't come off as uptight.
The guys on ESPN...especially Greg and Tim...they come off as the bitter ass scrubs they were as players who never won jack....And SAS just seems miserable to be around to me. Don't even get me started on Tolbert...the only winner ESPN/ABC has is Walton...and he's just naturally annoying lol.
Last edited by whottt; 04-25-2006 at 01:58 AM.
Since their parent company is Turner they don't show Eva 50 times a night
ESPN ed up by getting rid of David Aldridge in favor of SAS. Aldridge is one of the best in the business IMO, and is vastly underutilized by Turner.
At least Mother Mouseears doesn't have Peter Vescey on their shows giving analysis like NBC did.
The guys on ESPN...especially Greg and Tim...they come off as the bitter ass scrubs they were as players who never won jack....
I've thought that for years
Start on him
Turnovers and missed free throwsStart on him
right on! wonder how NVE would differentiate himself...
hehe
And i thought it was about his commentary
I miss Ernie's tumor
ESPN is just terrible. ABC isn't to bad, and TNT is very good.
The Charles, Kenny, Ernie show can get a little repe ive and end up no where, but it's entertaining. Just the quality of the analysts and commentators is far and away above that of the other networks.
I think this has very little to do with the on-air talent and their basketball careers. TNT has some amazingly talented people with great personalities and accomplishments, but this starts with the style of the program.
TNT is very unscripted (unfortunately, it seems to be slowly crawling back towards the traditional) and very simple. They put three guys in a room, two of which have played professional basketball, and let them talk. The cameras don't get super-close, they don't look directly into the camera, and there's very few distractions from what I can tell. Because they don't prepare a lot of B-roll for Sportscenter and their pre-game, there aren't the funky camera angles during the games.
They will prepare some jokes, but most of them are good-natured and very rarely cross the line. ESPN prepares gimmicks like the "fortune tellers" and various other props. 'Gone Fishin'' came out of a unscripted postgame comment they made that ended up taking on a life of its own. As they did so many times, they prepared a graphic, and the guys on set enjoyed a chuckle. That was in 2001 or 2002, I believe. Now, it's iconic.
It wasn't a prepared "bit." But because of all the on-air directions the personalities have to receive at ESPN because they want to appeal to a fast-paced, expresso-shot, low attention-span male audience, they SCRIPT EVERYTHING.
Everything is absolute because you have to be a man and come down on the strong side of an arguement, with an accompanying graphic in case you can't figure it out for yourself. Since males are more visual, you get the question, the answer, and video of the subject for debate without ever having to listen to what's being said. If you're a little more grey-minded (in every sense of the word grey), that doesn't appeal. The only analysis Tim and Greg, Mark and Scottie are ever asked to deliver is "why?"
Why are the Pistons going to win tonight?
Why is Lebron James the MVP?
Why is Ron Artest having such an effect on the Kings?
I can predict the questions before they are asked. You get 30 seconds of nonsense followed by another question of why? It's a stale program, and has been since it started in 2002-03.
TNT may ask the question, but if they don't find any merit to the argument, they answer the question as if it's as stupid as it is, and then move on to what they think the issue is. Agree or disagree (I hate hearing them dis KG) I still listen to them.
Another thing that I like, and I don't know if anyone has noticed this, is that the show lasts as long as they have something to talk about. It appears that they will talk until they are out of time. They may have only 22:30, but that isn't broken up into exactly five 4-and-half minute segments. If that leaves them with only sponsors left to pay, then they come back long enough to tell you about some TNT program and then go back to commericals.
I like that because I don't feel like they are playing an actress over on time with her acceptance speech off the stage. It is, once again, a more relaxed television atmosphere. They allow the energy to come from their analysts, and not too many bells and whistles, constrictions of usual commerical television. The format feels more like something that would be on HBO, not TNT. They just stumbled onto it when they found Kenny Smith and Charles Barkley.
As for their analysis - they farm coaches a lot. They go after Doug Collins, Mike Fratello, Hubie Brown, Jeff Van Gundy, John Thompson, Mike Dunleavy, PJ Carlisemo, Danny Ainge - they tend to be more about strategy and adjustments than the players. Kenny Smith was on probably the most forgettable Championship teams of the last 20 years, and he wasn't a big name from them. But he knows basketball, and he is articulate, and they tend to go for players that are more like that because they had to be to survive in the league as long as they did. Steve Kerr is another cerebral player.
ESPN came in with the intent of providing a "player's perspective." That's why they hired Tolbert, Walton, Laimbeer, Majerle, Elliott, etc. Players tend to be more narrowly focused on one specific aspect of the game - shooting, scoring, the one-on-one duel. Coaches have to think more broadly about the game. They have to worry about 10 guys, not 2. That opens up the floor to see what's there if you listen to them as analysts.
Also, TNT has been doing this awhile. ESPN doesn't seem to treat basketball any different than it treats Baseball or Football, and that means when they do market research, it's about sports fans generally, not basketball fans. They want the Sportscenter audience to stay tuned in for their feature event, no matter what it is.
If you didn't read all of this, go turn on ESPN and stay there for the 15 minutes you can stand to have it on before your ADD twitches.
ESPN = Great for Sports bars.
TNT = Great for basketball games.
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