Now confirmed, Chris Berman leaving ESPN's NFL gigs after 2016...

We'll just have to agree to disagree. Stuart Scott was a great sportscaster. Mentioning Stephen A. Smith in the same post is a monumental insult. Smith is a clown. Scott was a class act.

 

Chris Berman. In the beginning of ESPN he & Tom Mees were terrific together. Sportscenter WAS Sportscenter, highlights galore!

ESPN with their focus solely on sports highlights in the 80's & 90's was great! Ego's, but basically ownership changing hands & having to be "politically correct" now at every conceivable turn is proving to be their downfall.
And This....

While I do enjoy some of the "shtick", ya gotta know when enough is enough. And people like Kikjian annoy the hell outta me. Yes, he might be an encyclopedia of baseball knowledge, (In fact, I think he know's nothing else!), but I don't think he could hit a baseball off a Tee let alone if one was pitched underhanded to him.

And don't even get me started on Smith...probably the most Unlikeable employed person ever to walk the planet.

Another thing that irks me about the Mothership is ALL these ex athletes' they bring in for insight, color commentary, etc. OMG, let's make a make shift field in the studio and Cris Carter can relive his glory days of showing the audience how he evades Ray Lewis in the open field, "Ray, you line up here and take off your stupid hat for a second". I'm sick of hearing them and looking at them. Great athletes KNOW just to go about and enjoy their retirement. Others, "think" we need to hear them. No, I don't.

Who watching this crap in the first place? Professional Baseball players jacking homer after homer from a guy throwing a ball at 45 to 50 mph. You could have high school guys jacking them out at that speed. It's like the pro bowl or NBA all star game, boring.

Chris Berman was great for ESPN in the first 10 to 15 years. Then the shine started to wear off. He became something of the old adage of "becoming to big for your britches". But he had a great career and I will remember him fondly.

 

Plus, the baseballs they use are juiced up hotter than Jose Canseco.

 

Sportscenter is best served with the sound off, and some excellent music on the hi-fi. If by chance one looks up and sees something truly interesting (still another dunk), there is always the rewind button on the DVR.

I don't think Sportcenter is designed for this 60 year old.

 

Therein lies most of the problem. I don't need to be entertained while I'm watching highlights. If I want entertainment, I have limitless options on my tv. I want to let the sports entertain me, not some guy trying to inundate me with his cool his street-slang.

 

Musberger = Shilling/plugging whatever network he worked for every few sentences makes for a long game with Musburger droning. Don't care much for Burman, either.

 

Musburger isn't bad at college basketball. He and Fran Fraschilla are a decent team. The biggest problem I have with Musburger is his suits are almost as ugly as Craig Sager's.

 

I like the nicknames. ( Jim "Two Silhouettes on" Deshaies).
At least he kept coming up with new ones.
The back, back, back I could tolerate.

But for me it started going downhill after ESPN got into the NFL with:

HE - COULD - GO - ALL - THE - WAY! ( obviously taken from Howard Cosell )
PRIMETIME - PRIMETIME - PRIMETIME sometimes in dual voices

and the worst: HE GOT JACKED UP!

 

Rumblin', bumblin', stumblin' !

 

I had to attend a corporate event one time and Berman was the guest speaker. He went on forever, I could not wait for him to finally shut up.

Brent Musberger was just incredibly bland. He was the Anti-Cosell. Plus, for a few years in the late 70s and early 80s you could not escape him.

 

His "he could go all the way" was in homage to Cosell. Imitating Howard's line when doing the halftime highlights on the original MNF.

 

I, for one, will miss Boomer. Loved him from the start. Yes, his schtick has been around for a long time, but that's his main appeal to me. There are very few of the new generation that I can even tolerate. They either come across as A holes (S A Smith and others) or don't seem to be knowledgeable and fair (hello most of the NFLN analysts - some of them truly hate certain franchises and it comes through loud and clear).

I am sick of the PC of ESPN, but that's another topic.

There's a reason for the tradition of Sports on TV for the Holidays - something to talk about at the Family get together's that doesn't turn into a fight in 2 seconds flat. keep Politics out of it.