Jun 28
You knew it was coming. A Monday night game at The Trop against the Reds broadcast on ESPN. But there was something the ESPN crew didn’t count on: a decent crowd. In fact, paid attendance was 19,891. Not bad. Not bad at all.
But that didn’t stop the talking heads in the ESPN booth.
First there was a camera that showed a Rays fan grabbing a foul ball…
Sean McDonough: “One good thing about not many people being here. less competition for a souvenir”
Rick Sutcliffe: “Of course, for a lot of years, if you didn’t go home with a souvenir, you were the exception to the rule”
Booth: *BrendanFraser-like giggles*
Later on, Rick Sutcliffe chimed in with this doozy…
“Hard to believe people don’t want to come watch this team.”
But then, to our surprise, Read the rest of this entry »
Jun 23
The article is titled “Rays need to get out of Tampa Bay.” And it is filled with all the typical ESPN.com rhetoric. Such hits like…
The Rays have some passionate and supportive fans. There are simply not enough of them.
And then there are nine or ten more paragraphs of “yadda, yadda, yadda” to support the conclusion that the Tampa Bay area “hasn’t been a great place for Major League baseball to do business.”
But what really puts the article over the top is the picture sitting front and center. The same one you see above. It’s great, right? It caters to every stereotype of Rays baseball. Thousands of empty seats.
There is only one problem: It is a bold-faced lie.
The first thing you will notice (here is a larger version) after the empty seats, are the old school Devil Rays logos. [Ed note: the photo has since been removed after the author of the article got ripped to shreds on Twitter. The story is now using a pic of Kelly Shoppach hitting a HR in Milwaukee, of course]
But wait. There is more.
A search through the archives shows that
Read the rest of this entry »
May 31
This weekend we got a good look at ESPN’s New York-Boston bias when they presented a graphic titled “RACE FOR 1st IN AL EAST.”
So we thought it was only fair to take a look at what the graphic should look like. Our budget is a little less, but apparently, so is our bias…
This is just a fancy way of saying that two teams started hot, two teams started cold, and all four are now within two games of each other as we approach the one-third mark of the season.
May 28
Here is a graphic that aired this morning on ESPN’s “Sportscenter.” Rays are 1.5 games behind the Red Sox and one game behind the Yankees with 112 games to go. But apparently that is enough to eliminate the Rays from contention.
OK folks. Let’s pack it up. Somebody put Johnny Damon on eBay, and leave Kelly Shoppach by the curb. We’ll try again next year.
After all…why would anybody think the Rays could win the AL East? We can’t think of ONE REASON. And we definitely couldn’t think of a SECOND REASON.
Mar 31
Forty-five ESPN.com “experts” made their picks for the 2011 season. Here are their predictions for the AL East…
We don’t expect all of these talking heads to be stats savvy, or even up on everything that happens with every team (although that is kind of their job). But it is a little surprising that everybody is drinking the Red Sox Kool-Aid.
In contrast, several Read the rest of this entry »
Mar 31
The season hasn’t even started, and yet take a look at what ESPN.com considers one of the big stories heading into the season (click on the image for a larger version; thanks Aaron)…
Just think. Just 25 more weeks of this crap.
Mar 04
Earlier this week, ESPN’s “Baseball Tonight Express Tour” stopped in Port Charlotte to preview the 2011 Rays (you can see the entire video clip below). Among the other standard no-thought lines like the “defense [was] depleted” this off-season, is the projected lineup you see at right.
Serenity F****ing NOW! Holy Sh*t this pisses me off! Who the hell put this idiotic, sh*t-brained piece of donkey doo-doo together? Oh yeah, ESPN did. Did they even get out of the god damned bus?
*Deep Breath*
They could have spoken with Billy the Wild Boar on the other side of the center field fence and he would have given them a more accurate projected lineup.
And if they had actually, you know, asked somebody in Port Charlotte, they would know that Joe Maddon has already made it clear that the opening day lineup will most likely look like this…
C John Jaso
LF Johnny Damon
3B Evan Longoria
DH Manny Ramirez
2B Ben Zobrist
CF BJ Upton
RF Matt Joyce
1B Dan Johnson
SS Reid Brignac
We’re Read the rest of this entry »
Sep 20
There are only four major professional sports leagues in North America. So you would think the self-proclaimed “Worldwide Leader in Sports,” would at least know the names of the teams that play in those leagues. And yet, time after time after time, they continue to mangle the name of one of the best teams in Major League Baseball.
We don’t even know how many dozens of times the talking heads in Bristol referred to the team as the “Tampa Rays.” A phenomenon that we find bizarre considering we NEVER hear anybody say “Tampa Bucs” or “Tampa Lightning.” And those teams actually, you know, play in Tampa.
And there is at least one writer at ESPN.com that didn’t get the memo that the Rays exorcised the Devil three years ago…
Exhibit ‘A’ is the American League East, where both the Yankees and Devil Rays are almost assured of a trip to the postseason.
Unbelievable. Hey, if you are a fan
Read the rest of this entry »
Jun 07
(alternate title: Why some think I am a douche)
Last week, after receiving recommendations from several readers of this blog, ESPN.com reached out and asked us to join their new “Sweetspot Network.”
After reviewing the offer, we decided it was not in the best interest of this blog to join ESPN.com at this time. We made a very brief mention on Twitter and thought that was it. Since then, we have received at least a dozen inquiries asking why we turned down the offer.
After the jump, you will find the reasons for our decision…
Read the rest of this entry »
May 20
Below is a screengrab of ESPN’s MLB page, one hour after last night’s game (click on image for a larger version). You will notice that the Rays victory over the Yankees is not mentioned…ANYWHERE (thanks David).
Let’s ignore for a second that this was a match-up of the two best teams in baseball. The game was televised on ESPN! Think the same thing would have happened if the Yankees won last night? Not a chance in H-E-doublehockeysticks.
You knew it was coming. A Monday night game at The Trop against the Reds broadcast on ESPN. But there was something the ESPN crew didn’t count on: a decent crowd. In fact, paid attendance was 19,891. Not bad. Not bad at all.
