Colin Cowherd To Host Sports Nation Show
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
I honestly hate when days turn into an all ESPN free-for-all, but the "Leader" is breaking some really big news today. In addition to the Comcast item, ESPN also released the details surrounding their long rumored Sports Nation show, and lucky for all of us, Colin Cowherd is going to be the host! Joining Shrutebag will be ESPN 1050 anchor, Michelle Beadle, and the show will premier on Monday, July 6, at 4 p.m. ET on ESPN2. Via ESPN PR....
The show will include discussion of the smaller stories that generate buzz on the Internet but often aren’t seen on television.I feel like ESPN has tried this before, but for some reason, I can't remember the show's name. In any case, it's a risky idea and Colin Cowherd is either going to be hit or miss on television. Just like on the radio, people are going to love him or hate his guts. I also find it interesting that ESPN is breaking this news right after Versus announced their plans for a similar show.
“SportsNation will focus on topics that dominate fans’ email exchanges and blogs,” added Horowitz. “The show will be a conversation between people who love sports but don’t take every story so seriously. The funny Web stories everyone forwards to their friends will find a home on SportsNation.”
Feeding off the producers’ theory that if two heads are better than one, 100,000 heads are better than two, SportsNation will engage hundreds of thousands of sports fans across the country via ESPN.com’s SportsNation. Fans will be able to interact with the hosts before, during and after the show by e-mail, text, Twitter or just making a phone call.
“SportsNation will really have three hosts – Colin, Michelle and the fans,” Horowitz said. “We are counting on the fans’ commentary and feedback to make the show unique. I’d like to rely on Colin, but he doesn’t listen to anything we tell him.”
Said Cowherd, “I’m stunned management let me do a TV show. I know what the producers and I find interesting and funny – and it leads me to conclude that we probably won’t be on the air very long.”
In addition to this news, there is also a small shakeup at ESPN Radio. The SN show will actually premier after the new ESPN2 simulcast of the Scott Van Pelt show. Mike Tirico is going to work strictly on TV, and SVP will be joined by Ryen Russillo for a two hour show starting at 2pm (only the last hour will be simulcast).
15 Comments:
Colin Cowherd obviously has a love him or loathe him style/personality and I've found it very interesting that he has made a concerted effort to be more blog-friendly in recent months.
Say what you wish about Cowherd, but the guy is shrewd. CC knows that he'll need bloggers and blog readers in his corner for this show to have any chance of success.
Colin Cowherd sucks. He is really annoying. I miss Max Kellerman on 1050. Come back Max!
Cowherd doing a show about what is popular on blogs??? What a fucking hypocrite.
It's about time ESPN got rid of Tirico as a sports talk host. The guy had his own show and only worked maybe 3 days a week. (Howard Stern doesn't even have that good of a deal). I never understood why ESPN tried to make Tirico into a radio host. You can't host a radio show PART-TIME!
@ 49er: I'm with you on that one. For the longest time ESPN radio was very stable with M&M, Herb, DP, and the Sportsbash. Now aside from M&M and the Herb I don't know what the hell is going to be on.
Luckily a few years back my area finally picked up Fox Sports Radio which completely owns ESPN in every way. I get DP in the morning, Rome after and Petros and Money at nights.
According to this, Tirico is also getting a two hour radio show devoted to football on Friday nights (22 weeks of the year) so he'll still be doing some radio.
Shoot me now, please. Shrutebag is all about ratings, so I wonder how he'll feel when his show is pulling a .8 share.
As far as Tirico goes, that couldn't be better news. He is awful on the radio.
I think this was the original idea for "First Take" when it was orignially "Cold Pizza.."
Michelle Beadle is smoking hot
I guess I'll infuriate Colin with my incessant petitions for a college football playoff, much to GMoney's chagrin. This should be fun and I've got to see just how hot this Michelle Beadle is.
I think they're keeping Scott Van Pelt because unlike Mike Tirico, Van Pelt only needs to be committed to the TV side of ESPN primarily for their golf coverage, which has far less interruptions that Tirico's full-time coverage during the NBA season from November to early June.
I would LOVE to see Max Kellerman eventually take over the 2-4 pm ET slot though--I've heard his old show through ESPNRadio.com and he's actually a pretty sharp and intelligent host.
If Cowherd hadn't made it in sports babble/talking headdom, he'd assuredly be one of the douche-bag contestants on VH1 reality sleaze. He once divulged that he had considered stand up comedy; clearly his life goal has been to be famous. And I guess, kinda, kudos to him, he found the easiest way to get there - loud sports talk radio... all one really needs is a degree in broadcast, a radio voice and knowledge of sports. And, even more kudos, he did that without the latter... well, I'm sure he's knowledgeable about the present, but he knows nothing about anything that happened before he was born.
Even the best talk radio is pretty sleazy, whether it's Limbaugh claiming to have secret evidence about how the Clintons had Vince Foster murdered or some sports clown in Tennessee claiming that the Redskins offense, in 1996, purposely fumbled a reverse to make favorite son Heath Shuler look bad (because his teammates didn't like him). Sports talk is virtually identical to the internet message boards that Cowherd rips on - I guess the talkers don't see the likeness because their names are attached to what they say - but each and every one know that slander is impossible on talk radio if the speaker simply believes it to be true.
Colin Cowherd, just as most talk radio demagogues, would make Niccolo Machiavelli blush. The next time you hear him read a short email from some loser which very perfectly proves a point he was making about losers, I would wonder if the said email exists.
After once hearing Sean Salisbury, on ESPN Radio, state how strongly he disagrees with homosexuality because of his religious beliefs, then make a thinly veiled reference to two women kissing, I was kinda happy about his downfall. Quick, someone buy Colin a camera phone!
marginally talented sports commentator...sounds like an ass every time he veers away into the real world...right now ranting about unions...dude, shut up and stick to sports
It's funny seeing ESPN Radio still playing with their lineup two years after Dan Patrick left.