ASSESSING THE ESPNIZATION OF ABC SPORTS.Byline: Richard Sandomir New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of Times ABC ABC in full American Broadcasting Co. Major U.S. television network. It began when the expanding national radio network NBC split into the separate Red and Blue networks in 1928. Sports is starting to look a lot like ESPN ESPN Entertainment and Sports Programming Network , as ESPN executives and voices mate with ABC, its Walt Disney Co. sibling. Already, Chris Berman is host of the ``Monday Night Football'' halftime show, Robin Roberts is host of ``Wide World of Sports'' and John Saunders is host of the college football studio show. Starting early next year, Mike Tirico, with all of two seniors golf telecasts behind him, will replace Brent Musburger as ABC's golf host. There's more: last week ABC shifted Joe Theismann and Mike Patrick, the voices of ESPN's Sunday night National Football League telecasts, to the NFL NFL abbr. National Football League NFL (US) n abbr (= National Football League) → Fußball-Nationalliga wild-card playoff game Dec. 28, replacing Musburger and Dick Vermeil, who will be busy with bowl games. Steve Bornstein, the president of ESPN, who replaced Dennis Swanson atop ABC Sports last spring, growls at the notion of the ESPNization of ABC Sports. True, ESPN Radio's Fabulous Sports Babe has not yet been tapped to replace Chris Schenkel on bowling, but there is no doubt that ABC is tapping ESPN to improve ABC. One of Bornstein's first hires was Steve Anderson, an ESPN colleague, as senior vice president of production. ``We're contemporizing ABC Sports and enhancing our presentation,'' Bornstein said. ``I'll do everything I can to improve our product. I don't care if it comes from Mars, CBS (Cell Broadcast Service) See cell broadcast. , NBC NBC in full National Broadcasting Co. Major U.S. commercial broadcasting company. It was formed in 1926 by RCA Corp., General Electric Co. (GE), and Westinghouse and was the first U.S. company to operate a broadcast network. or Fox - we'll use it.'' And, he said, as the need arises, more ESPN folks will time share on ABC. Given ESPN's power, it is no surprise that ESPN is influencing ABC Sports. Why not? It's bigger. It's on virtually all the time. It's a renowned brand name. The theme of ``SportsCenter'' is no doubt better known to young viewers than Jim McKay's famous words that introduce ``Wide World of Sports Wide World of Sports can refer to:
ESPN is the sports maw. It has three networks plus pay-per-view and on-line businesses. Save for ``Monday Night Football “MNF” redirects here. For other uses, see MNF (disambiguation). Monday Night Football (MNF) is a live television broadcast of the National Football League. ,'' ABC is a weekend enterprise. Bornstein vows to reassert the former potency of ``Wide World,'' improve production of Nascar races and upgrade golf telecasts. To that end, ABC hired Tirico and promoted Jack Graham to be the lead producer, replacing Terry Jastrow, who was ABC's golf boss despite producing only six events. Curtis Strange was also added to the golf crew to analyze about 11 events. ``We'll have the best golf coverage around,'' Bornstein said. Regarding Graham's plan to mute the role of the host while increasing input from on-course analysts and reporters, Art Kaminsky, the agent for Tirico and Graham, said: ``Mike will use fewer words than Brent.'' The changes at ABC have most notably hurt Musburger, a good corporate soldier at $2.2 million a year through 2001. But he has been flayed by viewers and golfers. He was miscast mis·cast tr.v. mis·cast, mis·cast·ing, mis·casts 1. To cast in an unsuitable role. 2. To cast (a role, play, or film) inappropriately. as the host of the too-short halftime program on ``Monday Night Football.'' Now his role has been cut to being the No. 2 college football announcer and the quiet one beside Dick Vitale on college hoops. |
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