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Videos of the Week — 2008 Olympics

As the 2012 Summer Olympics in London or officially known as Games of the XXX Olympiad get underway on Friday, let’s look back at how the 2008 Games in Communist China were covered by the English language rightsholders in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia. I’ll provide videos of various opens, closes and how some of the events were called on NBC, CBC, BBC and 7 Network. In the cases of the CBC and 7 Network, 2008 marked the end of their Olympic roads. Unless CBC and 7 Network win the bids for the 2014/2016 Games, they’ll be shut out for another set of Olympics.

Let’s begin with NBC and its coverage of the Games of the XXVIX Olympiad in Beijing.

NBC

This is the opening to NBC’s coverage just as it was ready to show tape delayed coverage of the Opening Ceremony on August 8, 2008 (08/08/08). And we have a whole bunch of athletes which NBC showcased saying, “It’s not the triumph, it’s the struggle.” So dramatic. And you get the ending NBC’s Opening Ceremony coverage with a nice dedication to ABC’s Jim McKay who passed in 2008.

As the USA’s men’s basketball team took on Communist China, NBC surprised viewers by bringing back the “Roundball Rock” theme that had laid dormant since the network lost the rights to the NBA in 2002. It was nice to hear it again. Almost brought a tear to my eye. And note weekend host Jim Lampley who is no longer part of the Peacock’s coverage.

Here’s Tom Hammond’s call of Usain Bolt’s shattering the 100 meters World Record.

And we have NBC’s closing montage set to “Remember The Titans”.

CBC

This is CBC’s highlights of the entire 16 Days of Glory.

And to end CBC’s coverage of Beijing, it looks back at 40 years of Olympics coverage using Ali Slaight’s “Story of Your Life”.

CBC lost the contract to the 2010/2012 to the Canadian Olympic Broadcasting Consortium led by CTV. The rights to 2014/2016 are up in the air.

7 Network

Here’s 7 Network in Australia and its open to its coverage of the Games in Communist China. A bit different to how it looks in the US. Matthew White is the host.

And here’s a 7 Network montage done to “Ready to Fly” by Amy Pearson. The song is about breaking up with a man, but whatever. 7 Network reworked it to fit its coverage.

BBC

This was released before the 2008 Games, the great animation used by BBC for the Olympics, based on the old Monkey TV series, this was done by Jamie Hewlett and Damon Albarn who also did work for the group Gorillaz.

Here’s a few minutes of BBC’s coverage of the Opening Ceremony. Just be patient after the weather forecast. Sue Barker hosts and throws it to Hazel Irvine, Huw Edwards and Carrie Gracie.

And this is a compilation of opens featuring Michael Johnson saying, “Previously at the Olympics”. I love these opens. The music is from “The Matrix Reloaded”.

This is a cool BBC review of Michael Phelps’ 8 gold medals in Communist China.

Finally, here’s BBC’s ending montage. I like this a lot. It’s done to Tom Baxter’s Miracle.

And that’s going to do it for the Videos of the Week. Enjoy the Olympics.

Videos of the Week: The NFL Today on CBS

This is some amazing stuff. I don’t know who uploaded these to YouTube, but this is some pretty video showing entire editions of The NFL Today on CBS. This is from Week 13 in 1979. Brent Musburger is the host (why he has never won a Sports Emmy for Outstanding Studio Host is beyond me), Irv Cross is the analyst, Jayne Kennedy plays role of feature reporter and Jimmy “The Greek” is there for prognostications.

You can see how different The NFL Today was from today’s NFL pregame shows. First, the 1979 show was a half-hour compared to the at least one hour editions seen on CBS and Fox. Second, college football highlights lead the show instead of going straight to NFL news. Third, you see some of the announcers CBS used in 1979. John Madden was on the “C” team for CBS back then working with Gary Bender. Frank Glieber was a former Dallas Cowboys announcer and yes, Vin Scully worked the NFL on CBS in the 1970′s into the early 1980′s. Fourth, only Irv was the analyst as compared to seeing as many as four analysts on the set today.

I love seeing the original commercials from the show as well. And you can see that Jayne was more of a novelty. There weren’t many women working in sports back then. Jayne replaced Phyllis George and both women had time for one feature before throwing it back to Brent.

And the features were longer back then as compared to the quick cuts you’ll see today. I love seeing the commentary from Jack Whitaker, something sorely missing from sports television today. Keep an ear for Pat Summerall voicing a True Value ad. And watch for the always entertaining segments between Brent and “The Greek.” I believe the actress singing in the Muriel Cigar commercial is former actress Susan Anton. Google her.

Check it out.

And let’s go back to Week 14 in 1977 and a very good quality video for the NFL Today. Phyllis George is in this edition. I love the NFL Films open for The NFL Today. Yes, you hear Brent saying Week 14 was the last weekend in the NFL. This was when the NFL actually had a 14 game season.

The remote report features the “A” team for CBS, Pat Summerall and Tom Brookshier in Washington for the LOS ANGELES Rams against the DC NFL Team. There’s also Jack Whitaker’s commentary on the biggest sports moments of the year.

Hey gamers! Check out the Atari video game system commercial. Different, huh? And whatever happened to Tuborg Gold beer?

And again, Brent and “The Greek” are always entertaining, but what was the outfit “The Greek” wearing?

This is great stuff. And I hope to resume posting Videos of the Week again.

Videos of the Week: Funny Australian Open Interviews

I don’t know what got into the water in Melbourne over the last two weeks, but tennis players showed some spunk and personality during postmatch interviews and press conferences throughout the fortnight. That is a very good thing too as tennis tries to regain popularity in the United States. If players continue to show humor instead of the boring same old, same old answers, then we might see some more of tennis in the highlight shows.

Let’s start with Caroline Wozniacki who decided that she would take control of a postmatch press conference after learning that reporters called her “boring.”

The following day, Caroline decided to have some fun with the media saying she got cut by a kangaroo. This ended up not being true.

Caroline did apologize for pulling one over the media on her Twitter account.

But these interviews pale in comparison to Kim Clijsters’ interview with Todd Woodbridge of Australia’s 7 Network after her second round match. Kim and Todd are friends off the court and they like to tease each other. This has become viral.

Of course, there’s Li Na’s funny interview after her semifinal win over Wozniacki. Every wife and girlfriend could identify with Li’s comments about her husband’s snoring, inspiration to win, remembering the date of her wedding anniversary and dealing with her mother. As you can see from the reaction of 7 Network’s Sam Smith, she must have felt like the straight man to Li Na’s classic lines. Li became a worldwide star thanks to this interview.

And finally after losing a hard fought three set match in the women’s final to Clijsters, Li made some very funny comments about her husband again.

If I work for Breathe Right strips, I sign Li Na and her husband to an endorsement contract right away. What a great two weeks of tennis. Now, it’s to the winter tournaments here in the States, then the clay court tournaments leading to French Open in May.

We’re done here. Nice to have the Videos back again.

Videos of the Week – Lee Corso Fires Off Guns on College Gameday

Since analyst Lee Corso began making his mascot head predictions on College Gameday in 1996, he has made his prognostications entertaining. Sometimes, the pick is just a football helmet or a mascot head, but a very funny addition has been Corso attempting to fire rifles, pistols or a variation of. Noticeably, this has happened in either Texas or Oklahoma where guns are a part of the culture. Host Chris Fowler and fellow analyst Kirk Herbstreit flinch and attempt to dive for cover.

We can trace the origin of when Lee first brandished a rifle and go through the years. It lends for some very good entertainment. Let’s start it in 2006 at the Oklahoma-Texas A&M game. Corso and Herbstreit are wearing jockey colors because regular host Chris Fowler was at the Breeders Cup for ESPN and sitting in for him was Rece Davis. Lee took out the rifle, but it didn’t work.

So it took a couple of years, but Corso got another opportunity at the 2008 Red River Shootout between Texas and Oklahoma. This time, the rifle worked. Ignore the rest of the video after Lee fires off the rifle.

Let’s move forward to November of 2008, former Texas Tech basketball coach Bob Knight joined the College Gameday crew for the Texas-Texas Tech game and Lee Corso takes the Red Raiders and fires off two guns in the process. Hilarious.

A couple of weeks later, Lee picked the Sooners against Texas A&M and again tried to fire off a couple of rifles. You could see that Chris Fowler was very scared.

That was it for the guns in 2008, but they came back on Saturday for the Bedlam game between Oklahoma and Oklahoma State, Lee fired off a six shooter and we do mean six shots. Desmond Howard got his first taste of the weapons up close and Herbstreit was ducking as you can plainly see.

Amazing stuff. College Gameday is the only show that provides you with explosive commentary like that. You can’t get guns on a pregame show anywhere else.

And that concludes the Videos of the Week.

Videos of the Week – NFL Copyright ID’s

You’ve seen the video before each NFL game and it’s on every network whether it be CBS, ESPN, Fox, NBC or NFL Network. For a time, they were even shown before NFL Films presentations on ESPN.

Ever since 1998, NFL TV partners are required to air the video, “XXX Sports welcomes you to this presentation of the National Football League” or “XXX Sports thanks you for watching this presentation of the National Football League.”

Other leagues have tried to copy it, but it’s the NFL that seems to have this market cornered. So today, I will present all five of the last season’s NFL Copyright ID’s. This will get you into the mood for the NFL which begins next week.

We’ll go alphabetically. We’ll start with CBS Sports.

This was ESPN’s version which celebrated the 40th year of Monday Night Football.

To Fox Sports and it’s copyright introduction.

Here’s NBC’s version that airs just before the start of Sunday Night Football.

Finally, this is NFL Network’s which seems to be quite extended.

Lastly, here’s the NFL copyright disclaimer complete with a Barney Stinson sighting. From Super Bowl XLIV.

That’s it for the Videos of the Week. Short and sweet, but it gets you in the mood for NFL season.

Videos of the Week – Best Baseball Announcers: Vin Scully

Now that I’m done with the Best/Worst Sports TV Themes, it’s time to move to another topic and this one is perfect now that we’re in the summer season. Baseball is a sport that lends itself to radio and warm weather. Over the next few weeks and as long as I can, I’ll post some of the best calls of the greatest baseball announcers of all time. This first one is a natural subject. Vin Scully of the Los Angeles Dodgers is in his 61st season with the team and goes back to when the Dodgers were in Brooklyn. He moved when owner Walter O’Malley packed the moving vans and decided to go to Los Angeles and he’s been calling games ever since.

Vin was inducted in the broadcasters wing at the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1982, into the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Hall of Fame in 1991, a member of the Radio Hall of Fame since 1995 and he even has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Scully started his career as a fill-in on college football on the CBS Radio Network, recruited by Red Barber, who would become to be his mentor with the Dodgers. He joined the Dodgers in 1950 replacing Ernie Harwell who would go to the New York Giants. In 1953, Vin became the youngest broadcaster to call a World Series at age 25, a record that still stands.

In addition to calling baseball for the Dodgers, he’s called the Game of the Week for NBC from 1983 until 1989, heading World Series coverage in 1984, 1986 and 1988. He was the main broadcaster for CBS Radio and called the Fall Classic from 1979-1982 and again from 1990-1997.

Vin also called the NFL and the PGA Tour for CBS. He was the first voice of the Skins Game when it began on NBC in 1983 and called it on ABC from 1991 until 1996.

Over the last few years, Scully has cut back on his schedule, calling home games and rarely traveling outside of the Pacific and Mountain time zones. He has hinted at retirement, but he hasn’t given the official word as of yet. When he does, Vin will be missed as he’s truly a national treasure, especially to Dodgers fans who have grown up listening to his calls.

Ok, enough of the brief biography and let’s get to some of his best known calls.

This is from April 8, 1974. Henry Aaron faced Al Downing of the Dodgers in Atlanta and hit his record breaking 715th home run, passing Babe Ruth. At the moment the ball cleared the fence, Vin got up from his chair and got a cup of coffee allowing the crowd at Atlanta Fulton County Stadium tell the story for 90 seconds. And then he had the perfect words to describe what was happening.

Here’s a rare recording of Vin calling Sandy Koufax’s first of his four no-hitters on June 30, 1962 against the New York Mets. We have the fascinating story of how this recording came to fruition as game audio recordings were rarely done in those days. Here’s a short excerpt of the no-hitter.

From September 9, 1965, we have the audio of Vin’s call of Sandy Koufax’s perfect game against the Chicago Cubs at Dodger Stadium. This the entire 9th inning and the description is just tremendous. When the transcript published verbatim in a book, readers could not believe it was spoken because the words were grammatically correct. Just enjoy the next 10 minutes and 50 seconds.

Ok, you’ve heard why Vin put timechecks into his call of the Koufax perfect game. Let’s now go to July 20, 1970 and the last three outs of the Bill Singer no-hitter against the Philadelphia Phillies. Keep that in mind when you hear the next 9:37 of the call. This comes off a record made a few weeks after the no-hitter so you’ll hear some pops in the audio.

Let’s jump to last year’s National League Division Series between the Dodgers and the St. Louis Cardinals and listen to Vin’s excellent call of Mark Loretta’s walk off base hit in Game 2.

Lastly, here’s Vin informing his audience earlier this month on Fox Sports Prime Ticket of the passing of former UCLA basketball coach John Wooden. As usual, Vin finds the right words and uses Shakespeare to describe Wooden.

Next week, I’ll post calls of another great baseball announcer.

Videos of the Week – Worst Sports Themes

After a two week hiatus, the Videos of the Week return continuing a theme I started last month, Best Sports TV Themes. You can check them out here, here, here, here and here. There are a good many sports themes, but there are also some bad ones. Not every sports theme is a home run and today, I’m going to explore some of the bad ones. You may not agree, but you can certainly offer your own in the comments below.

Let’s start with the NFL and usually, the networks do a good job in creating music for the National Football League. However, there is one particular dud. This one belongs to CBS and it was used in the period between from 1990 to the end of the 1991 season. Compared to others used by CBS, it’s not as strong and in fact, it’s very weak. It sounds like an Eyewitness News theme.

NFL Network does a good job covering the league especially when it comes to the NFL Draft or creating events like the Super Bowl Selection or the NFL Schedule unveil. But when it comes to game coverage, it’s horrible. The production is amateurish. Sometimes the announcing can be bad. And this for Thursday and Saturday Night Football doesn’t even come close to the excellent themes used by Fox, ESPN and NBC. It’s downright awful.

This is ESPN’s Sunday Night Football theme from 2001 to 2004. Do you even know what ESPN was trying to achieve with the siren? Not my favorite theme.

When Fox ended its tenure with the Bowl Championship Series, it concluded a pretty forgettable reign over a sports property. While Fox Sports had some decent games, its choice of announcers to game production was practically low rent. Who could forget Thom Brennaman’s overgushing on Tim Tebow in 2009? Did you know Fox had a theme for the BCS? Yes they did and it was pretty bad.

When NBC had the Major League Baseball Game of the Week, it had two excellent announcing teams, Vin Scully and Joe Garagiola and Bob Costas and Tony Kubek. But for a couple of years, it had one of the worst synthesized openings of all time. Here’s an opening from the Opening Game of the season on NBC, Detroit at Chicago. Vin Scully does the open, but the music is just plain awful. One aside, Jack Morris the pitcher for the Tigers threw a no-hitter during this game.

Let’s go back to CBS and it’s current music for the PGA Tour. It was composed by Yanni and that alone is enough to make me hate it. It’s also terrible. Does this inspire you to play golf? Most certainly not.

This is CBS’ theme for U.S. Open Tennis and it’s also composed by Yanni. And it’s also horrible.

And completing a CBS trifecta here, this is a computer generated open for CBS Sports Saturday/Sunday used in 1984, replacing a more newsy theme that was utilized from 1981-83. Try to sit through this without hurling.

Over to the NHL on Versus, this is a very pedestrian theme. I see what Versus is trying to do, but it’s nothing special. The game production has improved, but this reminds me of the very boring Hockey Central pregame show.

When ESPN2 began, the whole idea was to make the network appeal to younger viewers so the graphics were edgier, hosts weren’t allowed to wear suits and blazers, ties were louder, but in the end, ESPN scrapped the idea. Here’s the open to the ESPN2′s “Fire on Ice” theme which was the open to the NHL. The music is dreadful. But note the late Tom Mees with Darren Pang at the end of the video. RIP, Tom.

I’m going to end this with a really lame theme and again, it’s from CBS Sports. This was the original NBA on CBS theme used back in the 1970′s. CBS got the NBA from ABC in 1973 and used this theme until 1976. The music and lyrics were just bad. Yes, that’s Brent Musburger on the play-by-play.

I can go on, but I’m going to get kidney stones if I continue to find bad themes. If you have any nominations, put them in the comments below or you can e-mail me or send one to me on Twitter. Should we get enough for another edition, I can certainly put together another edition. I’ll just need some Maalox before doing it. That concludes this edition of the Videos of the Week.

Videos of the Week – Best Sports Themes, Part IV

This is the fourth and last part of Best Sports Themes. Today, we’re focusing on sports anthologies such as ABC’s Wide World of Sports, CBS Sports Spectacular, NBC SportsWorld and the like.

We’ll start this with the original sports anthology program, Wide World of Sports. It’s cut off, but it’s pretty cool to see iconic athletes such as Franz Klammer, Pele, Mario Andretti and of course, representing the Agony of Defeat, Vinko Bogataj the ski jumper on the intro.This is from 1978 and the quality isn’t very good.

By 1996, Wide World was appearing less frequently as ESPN was taking over ABC Sports, but we did get a short version of the intro.

Going back to 1983, here’s the ending of Wide World and you have the theme played in full.

And here’s an intro which is a little longer, but again the theme plays out.

Finally, here’s a promo for Wide World of Sports dating back to the 1970′s. I wish they used this music for the show.

In 1973, CBS decided to create its own anthology called the CBS Sports Spectacular. It still runs today, but not really in the same format as back then. Anyway, here’s the theme from 1979 and I like this version. This is Emerson, Lake and Palmer. For 1977-1978, they used Electric Light Orchestra’s Fire on High.

NBC tried a couple of anthologies, one called Grandstand in 1975, but it didn’t work. Then it tried again in 1977 with SportsWorld and that through the late 1980′s. This is the theme for the program.

And one which you probably didn’t see unless you lived in the UK. This is BBC Grandstand which ran from 1958 until 2007. This theme is very familiar to British sports fans. This person loved the theme so much, he tacked four different openings during the period of 1993 through 1998.

Because I can, I’ll post the final BBC Grandstand opens. This is the last Grandstand Saturday open with Hazel Irvine as the host.

Finally, this is the final BBC Sport Grandstand as presented by Claire Balding. Kind of interesting to see how BBC presented their programs.

So that does it for the Best Sport Themes. For past versions, you can check out my original effort which featured NFL, MLB, NBA, NHL and college football and a follow-up on the same day. Part II had NFL pregame shows, college basketball and soccer. And Part III focused on golf and tennis.

Next week, I’ll focus on the Worst Sports Themes and there are quite a few.

Videos of the Week – Best Sports Themes, Part II

Last week, I did a Videos of the Week on the Best Sports TV themes and it was so popular that it warranted a follow up that same day. And it’s now time to do a Part II and give you some more themes. I’ll do some college basketball, pregame shows and soccer. Let’s get to them without delay.

College Basketball

Since CBS renewed its contract with the NCAA, bringing in Turner Sports to air the NCAA Tournament through 2024, I figured we could look back at the networks various themes over the years. And yes, they’ve used more than one.

This dates back to 1982 when CBS first got the contract to air college basketball in 1981, taking the package away from NBC Sports. It began a relationship that has lasted into the 21st Century. This is the original open and theme. It’s a clean copy of the open that would show clips to introduce the teams participating in the day’s contest.

This theme was used when CBS renewed its contract with the NCAA for another six years in 1987 and lasted until 1993. I like this version.

In 1993, CBS renewed its contract with the NCAA once again and this video has a couple of opens to the tournament that year featuring Jim Nantz and Sean McDonough. The music is quite familiar.

The other network doing college basketball in earnest is ESPN and this the theme used from 1995 through 2001.

And here’s ESPN’s current college basketball theme used on its family of networks including in syndication.

NFL Pregame Shows

Let’s move to the NFL pregame shows and I love these themes. They just get you ready for football. This is from 1978 and the NFL Today theme. Brent Musberger is your host. Jayne Kennedy had replaced Phyllis George who tried to branch out from sports.

Moving to 1982, CBS updated the NFL Today theme and jazzed up the open for the times. Phyllis George had returned to the show. It also segued into the NFL on CBS theme that was used at the time.

Let’s jump ahead to 1993 and CBS now had a different cast for the NFL Today, Greg Gumbel and Terry Bradshaw and this video also segues into the theme that was used at the time, one that CBS used in the late 1990′s into the early aughts.

NBC didn’t have much luck in the ratings with its NFL pregame shows as it was pitted against the NFL Today and then Fox NFL Sunday from the late 1970′s into the late 1990′s. But it still tried. We go to NFL ’81 and this video is bad quality, but you can still hear the NFL on NBC theme and Bryant Gumbel is the host.

Here’s a nine second version of the NFL ’85 theme. Bob Costas had become host by this time.

As NBC Sports prepared to go into a new decade, the pregame show had been renamed “NFL Live” and here is the theme from 1990.

And here’s NBC’s current theme used for both Football Night in America and Sunday Night Football, composed by the great John Williams.

This wasn’t a pregame show, but ESPN’s NFL Primetime got you ready for Sunday Night Football and it was one of the best highlight shows bar none. While Chris Berman is a parody of himself now, he was in his element doing the highlights of every Sunday afternoon NFL game with Tom Jackson. Here’s the NFL Primetime theme from the mid to late 1990′s.

Soccer

Back in the 1970′s, one of the few ways for a soccer fan to watch international games was to wait on Saturday afternoons to watch “Soccer Made in Germany” on PBS. That’s right, PBS aired some sports in its early days. Be patient. The theme comes at the end. Toby Charles voiced the highlights and he was even the host for World Cup highlights in 1978 for PBS as well. Great stuff.

I don’t know why, but I find this next theme very intriguing. This is the UEFA Champions League theme that’s played by every rightsholder around the world. I have the entire version and I once found myself singing “THE CHAMP-EE-YONS! THE CHAMP-EE-YONS!” walking out of my car. Silly, I know, but it’s catching. This is the description of the arrangement as put on the page where this video is on YouTube: “The UEFA Champions League theme song was performed by Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and sung by the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields chorus. It is an arrangement by Tony Britten of Georg Frideric Handel’s “Zadok the Priest” from the Coronation Anthems.” Enjoy.

Since the World Cup is coming up in less than a month, why not give you some World Cup themes? This is from the BBC for its 1990 coverage in Italy. I love the opens BBC Sport produces for the Olympics and World Cup. This is Luciano Pavarotti’s version of Nessun Dorma, an opera that was made popular in the last decade by the Three Tenors.

Damn! That was awesome! Here’s BBC’s open and theme for World Cup Match of the Day in 1998. The World Cup was in France that year.

In 2002, the World Cup went to Asia and South Korea and Japan were co-hosts. This is the BBC open from that year. I don’t know what this music is supposed to be.

And this is from 2006 when the World Cup went to Germany.

Ok, I found more videos than I had planned on, but this was fun to do. Next week, sports anthology themes as well as tennis, golf and other sports that find my fancy.

Videos of The Week Follow Up – Best Sports Themes

The Videos of the Week have been popular today so I’m going to give you a few more from various sports.

NFL

Let’s do the NFL and this theme from NBC Sports used for its last three years as rightsholder for the AFC package from 1995 to 1997. Composed by Randy Edelman, it became quite popular. For me, it’s a reminder how stubborn NBC Sports Emperor Dick Ebersol was in refusing to do a scoreboard bug while Fox, ABC and ESPN were all using one. But I digress. The music was good.

Continuing with NBC, this is the Sunday Night Football theme composed by John Williams.

Let’s go to CBS and the theme it used from 1992-1994 and then again from 1998-2003. I liked this theme as well. This is from CBS’ return to the NFL in 1998 when the New York Jets took on the San Francisco 49ers. This is very good quality.

Here’s the Monday Night Football Heavy Action theme composed by Edd Kalehoff that has been used as the intro dating back to the early 1970′s. I don’t think it was used in the first years of MNF, but certainly from 1974 through the ESPN days.

NHL

This is the NHL on ESPN theme that was used from 1994-2007.

NBA

I’d be remiss if I didn’t post the NBA on TNT’s current theme. I do like this.

MLB

This is the MLB on ESPN theme. Not bad.

I’m posting this not due to the theme which was pretty pedestrian, but for the memories it brings back watching Braves baseball on TBS. The late Skip Caray with the call and the late Don Harrison of CNN being the voice of TBS Sports. Trememdous stuff.

We end this edition of the Videos of the Week follow up with the last Baseball Game of the Week open for NBC from 1989. This is from June 10, as Bob Costas and Tony Kubek call the first US nationally televised game from Skydome in Toronto. Marv Albert is the host of Major League Baseball … An Inside Look.

That will do it for the Videos of the Week until next week.

Videos of the Week – Best Sports Themes

This week, I’m bringing back Videos of the Week and I’m doing sports TV themes. Some themes like TSN’s Hockey Song or NBC’s Roundball Rock are as identifiable with the sports they represent. Some such as ESPN’s old Sunday Night Football theme are forgettable. But today, I’m going work in my favorite sports themes of all time. I’ll try to pare them down to two or three each per sport. And  I hope to do the worst sports TV themes of all time.

Let’s do this and let’s get busy.

MLB

Of course, Fox’s theme which has been mostly been the same since the package’s inception since 1996 is well known to this generation of fans. It’s also pretty good.

I’ve been looking for this particular theme for ages and I’ve found it. The original ABC’s Monday Night Baseball theme that ran from 1976 until 1979. While ABC’s coverage of baseball was horrible from 1976 until about 1983, their music was pretty good. Here’s the original Monday Night Baseball theme from July 23, 1979 as the then-California Angels took on the Red Sox and Keith Jackson was behind the mic.

NFL

I’ll give you one from each NFL TV partner to make this fair. And we’ll go alphabetically.

From ABC’s Monday Night Football, I loved this particular version that was used in the late 1970′s. This is from the Houston Oilers and Miami Dolphins contest played in 1978 and the best announcing team for MNF, Frank Gifford, Dandy Don Meredith and Howard Cosell.

CBS’ best theme was from the late 1980′s and it was called “Pots and Pans” because it sounded like pots and pans banging together. For each TV contract signed, CBS would change its theme music and this only lasted from 1987 until 1990. It should be used today in my opinion. This is from a late season Giants-Jets game from December 18, 1988. Uncle Verne Lundquist is at the mic.

Fox has only had one theme for the NFL since it started broadcasting the sport in 1994, but it’s still very good.

This is from NBC and was used for all sports from 1973 until 1979. I loved this theme and here’s the NFL open from 1973.

I’ve never liked ESPN’s Sunday Night Football themes nor am I fan of “All My Rowdy Friends” for Monday Night Football so they’re not being posted.

College Football


This has been CBS’ theme for college football dating back to 1988 and was originally used for Super Bowl XXI, but has been exclusively for college football whether it be for CBS’ CFA or SEC packages. This is the theme in its entirety.

When ESPN actually gave ABC its own identity in the 1990′s and early aughts, it had this theme for college football. I like it.

NBA

I give you the two best themes ever and this was during a period when I actually watched the NBA. This is from CBS and its theme that was used from 1982 until 1990 when CBS lost the package to NBC. This is a clean copy of the 1982 open without voiceover and video that CBS would splice in to introduce each game.

You know where I’m going next, don’t you? Yes, NBC’s Roundball Rock composed by John Tesh. This is one of the best themes of all time. Gets you in the mood for basketball. Used from 1991-2002.

NHL

When Fox took the NHL contract from 1995 until 1999, it used a very cool theme and I give you two versions of its theme that is still used on the Fox Sports Net affiliates across the country. This is a few remixes of the NHL on Fox theme.

Of course, I use this as an excuse to bring back, Fox is Doing Fine, It’s Cup Time and its original NHL on Fox theme. This is from 1995 and note the funky original Fox Sports logo.

The best hockey theme and the best theme in all of sports is the original Hockey Night in Canada theme now used on TSN. This is the version CBC used in 2007. CBC now has a new theme.

That’s going to do it for now. Next week, I’ll post the best themes for college basketball, tennis, and various pregame shows.

Videos of the Week – Favorite Women’s Bands

Ok, time to do a Videos of the Week feature and instead of doing sports, I’ll be doing a music video post. Haven’t done one in a while. This one will feature some of my favorite all-female or female-led bands over the years. There’s some good music here so get ready to enjoy.

I’ll begin with The Go Go’s which consists of Belinda Carlisle, Jane Wiedlin, Charlotte Caffey, Kathy Valentine and Gina Shock. This is my favorite song from them, Head Over Heels.

Following the success of The Go Go’s in the early 1980′s, came The Bangles with Susanna Hoffs, Michael Steele, Debbi and Vicky Peterson. Their biggest hit was Walk Like an Eygptian, but Eternal Flame was also big.

We move to the 1990′s and the great riotgrrl band, L7 led by the wonderful Donita Sparks. I wanted to marry Donita Sparks at one time. Anyway, this is Pretend We’re Dead.

This brings us to Luscious Jackson, which used to back The Beastie Boys, then branched out on their own. I saw them live in Providence and I loved every minute of their concert. I bring you City Song.

Shonen Knife from Japan got big in the United States when Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain asked them to open for his tour for “Nevermind”. I really got to love this band and it’s still going strong to this day. This is Tomato Head.

Videos of the Week – Chet Simmons’ Influence on Sports

With the death of Chet Simmons on Thursday, I thought I would bring you some of the programs that he helped to bring into fruition as an executive at both ABC and NBC Sports, then as the first President of a fledgling cable sports network known as ESPN. Without his guidance, ESPN would have never got off the ground. He gave ESPN the broadcast standards that are still held today. You may not know the name of Chet Simmons, but his influence on NBC Sports in the 1970′s and ESPN in its early infancy cannot be forgotten. So today, we salute Chet Simmons and look at the programs he helped develop over the years.

Simmons began his sports television career with an entity known as Sports Programs Inc. which would later evolve into ABC Sports in 1961. And with ABC, a 13 week summer replacement anthology series began known as Wide World of Sports. The replacement series did not off the air until 1997.

This is a promo that I think dates back to the late 1960′s or early 1970′s.

Here’s a longer version of the promo.

As you can see, Wide World spanned the globe to find the constant variety of sport, whether it be a track & field competition, tennis, surfing, Little League Baseball and the like. Here’s a close from 1983.

Simmons moved to NBC and was instrumental in keeping the network in the NFL, MLB, NCAA Tournament, Wimbledon and also helped to gain the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow. He also helped to develop NBC’s version of Wide World of Sports, SportsWorld. This is an open from 1987.

Here’s an open from the NFL on NBC from 1973. NBC had the AFC package on Sunday afternoons and alternated the Super Bowl every year with CBS. It also had a very good stable of announcers including Curt Gowdy, Jim Simpson, Jay Randolph, etc.

In the early 1970′s, Simmons helped NBC to secure the rights to the NHL and aired a Game of the Week plus the Stanley Cup playoffs. Here are the final seconds of Game 7 of the Philadelphia Flyers-New York Rangers and on the call were Tim Ryan and Ted Lindsay.

However, the NHL did not garner ratings for NBC (sound familiar?) and dropped the sport in 1975.

Throughout the 1970′s, NBC was the network for Major League Baseball and thus, the World Series. Here’s the open for Game 4 of the World Series between the Cincinnati Reds and Oakland A’s. The late Curt Gowdy opens the broadcast with a commercial billboard and then introduces the game. This is great stuff.

In 1979, Simmons moved to ESPN and helped to develop SportsCenter, the anchor of the network at the time. Here’s the very first SportsCenter broadcast on September 7, 1979, started by Lee Leonard who introduces George Grande at the anchor desk.

Among the people Simmons brought to ESPN from NBC included Jim Simpson, Paul Maguire and producer Scotty Connal. At ESPN, Simmons brought in Leonard and Grande whom you saw in the previous video. He also hired Bob Ley, Chris Berman, had a hand in hiring Cliff Drysdale and Dick Vitale. One of the early events Simmons obtained was the early round of the NCAA Tournament and here are two games which eventually led CBS to buy the Tournament outright and get the rights to the 63 games.

In 1981 in the Sweet Sixteen, BYU took on Notre Dame and ESPN showed this moment live to the country. Danny Ainge took the ball the length of the court to defeat the Fighting Irish coached by Digger Phelps. Ignore the intro and outro of BYU-TV.

In 1987, Princeton of the Ivy League and a #16 seed took on #1 seed Georgetown of the Big East at the Providence Civic Center. By this time, ESPN was well established in the NCAA Tournament and here are John Saunders and Dick Vitale talking about the game and highlights. The best part was Vitale’s stunned look at halftime when Princeton went into the locker room with the lead. Calling the game were the legendary Mike Gorman and Ron Perry.

Chet Simmons had the vision to air the NFL Draft, something which then-Commissioner Pete Rozelle was puzzled as to why anyone would be interested in doing so, but it turned out to be a truly made-for-TV event. Here’s a portion of coverage from 1983. George Grande, Bob Ley and Chris Berman are there for ESPN.

Simmons left ESPN in 1982 and became the first Commissioner of the United States Football League, originally a spring football entity and the first TV contracts were signed with ABC and ESPN. Here’s a game from 1984 between the Philadelphia Stars and Pittsburgh Maulers as called by ESPN original and former NBC Sports announcer Jim Simpson.

And here’s the USFL on ESPN open.

Simmons left the USFL after being forced out in 1984 and later became a consultant and professor. As you can see, Simmons’ legacy at three networks is a big one. And he cannot be ignored when looking at the history of sports television.

Videos of the Week – 2002 Winter Olympics

Last week, I took a break from doing the Videos of the Week and the look back at previous Winter Olympics. Time to do it again, this week, we look back at NBC’s first Winter Olympics since Sapporo, Japan in 1972. Back then, Curt Gowdy was the overall host for NBC. In 2002, it was Bob Costas. In 1972, much of the coverage, a total of 37 hours, was live via satellite as events were held in the morning which translated to primetime on the East Coast. In 2002, NBC aired 375.5 hours from Salt Lake, much of it live as the network was able to utilize its cable networks, MSNBC and CNBC to air hockey and other spillover events. As usual, NBC took the glamor events such as figure skating.

We’ll look at how NBC and CBC covered the events. Both networks were in the midst of long streaks of televising the Olympics and would continue throughout the decade.

This was the first Olympics after 9/11 and there were concerns how security would respond. It turned out to be ok. 

This is NBC’s official promo for the 2002 Salt Lake games that was given to the affiliates and sales clients. I like this.

This is NBC’s open for the games. Why it’s so small here, I’m not sure, but I’ll link you to a better quality version in a second. NBC borrowed Jim McKay to introduce various features during the Games and he joined Bob Costas and Katie Couric at the Opening Ceremony. Here, Jim starts the open and Bob joins later.

Here’s a better quality version. I can’t embed it, but you can see it here.

This is CBC’s open with veteran host Brian Williams at the helm.

Here’s how the Opening Ceremony began as CBC Sports’ Brian Williams is joined by CBC News anchor Peter Mansbridge.

This is the lighting of the Olympic cauldron which is always kept a secret and you can see who gets the torch at the end. Plenty of famous American Olympic athletes get to touch the torch as it makes its way through Eccles-Rice Stadium. Again, CBC’s Brian Williams and Peter Mansbridge are on the call.

During the 2002 Olympics, we had controversy early in the figure skating pairs competition. This is the NBC call of Canada’s Jamie Sale and David Pelletier in the free skate portion. They skate to Love Story and did it flawlessly. And when they got their marks, it was rather obvious something rotten in Utah was going on. However, as I look back, I think the judges actually got it right. Tom Hammond, the lovely Sandra Bezic and Scott Hamilton are in the booth and I like the way they remain quiet during the program, but then go crazy as the marks are given. I’ll explain my reasoning later.

From the Eurovision feed, this is the performance from Russian pair Yelena Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze who after looking at this, skated better than Sale & Pelletier. This is a beautiful performance.

And here is NBC’s Jimmy Roberts giving a report on the whole scandal using Days of Our Lives to help explain the whole thing. This was filed in 2006, but it’s the best way to explain what happened in 2002.

Let’s move to hockey, shall we? The men’s hockey tournament turned out to be one for the ages. The USA and Canada went undefeated and led to a gold medal showdown. The game did not disappoint. This video is from the CBC DVD and the call is by legendary Hockey Night in Canada team Bob Cole and Harry Neale.

Here’s the Coach’s Corner with Don Cherry and Ron MacLean trying to hold court from the USA-Canada gold medal game that aired in the first intermission on CBC. Don shows some of the greatest goals in Team Canada history.

I’m so happy I found an Olympic Coach’s Corner segment. Been looking for one for a long time.

This is CBC’s tribute to Team Canada for winning the gold medal in Olympic competition for the first time in 50 years.

Let’s go to short track speedskating and the 1,000 meters final in which Apolo Anton Ohno was the overwhelming favorite, but he fell leading the way for Australian Steven Bradbury to steal the gold. Ted Robinson and Eric Flaim are on the call for NBC.

This is Bob Costas interviewing Ohno the day after the 1,000 meters.

One more short track race, the men’s 1,500 meters final and Apolo Anton Ohno wins the gold here, but again, there’s some controversy as the Korean skater that crossed the line first was disqualified and Ohno who finished second was awarded the gold. This led to Koreans giving death threats to Ohno.

Here’s CBC review of the 16 days of competition with this video with the winning moments for Canada and other countries, but this is mostly Canada-centric.

Videos of the Week – 1994 Winter Olympics

Time for another edition of the Videos of the Week as I get you ready for the Winter Olympics in Vancouver on February 12. I’ve already presented a look back at the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary through the eyes of ABC Sports. And last week, there was the flashback to the 1992 Winter Games in Albertville.

Now we go to 1994 in Lillehammer, Norway, probably one of the best run Olympics and one that really had the community feel. This was the year the International Olympic Committee separated the Summer and Winter Games, running them in two year cycles instead of a full four year cycle. It also gave the IOC the opportunity to fully concentrate on the Olympics in separate years instead of running themselves thin doing the Summer and Winter Olympiads in the same years.

Thanks to winning the bid for the 1992 Winter Olympics, CBS nabbed the U.S. rights to Lillehammer. CTV had the Canadian rights and as usual, BBC through the European Broadcasting Union aired the Games in the UK.

I’ll begin with a CBS Olympic ID used in advance of the Olympics.

Here’s how CTV opened its coverage for the 17 Days of Glory in Lillehammer. It would be the last time CTV aired the Games in Canada until this year.

We have the opening to BBC Olympic Grandstand with its standard music for the Winter Olympics. Steve Rider and Sue Barker are the hosts.

This was the opening of coverage for the Olympics in the home country of Norway.

I’m so happy to have Olympic hockey video. This marked the final year of “amateur” hockey in the Olympics. Four years later in Nagano, NHL players would be allowed to participate and it’s been that way ever since. In 1994, Sweden was the favorite for the gold medal. Canada was not expected to get to the gold medal game, but it managed to get there and to my dismay, the game was decided in a shootout. Peter Forsberg and Paul Kariya had the last opportunity to win the game for Sweden and Canada respectively. You see the result. My thanks to Keith Stewart of The Cycle blog for finding this video and sending me the link. Familar NHL voices Mike Emrick and John Davidson are on the call for CBS.

One of the great stories of the 1994 Olympics was U.S. speedskater Dan Jansen. Up until the 1,000 meters, Jansen had lost or fell in every one of his Olympic races. His sister had died before his first race in 1988 and Jansen was considered the odds-on favorite to win the gold, however, he fell in the 500 meters and then again in the 1,000 meters. In 1992 in Albertville, Jansen finished out of the medals in both races despite being again, the odds-on favorite to win gold. In 1994, he was considered snake-bitten and finishing 8th after slipping in the 500 meters did not help matters. His last race of his career was the 1,000 meters and it was not his best distance. Dick Stockton called it for CBS, but we don’t have that video. We do have a Norwegian feature on Dan including the call of the race in the Viking Ship arena in Hamar. 

One of the bigger stories in the Olympic Games was the whole Tonya Harding-Nancy Kerrigan affair. Before the U.S. Nationals in Detroit, someone hit Kerrigan in the knee injuring her and preventing Nancy from skating in the competition. It was later determined that Tonya’s husband, Jeff Gillooly and her bodyguard, Shawn Eckardt hired someone to whack Nancy with a club. Tonya won the nationals, but the U.S. Figure Skating Association allowed Nancy to go to Lillehammer. So we go to the women’s free skate in the figure skating competition. By this time, Tonya has no shot to win after a fall in the short program. But as she did frequently in the past, Tonya had to have some drama. Verne Lundquist and Scott Hamilton are on the call for CBS.

So Josee Chouinard of Canada had to hurry to skate next after all that and she did not do well because she had to hurry to the ice. Once Tonya got her lace fixed, she went back out to the ice and this is how she did.

She was such a drama queen and as Scott Hamilton said, only these things happened to her. Let’s go to Nancy Kerrigan’s performance and unlike Tonya, Nancy skated the program of her life. Up until this performance, Nancy had had problems with her nerves and she nailed her program.

But it was Oksana Baiul of Ukraine who won the gold medal. She had a problem early in her program, but she threw in a triple jump late knowing that she needed it to win the free skate and the gold medal. By doing that, she rightly surpassed Kerrigan and won the competition.

On the last day of coverage, CBS put together a closing montage using its Olympic theme.

CBS would have one more Olympic Games to cover in the 1990′s and that would be in Nagano, Japan. We’ll have videos from CBS, CBC and the BBC next Sunday.

Videos of the Week – Fang’s Bites Favorite Beatles Songs

Time to do a Videos of the Week and since Sirius XM does “Breakfast with The Beatles” at 9 a.m. on Underground Garage every Sunday, I figured I’d give you some of my all-time favorite songs from my all-time favorite band. Many of these I have posted before, but I will do a countdown from 10 until 1.

Let’s start with number 10 and Penny Lane. This video comes directly from Apple Corp, The Beatles’ own record company so no threat of it being taken down.

From Help!, this is my 9th favorite Beatles song (no, it’s not Revolution No. 9. No. 9. No.9), You’ve Got To Hide Your Love Away.

This is from the movie and album, “Let It Be”. The famous rooftop concert on top of Apple Records in London in 1969. This is “I’ve Got A Feeling” at number 8.

Another video directly from the Apple Corp. vaults. “I Am The Walrus” from “Magical Mystery Tour”. This is my 7th favorite song.

At number 6, here’s “Strawberry Fields Forever”. Great song.

These are The Beatles performing “Hey Jude” on The David Frost Show at number 5. Note the Al Franken look-a-like at 4:23.

At number 4, this is a live performance of “All You Need Is Love” for the first ever live global satellite link. If you saw “The Beatles Anthology”, you’ll know that it was broadcast to 26 countries and 400 million people watching live.

Videos of the Week – Tour de France

As the Tour de France ends today, I thought I would take a look back at how the Tour was covered on US TV some two decades ago. Thanks to Lance Armstrong, the popularity of the Tour has led to wall-to-wall coverage on Versus.

When CBS had the exclusive rights, it would only show coverage on weekends and maybe an hour recap on CBS Sports Spectacular. For many viewers, it was the only way to see the Tour. There was no cable coverage, ESPN had not seen the viability of the event. When ABC Sports took the rights of the Tour in the early 1990′s, it did similar coverage, only on the weekends.

Then a network called OLN, Outdoor Life Network got the rights in the late 1990′s and with the rise of Lance Armstrong, showed coverage every day and when he started winning, the awareness of the Tour rose as well. And of course, OLN became Versus and the Tour is a mainstay of the network every July.

But let’s take a look at how CBS covered the Tour de France in 1988, 21 years ago. Tim Brandt was the host in this segment. And the music was done by John Tesh, who many of you may not know began first as a TV news reporter, then moved to CBS Sports in the early 1980′s, then when on to Entertainment Tonight and called the 1992 and 1996 Olympics gymnastics competition for NBC.

See how different the coverage was back then. This is how Tim sets the scene for CBS’ start of three weeks of coverage.

This is where we see the legendary Phil Liggett explaining the players and what we’ll see coming into the 1988 Tour de France.

We continue with the scenesetters. In this part, we have interviews with former Tour winner Greg Lemond, the first U.S. winner of the Tour.

Here’s more of the scenesetter from CBS. Tim Brandt again is the main host.

CBS recaps the first week. Tim and Phil are your narrators.

Here’s more from Week 1 of the Tour.

Here’s another opening montage for CBS. This is leading to the final prologue to Paris. Of course, some things never change at the Tour as you’ll see.

And we move to the final week of the Tour with Tim and Phil. Again CBS recaps from the beginning. The music is from John Tesh.

CBS now goes to the Final Stage.

And we conclude the Final Stage.

That concludes your look at the Tour de France on CBS from 1988.

Videos of the Week – Rage Against the Machine

Two years ago, on my birthday no less, I posted a RATM-themed Videos of the Week so I figured it was time to do so again.

It’s time and why not? No real reason other than Rage Against the Machine is one of my all-time favorite bands.

I’ll start with Freedom off RATM’s self-titles debut album.

This is the awesome Renegades of Funk.

A live performance of Guerilla Radio.

Here’s Bombtrack

Another live performance. This is Know Your Enemy.

A rare live performance from 1993 doing Bullet in the Head.

And this is No Shelter performed at the Tibetan Freedom Concert.

Finally, a bonus video. Someone at YouTube made this to Gil-Scott Heron’s The Revolution Will Not Be Televised.

That’s it. I’m gone for most of today. I’ll be back tonight.

Videos of the Week – Farrah Fawcett

Thanks to Ian Bethune over at Sox & Dawgs for suggesting this edition of Videos of the Week.

I was going to post Michael Jackson videos, but with everyone doing some type of tribute, I decided to go in another direction and I was stuck for a subject, then Ian tweeted me with the idea so thanks to him, I’ll take the opportunity to remember the person who had the misfortune of passing away on the same day as Michael, Farrah Fawcett.

As a kid growing up in the 1970′s, Farrah was the most beautiful woman on whom I had ever laid eyes. Most of my friends had this famous poster tacked up on their wall.

Gorgeous naturally, but I had to be different. I looked in a catalog and found this poster and tacked it up on my wall.

To me it was just as good. But the shot above it was the iconic one and became the best selling poster of all time. What can you say? It was great.

Farrah became famous during her one season on Charlie’s Angels in 1976-77. She was the reason that most people watched. And her hairstyle was copied all over. She left the show for a movie career that did not pan out, but she remained famous and after doing “The Burning Bed” and “Extremities,” she got the respect she was looking for.

I would give you clips of Farrah in Charlie’s Angels, but I can’t because they’re copyrighted. You can see entire episodes of the first season of Charlie’s Angels on YouTube. All of them are there. So you can see them at your leisure.

What I will do is embed some commercials and appearances that Farrah did before she hit it big and you will see how absolutely stunning she was.

This is the famous Noxema commercial she did with Joe Namath, I want to say this was done around 1970 or ’71.

This is from 1970 and there’s that famous smile in an Ultra Brite toothpaste commercial. You can hear a trace of Farrah’s Texas accent.

Also from the early 1970′s is an ad Farrah did for Lady Shick’s Speed Styler hair dryer. Angela Cartwright who was in the “Lost In Space” TV series is also in the ad.

The one ad that really got people’s attention was this ad Farrah did for the Mercury Cougar. This came out in 1975, the year before Charlie’s Angels debuted. And she still did Mercury Cougar ads until 1977.

After she hit it big with Charlie’s Angels, a lot of focus was on Farrah’s hair. So she signed with Faberge and naturally endorsed shampoo.

Do you want to see Farrah on a TV show before Charlie’s Angels? Here she is in an episode of “The Partridge Family”. Note a very young Danny Bonaduce before he became extremely crazy. And Farrah is gorgeous, of course.

And here’s Farrah from the Dating Game back in 1969. The host is Jim Lange. Note the three losers who try to get a date.

Finally, this is a CBS segment from some type of retrospective for 1978. The late Telly Savalas narrates and you’ll see Farrah’s ex-husband Lee Majors in there as well.

Farrah will definitely be missed. She exuded class and grace. It was sad to hear the news of her cancer and even sadder to hear of her passing. At 62, she still looked good. That concludes this look back at Farrah Fawcett’s early work.

Videos of the Week – Wimbledon

One event on my summer sports calendar that I look forward to every year is Wimbledon. It happens at the right time, right as we officially hit summer and the weather gets warmer. Or at least most years, the weather gets warmer. I don’t know about this year, but it usually does.

Thanks to various backdoor websites, I’ve been able to watch the BBC’s coverage the last three years and I’ve totally enjoyed watching commercial free tennis. Plus the approach to the matches is much different than ESPN2 or NBC. And there’s John McEnroe on the BBC which is totally enjoyable as well. The Beeb amasses a very good commentary team including Tracy Austin, Boris Becker, Tim Henman, Virginia Wade and so many others. For two weeks, it’s tennis heaven.

And when the network caps off its coverage, it puts together a video to different songs every year. Let’s go over the different years. And I’ll go backwards.

Here’s BBC Sport’s promo for this year’s Wimbledon coverage with John McEnroe doing the voiceover.

This is last year’s closing montage after the epic Rafael Nadal-Roger Federer match. Hostess Sue Barker says goodbye and we go into Jamie Callum’s These Are the Days. My favorite part is at 1:19 when the girl disses her boyfriend. Classic.

Let’s go to 2007, the final year for Tim Henman and the last time Roger Federer won the Big W and it was over Rafa. And there seemed to be lots of rain this particular year. The song is “Let There Be Love” sung by the legendary Nat King Cole.

In 2005, it was abnormally hot in London and Venus Williams won the ladies final and Roger Federer was in the midst of total domination at Wimbledon. The song is “That’s Life” by Francis Albert Sinatra.

Let’s go back to 1999 when Lindsay Davenport won Wimbledon over Steffi Graf and Pete Sampras defeated his good friend, Andre Agassi. The BBC used three different songs to put this montage together.

Here’s the montage from 1996. I recognize Tim Henman, Andre Agassi, Michael Chang, Monica Seles, Arancha Sanchez-Vicario, Mary-Jo Fernandez, Boris Becker and Pete Sampras.

And lastly, we go back to 1988. This is a long video and had to broken up in two parts. This is fun to watch. You had Martina Navratilova, John McEnroe, Jimmy Connors, Steffi Graf, Michael Chang, Boris Becker, Ivan Lendl, Jennifer Capriati and Hana Mandlikova. The BBC host for this event was Des Lynam.

And here’s part 2. Chris Evert makes an appearance. It’s rather long. And this is the year Steffi Graf won the Grand Slam Plus One which included the gold medal at the Summer Olympics in Seoul. And it cuts off before you see Stefan Edberg defeating Boris Becker. Why I know these off the top of my head scares me.

Finally, here’s the 1987 montage using Huey Lewis & The News’ “Walking on a Thin Line”? I’m traumatized. I’ve recognized, Martina, Jimmy, Yannick Noah, Boris Becker, Ivan Lendl, Chrissie and big time tennis fan Princess Diana.

That’s going to do it. I hope you’ve enjoyed this walk back in time through the Wimbledon montages.

Fang’s Bites Musical Interlude – Fleetwood Mac

I shouldn’t date myself, but I’m going to anyway. When I was in high school, the one record album everyone had to have was Fleetwood Mac “Rumours“. Every song on that album was strong and there wasn’t a weak tune in the bunch. From the 1970′s to the mid-1980′s, this band was quite prolific. With every band, there’s infighting, backstabbing and in some cases like in Fleetwood Mac, incestuous relationships, divorces, breakups, reconciliations and then back together for good. For Fleetwood Mac, multiply that times 100. There isn’t enough time in the world to go over the stories of Fleetwood Mac. But the one thing that lives on is the great music and the band still tours. Check out the official band website for more information about the history and albums.

When I did Videos of the Week this morning, there were two Fleetwood Mac songs that were used in the movie, “Slap Shot” and I had written that there will be a Fleetwood Mac Musical Interlude down the road. Well, what better time than now for a Fleetwood Mac Musical Interlude.

In their heyday, Fleetwood Mac was comprised of Mick Fleetwood, John McVie, Christine McVie, Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks. There were other incarnations with different band members, but the core of Mick Fleetwood and John McVie have always been with the group.

Let’s start off with a great live performance of “Dreams,” the big single from “Rumours”. I had a big crush on Stevie Nicks at the time.

From Fleetwood Mac’s 1977 tour of Japan, this is “The Chain” also from “Rumours”. The group’s harmony was second to none at the time. Lindsey Buckingham is on lead vocals here with Stevie Nicks and Christine McVie on background.

And a clip from the “Rosebud” documentary in 1977. This is the fourth single off “Rumours” called “You Make Loving Fun.” Christine McVie leads. She wrote songs based on what she was feeling at the time.

From 1982, Fleetwood Mac sings “Go Your Own Way” on its tour promoting “Mirage.” Lindsey is again on the lead vocals. I believe this was taped in Los Angeles for HBO. You can see how hard the band worked on stage.

Another clip from the HBO concert, here’s the big single off “Mirage.” It’s called”Gypsy.” Lindsey Buckingham is awesome on guitar.

One of my all-time Fleetwood Mac songs is “Sara” off the double album “Tusk“, the epic follow up to “Rumours.” This is another live performance, this one in 1979 promoting “Tusk.” A quick story. I had a crush on a girl named Sarah at my high school so I tried singing the chorus to her. She made the right move by running away. Needless to say, Stevie Nicks sings way much better than me.

Here’s “Don’t Stop” performed with the help of the USC Marching Band. Nice to see Christine McVie singing here.

This is the original reason why the USC Marching Band was in that concert. Fleetwood Mac used the band for “Tusk”, the title track off “Tusk.” This is the arrangement of the Marching Band at Dodger Stadium and it became the official video of the song. Stevie can wave a nasty baton.

This is “Little Lies” from Christine McVie off “Tango in The Night.”

I don’t know exactly what year this is from, but this is Stevie and Lindsey performing “Landslide”, a song that has been covered by the Smashing Pumpkins and the Dixie Chicks. While both covers are good, I will always prefer Stevie’s version. It’s off the 1975 self-titled “Fleetwood Mac” album.

One last song from Fleetwood Mac. This is “Angel” from “Heroes Are Hard To Find.” I believe this song was done by the incarnation before Stevie and Lindsey came to the band. But you can how Stevie makes it her own and how she became a sex symbol for the band.

Ok, I can find plenty of more songs for you, but I have some work to do. I’ll be back with links later.

Videos of the Week – Slap Shot Soundtrack

I just finished watching Slap Shot so I figured I would give you the songs from the movie. When you think about it, not only was the movie great, but so was the soundtrack. The cast was really good starting from the late Paul Newman to Strother Martin to Jennifer Warren to a young Lindsay Crouse and I didn’t realize that Swoozie Kurtz was also in the movie. Of course there’s the Hanson brothers as well. Great movie that still stands up today.

So using the movie’s soundtrack, I’ll give you the videos to the songs that were in the movie.

I’ll start with Elton John performing “Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word.” This is from a performance for the BBC in 1976.

I can’t believe I found something from NBC’s old Midnight Special program. Of course, it ran at 1 a.m., not at midnight, but that didn’t stop NBC from running it. This is Fleetwood Mac performing “Rhiannon.” The quality is very good.

Another classic song from Fleetwood Mac, “Say That You Love Me” performed live in 1977. I think we’ll have a Fleetwood Mac Musical Interlude down the road.

Probably the worst song of the bunch, but still not bad. Leo Sayer in a rare promotional video doing “You Make Me Feel Like Dancing.”

This was the hardest to find, but I did manage to get this one. It’s Sonny James doing “A Little Bit of Saskatoon.”

Last but certainly not least, the great Maxine Nightingale with the signature song, “Right Back Where We Started From.” This goes back to 1976! And you have scenes from the movie in this clip!

And those are all of the songs used in the movie. Back in the 1970′s, movie studios rarely released soundtracks. Every once in a while, a single would get released, but it was rare for an entire soundtrack to be pressed. Now, every movie has at least one soundtrack CD. But I digress.

Great to have the music of Slap Shot. I hope you enjoyed the videos.

Videos of the Week – Peter Puck

Since last week was the debut of “The Adventures of Digger and Friends” on Fox’s NASCAR coverage, let’s go to one of the cartoons that probably started this whole Fox trend of using animated characters to help promote its sports properties. As a kid, I got to watch Peter Puck when NBC had the NHL in the 1970′s. CBC also used Peter Puck and the little guy actually became popular. Only 9 episodes of Peter Puck were produced by cartoon powerhouse Hanna-Barbera, but as you can imagine, they left a mark.

So let’s take a look at the episodes.

In Episode 1, Peter explains how to play the game by going over the offsides and icing rules.

In the 2nd installment of Peter Puck, he talks about epuipment, officials and players.

In episode 3, Peter discusses pucks, stakes and sticks.

In the 4th episode, Peter explains penalties, signs and fines.

Here’s a quick :30 vignette about the Stanley Cup.

That seems to be all of the episodes that are available for now. If I find more, I’ll put them up. If you’re interested, you can buy the complete series on DVD.

Videos of the Week – B.J. Fletcher Private Eye

Time for another four episodes of B.J. Fletcher: Private Eye. Last week, I posted the first four episodes of Season 1. Time for four more.

Episode 5 – In the case of “Mr. Christie and his Wandering Aperture”, Fletch (Lindy Zucker) and George (Dana Puddicombe) go undercover at Dominic Christie’s photography studio. Once there they set to work to uncover proof on Marilyn’s cheating husband (Stuart Dowling). Unfortunately for our intrepid investigator, things don’t go quite according to plan.

In episode 6, Fletch sends George undercover at Dominic’s studio. With the help of her good pal Joe Magnum (Karim Morgan) Fletch sets into motion a plan that’s sure to entrap the cheating husband.

To episode 7 in which Fletch while trying to wrap up the case of “Mr. Christie and his Wandering Aperture”, ends up putting her best friend George in harms way when the undercover mission goes awry!

And our last episode for today, “The Little Lost Lesbian: Run, Jenna, Run”, Fletch and her assistant Georgia Drew are drawn into the seedy underbelly of municipal politics when they help a local politician’s wife find her missing daughter. Little does Fletcher know a dark figure from her past will thwart her at every turn!

Next week, the last episodes of Season 1. For more information on B.J. Fletcher: Private Eye, head to the official website.

Videos of the Week – B.J. Fletcher Private Eye

Today, I’m going off the beaten path with the sports videos and I’m going to give some love to a web series that I’ve been following since last year. Granted, some web series are not very good and don’t deserve your attention, but this one does. It’s done with virtually no budget and from the first webisode through its second season, I’ve seen constant improvement. Plus, I like the cast and I like that the series shares a sense of humor with the viewer.

So over the next few weeks, I’m going to run webisodes from the series for the Videos of the Week. I’ll get back to sports in time for the Super Bowl. I have a plan, so indulge me for this month.

Some background on the series. B.J. Flectcher Private Eye won the AfterEllen contest to find the next great web series. It’s been featured on the site since last May and a new webisode is released every week. It’s about the barely competent B.J. Fletcher and her friend, Georgia Drew as they attempt to solve cases. Filmed completely on location in Toronto, it’s produced and directed by Regan Latimer. Lindy Zucker plays B.J. and the very delightful Dana Puddicome plays Georgia. I totally love this series and wanted to share it with my readers. To get more information on B.J. Fletcher Private Eye, you can head to the official website. I’ve added the site to the Friends of Fang’s Bites that you see on the left. So without further ado, I’ll give you the first four episodes of the series. Next week, I’ll post the next group of four episodes of the first season, then in two weeks, the final episodes of the first season. And in three weeks, I’ll begin posting the second season.

In this first webisode, we meet B.J. and Georgia and B.J.’s former girlfriend, Marjorie (played by Natasha Gordon). B.J. agrees to take her case, but gets more than she bargained for.

In part 2, after a night of reminiscing, B.J. sets to work in “Agatha and her Leaky Empire”. When Fletcher and George go on stakeout, they make a shocking discovery.

In part 3, Fletch decides to confront of her ex-girlfriend, Marjorie after finding out she is more involved in “Agatha and her Leaky Empire” than she’s letting on. Later as Fletch tries to wrap up the case, she brings George in on a fact-finding mission.

After wrapping up “Agatha and her Leaky Empire”, Fletch is looking forward to some time off, but her plans are cut short as trouble once again finds its way to B.J. Once again, Fletch takes a reluctant George on a recon mission.

I’ll post the next four episodes next week. Once again, for more information on the series, head on over to the official website.

Videos of the Week – Howard Cosell

There’s no discounting the impact that Howard Cosell had on sports television in the 1970′s to the mid-1980′s. Whenever ABC had a big event, Cosell would be similar to what Bob Costas is today. He could give perspective and be called upon to interview the heavy hitters. Granted at the end of his career, Cosell became a bitter man, but when he was in his prime, Cosell was a giant in the business. While many critics were often brutal to Cosell, one cannot diminish his intelligence nor his impact on TV.

So I’ll bring you some interesting clips on Cosell from his career at ABC Sports, then as a columnist for the New York Daily News (that’s right, he became a columnist briefly, but later left).

This clip is from 1973. “Monday Night … Foot-BALL” as Howard would say, the Pittsburgh Steelers taking on the Miami Dolphins at the old Orange Bowl. Howard does the pregame introducing the storyline for the game, the start of Joe Gilliam at quarterback for Pittsburgh in place of Terry Bradshaw. Note the MNF Open with Frank Gifford, Howard and Dandy Don Meredith.

This is the cold open. A bit different than what you saw in the Pittsburgh-Miami clip.

In 1974, Howard was visited by John Lennon of “The original Beatles!” in the booth of Monday Night Football. Hey, didn’t we complain about celebrities in the booth on MNF during the last two seasons?

Then cut to 1980 during the New England Patriots-Miami Dolphins game, Howard was the one who broke the news that Lennon was shot by John David Chapman. I can’t embed it, but I’ll link you to the clip.

Howard was also known for calling boxing and in 1976 at the Montreal Olympics, Cosell was there to call the Americans harvest of five gold medals in the ring including one by Sugar Ray Leonard over Andres Aldama of Cuba. George Foreman was Howard’s analyst.

But Howard’s best known call was “Down goes Frazier! Down goes Frazier! Down goes Frazier!” George Foreman’s utter destruction of Joe Frazier in the World Heavyweight Championship in Kingston, Jamaica back in 1973. Cosell’s call was perfect and he was truly in his prime.

To 1981 and Howard hosted a prefight interview with Sugar Ray Leonard and Thomas “Hit Man” Hearns on ABC’s Wide World of Sports, just days before the two men fought their welterweight fight in Las Vegas. First, Howard did a prefight tale of the tape.

And here’s the continuation of the prefight interview with Hearns and Leonard.

A few weeks ago, I did a Videos of the Week feature on “Battle of the Network Stars” which Howard hosted from 1976 until 1985. This is from 1978 and Kevin Dobson of CBS’ “Kojak” battling Larry Wilcox of NBC’s CHiP’s” in the obstacle course. I believe Suzanne Somers is Howard’s “analyst”.

I wish I could find Howard doing ABC’s Monday Night Baseball or him in the World Series from 1977, 1979, 1981 or 1983, but no one seems to have one. If you have a clip, I would like to post it in a future Videos of the Week. E-mail me if you know where to find it or if you have one. It would be great just to hear Howard’s voice talk about Pete Rose or Reggie Jackson.

Now let’s go to a commercial from 1986, one year removed from Cosell leaving ABC Sports, this is Howard and Mike Lupica hyping the New York Daily News. Notice Lupica typing on the keyboard, but Cosell is not. Even back then, Lupica appears insufferable.

That’s it. Enjoy.

Videos of the Week: Battle of the Network Stars

I have to thank my friend, Rick Lacroix for sending me a Bill Simmons column from ESPN: The Magazine. The column describes Simmons’ favorite YouTube clip, a moment from the great 1970′s trash sports show, “Battle of the Network Stars” in which the big three networks, ABC, CBS and NBC each sent a team of their biggest stars to compete in athletic competitions. The network which won the most points would be declared the winner of the competition.

It started in 1976 and lasted into the mid 1980′s. It was classic TV. You had ABC Sports producing the events. You had Howard Cosell who hosted and called the play-by-play. You had out-of-shape actors trying to run and throw. You had sexy women like Farrah Fawcett-Majors and Cheryl Ladd competing. Basically, it was classic TV.

The video Simmons had in his column is from the very first “Battle” special in November 1976 and Farrah Fawcett-Majors from Charlie’s Angels was involved. Take a look at a controversy involving NBC’s Robert Conrad, ABC’s Gabe Kaplan and CBS’ Telly Savalas and the politically incorrect language would not be even spoken if we ever had a similar event take place today.

From that same 1976 special, this is Farrah Fawcett-Majors doing a “Closest to the pin” competition. Howard is calling it with ABC golf analyst Bob Rosberg. So funny to see ABC Sports treating this so seriously. And Howard is fawning over Farrah.

Someone put together all of Cheryl Ladd’s segments on the November 1977 special. Cheryl replaced Farrah on Charlie’s Angels that year.

From 1980, Catherine Bach from “Dukes of Hazard” goes into the dunk tank and Howard’s co-host was Joyce DeWitt of “Three’s Company”. Gil Gerard of “Buck Rogers” is trying to dunk her.

Great stuff. I do wish ESPN Classic would put these back on in their entirety. Next week, I’ll have a different theme.

Videos of the Week: 1990′s Dance Party, Part 4

Ok, unless something major happens, I plan for this segment to be the last 1990′s video dance party post for a few weeks. However, I do have a lot to cover. Next week, I move onto a new subject and it’s going to quite interesting, but that’s next week. First, we do our fourth installment of the 1990′s videos. This is the first part, second part and third part.

From one of my favorite movies of the 1990′s, “Go”, this is “Steal My Sunshine” from Len.

Also from “Go”, this is Magic Carpet Ride redone by Phillip Steir and this video features some of the cast from the movie.

Let’s go to OMC and its song, “How Bizarre”.

From the New Radicals, this is “You Get What You Give”. This is one of my favorite songs of the last decade.

From the Red Hot Chili Peppers and the soundtrack to “Beavis and Butthead Do America”, this is “Rollercoaster”. This rocks.

I would be remiss if I didn’t post the video that made the Chili Peppers on MTV, “Give It Away”. I have to admit, my sister turned me on to the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

As the 1990′s were wrapping up, Blink 182 was beginning to hit it big and this song, “What’s My Age” struck a chord with a lot of people, especially me. Great song. Great video. Makes fun of The Gap swing commercials of the time and you’ll see cameos of Hal Sparks and Jim Rome.

I can’t go without paying tribute to Nirvana which really started the 1990′s Seattle rock movement with “Smells Like Teen Spirit”. Too bad Kurt Cobain could not kill the demons that were affecting him. He left behind a lot of great music.

When Hole debuted, people were skeptical because it was thought Courtney Love was gravytraining on Kurt Cobain’s fame, but after listening to “Live Through This”, it was apparent that Courtney had some talent of her own. This is “Malibu” from “Celebrity Skin”.

One more Hole video. This is a live performance of “Violet”.

Also from Seattle came the great band Soundgarden whose album, Superunknown was one of the best albums I have ever heard from beginning to end. This is “Black Hole Sun”.

This is Live and “I Alone” off of another extremely strong CD, “Throwing Copper”.

Of course, the 1990′s gave us Smashing Pumpkins and this is my favorite song of theirs, “Cherub Rock”. Again, my sister turned me on to them. My sister was really on the cutting edge back then. This is a very trippy video.

And finally, this is “Tonight, Tonight, Tonight”, another trippy Smashing Pumpkins production, but again, a great song.

That’s going to conclude the look back at the 90′s. I may return to this down the line, but I’ll have a different theme for next week’s videos.

Videos of the Week: 1990′s Dance Party, Part 3

Ok, this is the third installment of videos of my favorite groups from the 1990′s. You can check back here and here for my previous picks. This week, Henry Rollins, the Crystal Method and a bunch more from the 1990′s.

First, Henry Rollins, formerly of the 1980′s Hardcore band Black Flag went solo in the 1990′s and gave himself a name for his spoken word tours. But he always stayed close to his musical roots and this is one of my favorite songs, “Low Self Opinion”.

One of my favorite from the 1990′s has to be White Zombie. This is “More Human Than Human”. This totally rocks.

Time for some electronic music and we go to The Crystal Method with “Name of the Game”.

Here’s The Chemical Brothers with “Block Rockin Beats”.

Here’s 2:01 of pure ecstasy, at least for me. Blur and “Song 2″.

Now I’ll slow it down a bit with The Verve and the cover of the Rolling Stones’ “Bittersweet Symphony”. You may remember this was used in the great movie “Cruel Intentions”.

I’ve been downhearted baby. Yes, it’s Primitive Radio Gods sampling B.B. King in “Standing Outside a Broken Phone Booth (with money in my pocket)”.

Let’s go to Jewel whom I saw in Providence at the old Lupo’s (and I have the picture from the meet & greet with her to prove it). This is so much different from “Intuition”. This is what made her famous, her folksy “Who Will Save Your Soul”.

Videos of the Week: 1990′s Dance Party, Part 2

Last week, I did a 1990′s Dance Party which included a lot of fun videos. Time for some more videos.

I’ll start with the lovely Julianna Hatfield of Julianna Hatfield Three doing her big hit, “My Sister”. Interesting thing, Julianna doesn’t have a sister. I like the fact that this is the raw video.

Here’s another band I got to see live in Providence, Luscious Jackson doing “City Song”. Love the scenes of New York in this video.

From Chicago, this is Veruca Salt doing “Seether”. This is the original incarnation of the band. They were so good.

Shirley Manson may be known for being on Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, but in the 1990′s she was the sex goddess of Garbage. I loved this group. I was hoping to see them in Providence, but never got the chance. In an interview in Details magazine (when the mag was actually good), Shirley was quoted as saying, “I want a man who will let me pee in his belly button.” Back in the 90′s, I thought that quote was hot. Now, not so much, but back then, quite a lot. This is “I’m Only Happy When It Rains”. Shirley is a big NBA fan.

Here’s a bonus Garbage video, “I Think I’m Paranoid”.

When Fox was an emerging network, it was dependent on teen dramas like Beverly Hills 90210, but then grew up with the great show, Melrose Place and it broke several hits like “Here and Now” from Letters To Cleo featuring the lovely Kay Hanley of Boston.

In 1992, the movie “Singles” tried to capture the mood of twenty somethings living in Seattle. It was an ok movie, but the soundtrack like in all of Cameron Crowe movies was spectacular. This is Paul Westerberg doing “Dyslexic Heart”. When I grow up, I want to be Paul Westerberg. He’s on a higher plain than many of us.

One more from Paul. This is “World Class Fad”.

Now to some electronic music. I’m A Firestarter (hey, hey, hey). Yes, it’s The Prodigy. My friend, Linda hates this band. I admit, they’re damned ugly, but I like the music.

And here’s “Breathe”. “You’re the Victim!”

You can’t mention The Prodigy without their controversial song, “Smack My Bitch Up”. I’m going to embed the video, but I will warn you that this is the uncensored version and is definitely Not Safe for Work. Don’t click on it if you’re offended by nudity.

That will do it for now. Next week, I’ll give you the Chemical Brothers, Henry Rollins, White Zombie, Crystal Method, The Offspring and a bunch more.