Fang's Bites

Doing Some Quick Wednesday Linkage

Lots of stuff going on here and it’s prevented me from providing links. I’ll do some now while I can.

Anthony Crupi of Adweek reports that the NFL has put the kybosh on a new Thursday Night Football package until next season.

Michael Smith and John Ourand of the Sports Business Journal report that with Pittsburgh and Syracuse joining the ACC, ESPN and the conference are reopening negotiations on the TV contract that took effect just this month.

In Media Bistro, Marcus Vanderberg has part one of his interview with embattled writer Jay “The Rat” Mariotti.

And Marcus has part two of his talk with Jay The Rat in Fishbowl LA.

Over to Michael Hiestand of USA Today who writes that a family medical emergency is preventing Ernie Johnson, Jr. from participating in this year’s MLB Postseason for TBS.

Michael looks at the ratings from some of this past weekend’s events.

Mike McCarthy at USA Today tells us about the athletes who will pose nude for ESPN The Magazine’s Body issue.

Erik Malinowski of Wired magazine profiles the great Timothy Burke of the Mocksession site and SportsGrid.

The Big Lead notes that ESPN sideline reporter Jenn Brown is now a paid endorser for GNC products.

Deadspin’s A.J. Daulerio is amazed at how Steve Bartman has managed to remain anonymous since his fateful failed attempt to catch a foul ball during Game 6 of the 2003 National League Championship Series.

Dan Fogarty at SportsGrid has video of a Dallas TV sports anchor creating the word “shart” on live TV.

The aforementioned Timothy Burke in SportsGrid has video from Germany of a reporter inadvertently trying to out Chelsea soccer star Didier Drogba.

At espnW, Sarah Spain writes about attending this week’s espnW: Women + Sports Summit which had a plethora of superstars from both media and sports.

Mike Reynolds from Multichannel News writes that ESPN’s Monday Night Football hit its biggest audience of the season in NFL Week 3.

CNBC’s Darren Rovell (and now officially a Friend of Fang’s Bites) writes that the toning shoe market could take a substantial hit after the Feds settled a case with Reebok on one its shoe claims.

Newsday’s Neil Best wonders if this is the last season for the Yankees on WCBS-AM.

Neil says SNY’s Mets announcers were critical of the team for taking out shortstop Jose Reyes after the first inning of today’s game against the Reds.

Neil says Ron Darling closed out a TBS media conference call with a line that only he picked up.

Pete Dougherty in the Albany Times Union says the Capital Region’s NFL fans should all be happy with the TV schedule this week.

Pete has this week’s college football TV schedule.

Crossing Broad has a new Philadelphia media feud for us to follow.

In the Washington Post, Dan Steinberg of the DC Sports Bog says ESPN’s Tony Kornheiser and Mike Wilbon weren’t too enthused by London Fletcher’s pregame speech before the Washington-Dallas Monday Night Football game.

David Barron of the Houston Chronicle says the Texans did well in the local ratings again.

Mel Bracht in the Daily Oklahoman writes that Oklahoma State has decided against going for pay per view for one of its games next month.

Mel notes that college football topped the local ratings last weekend.

Bob Wolfley of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel says TBS and MLB have yet to announce a time for the Brewers League Division Series game on Saturday.

Bob says Brewers voice Brian Anderson will call the Yankees LDS series for TBS starting on Friday.

Bill Novak of the Capital (WI) Times writes that ESPN’s College GameDay has chosen its location on the Wisconsin to broadcast for this Saturday’s show.

Tom Hoffarth of the Los Angeles Daily News looks at TBS’ announcers for the League Division Series and manages to misspell “Orsillo”

Sports Media Watch says last Sunday’s NASCAR race had better ratings than last year, but not up as it should be.

Steve Lepore at Puck The Media has the number of games each NHL team will have televised locally.

Joe Favorito talks about how sports can be a uniter, not a divider.

Over to Yahoo’s Big League Stew where Duk has some thoughts on the ESPN Films Steve Bartman doc.

From Obsessed with Sports, we have a pic thanks to Sarah Spain of Friend of Fang’s Bites Michelle Beadle sucking rattlesnake venom from Linda Cohn at the aforementioned espnW summit. I believe this really happened.

And that will do it for today.

Friday Megalinks Just For You

Let’s do some linkage.

The Weekend Viewing Picks give you everything to you need for your viewing pleasure.

Let’s do this.

National

Michael Hiestand of USA Today writes that primetime is the right time for college football.

Tripp Mickle of Sports Business Daily reports that ESPN has sold out its ad inventory for its new NASCAR non-stop initiative which will allow fans to see continuous race action while commercials run.

Mike Reynolds of Multichannel News says NFL Network used some creative methods in Boston to promote its Bill Belichick documentary.

If you watched the Belichick documentary, then you probably know about the best scene which was the coach yelling at the Baltimore Ravens’ Derrick Mason who was trash talking. Dan Fogarty of SportsGrid has the video.

Brandon Costa from Sports Video Group notes that Sports Illustrated has released a new Football Rivals mobile app.

Sports Media Watch says ABC is doing well with college football in its first two weeks of the season.

SMW notes that last Saturday’s Notre Dame-Michigan game on ESPN in primetime did better than the previous week’s Fighting Irish game on NBC.

SMW says last week’s NASCAR race in Richmond garnered a four year ratings high for ABC.

Tony Manfred of the Business Insider Sports Page says sports bars got hit the hardest by DirecTV’s NFL Sunday Ticket technical difficulties last week.

Steve Lepore from Puck The Media has NHL Network’s preseason schedule that begins next week.

Joe Favorito says sports brands are now jumping into the corn field maze craze.

Awful Announcing has this week’s network TV on-screen typos.

Parade talks with ESPN’s Erin Andrews.

East and Mid-Atlantic

Chad Finn from the Boston Globe writes about some ex-Patriots players who have made the transition to TV.

Jessica Heslam of the Boston Herald talks about 98.5 The Sports Hub winning the prestigious Marconi for Best Sports Station in the country over a former winner, WEEI.

Bill Doyle at the Worcester Telegram & Gazette praises the NFL Films documentary on Bill Belichick.

The New York Times’ Richard Sandomir looks at a rare film that followed the late Yankees announcer Phil Rizzuto and other ex-Pinstripers to Austria for an exhibition game in 1994.

Daniel E. Slotnick of the Times writes that former New York Jet and broadcaster Sam DeLuca has passed away.

Newsday’s Neil Best talks with statistician Steve Hirdt about his career and getting to work a “home” game for this week’s edition of Monday Night Football.

Neil says SNY is fortunate to have the Jets as a partner to help viewers forget about the Mets.

Phil Mushnick of the New York Post is angry at everyone.

The Post’s Justin Terranova has five questions for YES analyst Ken Singleton.

Jerry Barmash in Fishbowl NY writes that MSG Network brings back its signature hockey studio show for another season.

Pete Dougherty of the Albany Times Union notes that local sports anchor Andrew Catalon gets a call-up to the NFL on CBS in October.

Ken McMillan of the Middletown (NY) Times Herald-Record talks with MLB Network’s Brian Kenny about why he left ESPN after almost a decade and a half.

Ken has more with Brian Kenny in his column.

Ken is tired of NHL Network rerunning last season’s playoffs.

South

Serena Moyle of the Tallahassee (FL) Democrat profiles ESPN’s Erin Andrews as she’s in town for the Oklahoma-Florida State game.

David Barron of the Houston Chronicle says you watched the NFL in droves last week.

David says ESPN is treating Longhorn Network differently than its other entities.

Mel Bracht from the Daily Oklahoman writes that Longhorn Network will pick up one Oklahoma State basketball game.

Mel has some news and notes.

Gina Mizell of the Oklahoman says ESPN is keeping a close eye on Oklahoma State and Texas A&M for a potential College GameDay visit.

Midwest

John Kiesewetter of the Cincinnati Enquirer writes that Fox Sports Ohio expands its pregame show tomorrow to air highlights of Johnny Bench Night.

John says a local radio station has fired a long-time sports reporter and other parts of its staff.

Michael Zuidema of the Grand Rapids (MI) Press talks with a long-time Division II college football radio voice.

Bob Wolfley of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel says some local Time Warner Cable subscribers will have access to this Saturday’s Wisconsin game.

Bob explains why the Wisconsin game isn’t on TV.

Bob says the Brewers’ Prince Fielder will be seen in a profile on TBS Sunday.

Ed Sherman at Crain’s Chicago Business has his winners and losers in sports business and media.

Dan Caesar in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch says all of the Blues games will be televised for the first time ever.

West

Jay Drew of the Salt Lake Tribune writes that ESPN’s deal with BYU has now become a recruiting tool for the school.

Matt Solinsky of the Desert (CA) Sun says the NFL Network documentary on Patriots coach Bill Belichick is definitely “must see TV”.

John Maffei from the North County Times tries to discover what the holdup is for the San Diego Padres’ TV and radio rights.

Jim Carlisle at the Ventura County Star says Time Warner Cable has signed a long-term deal for California’s high school championships.

Lance Pugmire of the Los Angeles Times talks with the Fox NFL Sunday crew.

T.J. Simers of the Times writes that Vin Scully can cause trouble at home.

Also from the Times, Eric Sondheimer has details of the Time Warner deal with the California Interscholastic Federation.

Tom Hoffarth of the Los Angeles Daily News says Jay “The Rat” Mariotti is determined to get the last word on his tumultuous year.

Tom has some media moves that didn’t make his column.

Tom says MLB Network will air a special on statistics.

Canada

Bruce Dowbiggin of the Toronto Globe and Mail says an 8 year delay will help Steve Moore in his lawsuit against Todd Bertuzzi and the NHL stemming from an incident in Vancouver.

The Canadian Sports Media Blog notes that CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada has finally made some moves to fill some personnel holes.

And that’s going to conclude the links for this Friday.

Your Mid-Week Linkage

Let’s do some links on this Wednesday. It’s going to be busy for me later on and I’ll be away from internet access for a bit this afternoon so I’m going to the links now.

USA Today’s Michael Hiestand looks at the circuitous path NFL Network RedZone host Scott Hanson took to getting to getting his national gig.

Mike McCarthy of USA Today talks with former ESPN’er Brian Kenny who jumps to MLB Network next week.

Kim Hart at Politico writes that smaller cable companies are digging their lines in the sand to battle ESPN after it signed its huge Monday Night Football megadeal.

Tom Van Riper at Forbes says the next mountain the NFL has to climb is getting more distribution for the NFL Network.

Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk says Dan Patrick will host NFL Turning Point when it premieres on Versus tomorrow night.

Michael Smith at Sports Business Journal writes that Hyundai through IMG College has signed a deal to sponsor 24 universities.

At Variety, Rick Kissell says NBC used the NFL to roll to a primetime ratings victory last week.

Mike Reynolds at Broadcasting & Cable notes that ESPN’s opening week Monday Night Football doubleheader was down in the ratings from last year’s double dip.

Anthony Crupi of Adweek says both CBS and Fox drew strong numbers for the opening Sunday of the NFL.

Toni Fitzgerald from Media Life discusses the higher ratings for the U.S. Open Men’s Final on CBS Monday.

Glenn Davis of SportsGrid looks at a new book that claims that when she was a sports reporter, former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin nailed Michigan’s Glen Rice at the Great Alaska Shootout tournament in the late 1980′s. There are many jokes here. You can insert them if you wish.

Richard Sandomir of the New York Times writes that a portion of the country never got to see the U.S. Open’s Men’s Final thanks to several local CBS affiliates not picking up the match.

Pete Dougherty of the Albany Times Union has the NFL Week 2 schedule.

From the Virginian-Pilot, Dustin Long writes about NASCAR races finally being made available online through the WatchESPN apps.

John Daly at the Daly Planet says it’s about time that NASCAR has made this move.

Jack Bogaczyk of the Charleston (WV) Daily Mail talks with former coach Rich Rodriguez who’s now working with CBS Sports Network.

Kevin Scarbinsky of the Birmingham (AL) News calls a conflict of interest penalty on ESPN for assigning Urban Meyer to this Saturday’s Auburn-Clemson game on ABC.

Tyler Dunne of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel says ESPN’s SportScience will feature the kickoff return of Green Bay Packer Randall Cobb this week.

Ed Sherman in Crain’s Chicago Business says ESPN Radio Chicago is now on the street.

Ed says while Mike Ditka got a role in Entourage’s series finale, so did his agent.

Ed writes that Jay “The Rat” Mariotti has a new book, but it’s only available for the Kindle platform.

Scott D. Pierce of the Salt Lake Tribune talks with ESPN’s Ed Cunningham who will work this Saturday’s Utah-BYU game.

Tom Hoffarth of the Los Angeles Daily News says Jay Mariotti sent him a copy of his book.

Tom talks with CBS Sports Network sideline reporter Brooke Collins who’s picking up the pieces after her dream marriage was cut way too short.

Ben Koo of Awful Announcing handicaps the race to get the rights to the first half of Thursday Night Football.

The Toronto Sports Media Blog has some late breaking local sports radio news.

Joe Favorito looks at NHL teams trying to find new revenue streams.

And that will do it for us today.

The Tuesday Evening Linkage

Because I was a jobsite for most of the morning and into the early afternoon, I wasn’t able to supply links today. I’ll get to them now.

Austin Karp leads the Sports Business Daily team in looking at the overnight ratings for the Monday Night Football doubleheader on ESPN.

Eric Fisher of Sports Business Journal writes that ticket broker StubHub has signed ESPN’s Erin Andrews for an ad campaign to appeal to women.

Eric looks at HBO’s corporate parent Time Warner pulling out all of the stops to promote this Saturday’s Floyd Mayweather-Victor Ortiz fight on pay per view.

USA Today’s Michael Hiestand provides his take on some of the weekend TV ratings.

I wondered where Brian Lowry of FoxSports.com has been. He had not written a column since August, but returns this week to talk about the NFL’s TV partners handling of the 9/11 tributes on Sunday.

Tim Baysinger of Broadcasting & Cable writes that HBO will carve out a six hour block of programming on its HBO Zone channel leading up to this Saturday’s Mayweather-Ortiz fight.

Andrea Morabito of B&C says CBS saw a ratings jump for the U.S. Open Men’s Final in the late Monday afternoon timeslot.

Anthony Crupi of Adweek tells us that a shift of several sports events to cable hurt broadcast ad sales in the first half of this year.

Toni Fitzgerald from Media Life says the ratings proved that NFL fans don’t remember the lockout.

You’ve probably seen it by now, but here’s Ron Jaworski saying, “Shit” on Monday Night Football as provided by Timothy Burke from SportsGrid. And here’s the subsequent apology. For the most part, Jaws said it on cable. It’s no big deal, but it was still funny.

Dan Fogarty of SportsGrid has excerpts of Chris Russo’s appearance on the Howard Stern Show on Sirius XM, discussing former ESPN’er Steve Phillips’ past problems.

CNBC’s Darren Rovell says U.S. Open men’s champion Novak Djokovic’s sponsor has failed to properly promote its client while paying him a lot of money.

Darren says the 10th anniversary of 9/11 led to a boom in oversized U.S. flag rentals.

Ken Belson and Richard Sandomir of the New York Times delve into why MLB rejected the New York Mets’ plans to wear caps honoring the first responders for their game on 9/11/11.

Kimberly A. Martin of Newsday reports that a New York radio personality is defending his father who used an illegal taser during a fight with a Dallas Cowboys fan during the Jets game on Sunday night.

Newsday’s Neil Best says the Cowboys-Jets game set a Sunday Night Football viewing record for NBC.

Pete Dougherty of the Albany Times Union talks about the ratings for Monday Night Football and the U.S. Open.

From the DC Sports Bog at the Washington Post, Dan Steinberg says the local ratings for the New York Giants-DC NFL Team were very good.

Jim Williams of the Washington Examiner says he’s not surprised over the record ratings for Sunday Night Football.

Barry Jackson in the Miami Herald isn’t a fan of former CNN anchorman Rick Sanchez in the Florida International football radio booth.

David Barron at the Houston Chronicle has a look at the local college football TV ratings.

Mel Bracht of the Daily Oklahoman lists the local weekend sports TV ratings.

John Kiesewetter of the Cincinnati Enquirer says the Bengals scored on local TV.

John says Fox Sports Ohio airs a documentary on Pete Rose’s hit record.

Bob Wolfley at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel says former Wisconsin coach Barry Alvarez did well in the Entourage series finale on Sunday.

Dan Caesar in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch writes that the Rams’ ratings for their season opener were down from a year ago.

The Los Angeles Times reports that former ESPN’er and ex-Chicago Sun-Times columnist Jay “The Rat” Mariotti pleaded no contest to charges stemming from an assault and stalking case involving his former girlfriend.

Tom Hoffarth of the Los Angeles Daily News writes that Universal Sports is testing how much you want the Olympic sports channel on your cable system.

TSN host Michael Landsberg feels guilty he didn’t see the signs for Wade Belak’s suicide.

Puck The Media’s Steve Lepore talks with Hall of Fame hockey voice Mike Emrick in a two part interview. Part one is here. Part two is here.

Ryan Yoder of Awful Announcing wonders if ESPN is heading towards premium cable channel land.

And that is it for the linkage.

Getting The Wednesday Linkage In

Let’s do the Wednesday links while I can. It’s going to get busy the next couple of days as I try to wrap things up for the 4th of July weekend so blogging may get sparse through the weekend. Just giving you a heads up.

Here are the links for this Wednesday.

Michael Hiestand of USA Today says ESPN is going all out for the Women’s World Cup whether we like it or not.

Karolos Grohmann of Reuters reports that General Electric has pledged to sponsor the Olympic Games through 2020 as part of the deal that kept the US media rights with NBC.

Lindsay Powers of the Hollywood Reporter writes that Tiger Woods has signed his first endorsement deal since his marital troubles began in November 2009.

John Eggerton of Broadcasting & Cable says the NFL wants Congress to leave the silly TV blackout rules in place.

Tim Baysinger of B&C notes that Fox Soccer received its highest audience ever for last Saturday’s Gold Cup Final between the US and Mexico.

Mike Reynolds at Multichannel News notes the improved ratings for TNT halfway through its NASCAR season.

Mike also recaps the ESPN/espnW Women’s World Cup viewing party in New York’s Times Square on Tuesday.

Mike discusses NBC Sports Group providing full coverage of the Tour de France.

Adweek’s Anthony Crupi says the NBA playoffs steered TNT to a cable ratings win in the 2nd quarter of this year.

Tim Nudd of Adweek really likes DirecTV’s Football Cops ad starring Peyton and Eli Manning.

At the Indiana University National Sports Journalism Center, Dave Kindred provides a lesson on just who Grantland Rice was and why he’s so revered.

Robert Niles of the Online Journalism Review at USC Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism looks at the limits of free speech citing ESPN’s Jemele Hill defending David Tyree’s anti-gay marriage stance.

SportsGrid has video of Charles Barkley visiting the Sportsnet One booth during last night’s Pittsburgh-Toronto game.

SportsGrid’s Glenn Davis wonders if ESPN’s Robert Flores was caught napping on the job today.

SportsNewser’s Cam Martin writes that video game producer EA Sports plans to build a new studio in Texas.

CNBC’s Darren Rovell speaks with Nike’s CEO and President Charlie Denson on a myriad of sports business topics.

SportsbyBrooks is reporting that former Indiana and Texas A&M coach Bob Knight is preventing ESPN from hiring former Tennessee coach Bruce Pearl as an analyst. I didn’t know coach Knight wielded that much power.

Andrew Gauthier of TV Spy notes the return of Len Berman to the Today Show this morning. And no one got hurt!

The lovely Kristi Dosh of the Business of College Sports explains how she got into the sports blogging business.

Alessandra Stanley of the New York Times reviews USA Network’s new football-based series.

Newsday’s Neil Best says Derek Jeter haters will like one new internet product that allows them to ignore the Yankees shortstop.

Ken Schott at the Schenectady Gazette says tonight’s Red Sox-Phillies game originally scheduled for ESPN2 will now be seen on the ESPN mothership.

Ken says New York’s Capital Region will be blacked out on July 8 when Bob Costas and Al Michaels team up to call their first baseball game ever.

Pete Dougherty of the Albany Times Union writes that NBC golf reporter Dottie Pepper reaches out to the community when she’s back home.

Evan Weiner in the New Jersey Newsroom says handouts to sports owners are not a good thing.

John George of the Philadelphia Business Journal says MLB Network’s Mitch Williams will be seen on a DIY Network show.

Dan Steinberg from the Washington Post’s DC Sports Bog recaps a visit from consumer advocate Ralph Nader to the WaPo offices to discuss sports coverage and a new venture he’s helping to organize.

Graham Cawthorn of the Shelby (NC) Star looks at ESPN wanting to stream the American Legion World Series.

Danny Aller of the Albany (GA) Herald says Braves fans will finally be able to watch Peachtree TV games through the Fox Sports South affiliate.

Joel Hammond of Crain’s Cleveland Business says the Browns will launch a nightly radio show on the market’s dominant sports radio station.

Steve Brandt of the Minneapolis Star Tribune says local officials are denying that there’s a potential bid for the 2020 Olympics in the works.

The Syracuse (NE) Journal-Democrat reports that ESPN3 will stream all games of the American Legion World Series under a new four year contract.

Andrew Blankstein of the Los Angeles Times says former Chicago Sun-Times writer Jay Mariotti must stand trial on stalking and assault charges.

The Elk Grove (CA) Citizen notes that a local high school rejected ESPN’s request to air a football game this season.

Bruce Dowbiggin of the Toronto Globe and Mail talks about HBO hitting the ice once again next season.

Sports Media Watch says NASCAR on TNT’s ratings were up again this past weekend.

Steve Lepore at Puck The Media says viewership for the NHL Draft was up from last year.

The Big Lead wonders if NASCAR fired an in-house blogger for mentioning Kyle Busch’s marital problems.

That’s all for now.

A Few Saturday Links

Today with family and relatives in town for a wedding, time is very scarce for blogging, but I have a few minutes so I’ll do as many links as I can.

The hockey world is still reeling from Derek Boogaard’s death last night. While he was an enforcer, reading stories and tweets shows you how much he was loved by teammates, fans and writers. The best article I can link you to is from Michael Russo from the Minneapolis Star-Tribune who became Boogaard’s friend when he was at the Minnesota Wild. Reporters are always told to not become too close to their subjects, but in some cases, it can’t be helped and here’s a case where Russo is able to give us some very emotional thoughts on Boogaard.

Our other big story comes from Buffalo and involves ESPN and TSN NHL analyst Matthew Barnaby who was arrested last night on multiple domestic violence charges involving two women. T.J. Pignataro of the Buffalo News says Barnaby faces arraignment this morning.

The Big Lead has video of an Albany (NY) news anchor laughing hysterically at a member of Colorado Rockies ground crew getting stuck underneath the tarp during a rain delay.

The Sports Video Group notes that TNT is on pace to get the best NBA postseason TV ratings in cable TV history.

Newsday’s Neil Best says Fox Saturday Baseball is heading for primetime tonight.

Jim Williams from the Washington Examiner writes that the NHL Conference Finals begin tonight.

Jim says there will be plenty of baseball to watch this weekend on both the national and local levels.

Stuart Korfhage in the St. Augustine (FL) Record goes inside the NBC Sports production truck during the Players Championship.

Barry Jackson from the Miami Herald says Dan LeBatard will have his own ESPN2 daytime show starting in the fall.

Ty Tagami and Christian Boone of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution report that it will take at least couple of weeks to determine the cause of death for Chicago sports anchor Daryl Hawks who was in town to cover the Bulls-Hawks series.

Daniel Paulling in the Birmingham (AL) News says ESPN.com really blew it in its insider posts regarding the death of an Alabama offensive lineman.

The Dallas Morning News discusses a new reality series produced by Fox Sports Southwest on a new college football program.

Jim Benson at the Bloomington (IN) Pentagraph is happy to have TNT airing the NBA Eastern Conference Finals.

Indianapolis Business Journal notes the Indiana Pacers’ TV ratings are up even as attendance is going down.

Andrew Blankstein from the Los Angeles Times has Jay Mariotti’s lawyer calling the charges against his client “lies”.

Ferd Lewis at the Honolulu Star-Advertiser says the WAC would be willing to play on Sundays during the NFL lockout if ESPN asked.

Sox & Dawgs has the latest commercial by New Era involving 30 Rock’s Alec Baldwin and The Office’s John Krasinski.

Steve Lepore of Puck The Media says Comcast SportsNet Bay Area set record ratings for Game 7 of the San Jose Sharks-Detroit Red Wings series.

I’ll give Steve the final word on the Matthew Barnaby situation.

We’ll end it there for now.

Chugging Along On A Thursday Linkage Edition

Time for the linkage here on this Thursday getting a late charge out of the gate as I’ve had to visit a jobsite and then had to run a couple of office errands, but we’re back inside ready to give you some linkage. Lots of stuff to get to now.

We begin with some sad news from Chicago. Sports anchor Daryl Hawks of WMAQ-TV, the NBC affiliate, was found dead this morning in an Atlanta hotel room as he was going to cover tonight’s Bulls-Hawks game. He was 38. No other details are available.

Ed Sherman at Crain’s Chicago Business says this is the 2nd unexpected death to happen to the WMAQ-TV sports staff in less than a decade.

Robert Feder at TimeOut Chicago says Hawks’ friends and colleagues are stunned.

If I get more details about Hawks’ death, I’ll post it here.

From USA Today’s Arin Kariminian, we learn that the NFL players are suing for over $700 million in damages from the league over the disputed broadcast revenues that led to the lockout in the first place.

Fox Sports’ Ken Rosenthal who’s been wearing bow ties for charitable causes, tells us that he’ll be wearing one this week for the Red Sox-Yankees game that will be near and very dear to his heart. We at Fang’s Bites wholeheartedly support this.

Etan Vlessing from the Hollywood Reporter says the owner of Canadian sports TV network The Score has purchased the third largest sports mobile app provider in the US.

To Marcus Vanderberg of SportsNewser who tells us that ESPN3.com will stream the entire season of the National Lacrosse League.

Jason Dachman from Sports Video Group looks at NBC/Golf Channel’s production of this weekend’s Players Championship.

In the Indiana National Sports Journalism Center, Eric Deggans of the St. Petersburg Times does not want athletes to stop tweeting their thoughts.

CNBC’s Darren Rovell looks at one restaurant chain that is allowing customers to drink beer for free as long as the NFL lockout continues.

Darren suggests that Disney buy Kentucky Derby winner Animal Kingdom if he wins the next leg of the Triple Crown.

Public relations maven Bill Hofheimer in ESPN Front Row talks with two ESPN’ers who hope to have their CBS sitcoms picked up in the network upfronts later this month.

Adam Proteau from the Hockey News says fans rallying around Sean Avery’s gay marriage stance and denouncing of Uptown Sports’ tweets against it shows a true evolution in the sport.

In the Boston Herald, Ian R. Rapoport has video of Tom Brady explaining why he cried during the ESPN/NFL Films documentary, “The Brady 6.”

The New York Daily News’ Bob Raissman writes an appreciation of collegue, cartoonist Bill Gallo who passed away at the age of 88.

The Daily News’ Flip Bondy has Gallo’s obituary.

And Mike Lupica says Gallo will live on through his work.

Ken Schott from the Schenectady Gazette writes about ESPN airing a college basketball game from a military aircraft carrier on Veterans Day.

A related note from the Associated Press and picked up by the Sporting News: the carrier that buried Osama bin Laden at sea could be the one that hosts the game.

Ken says the NBC Sports Group will be airing horse racing from Saratoga Race Course over the summer.

Jim Williams of the Washington Examiner notes that NASCAR fans in the DC area will be flocking to Dover this weekend.

Garry Smits from the Florida Times-Union looks at the NBC Sports Group airing the Players Championship this week.

Tom Jones from the St. Petersburg Times says a popular local sports radio host has signed a new contract with his current station.

The Louisville Courier-Journal reports that police confiscated some 30 phony passes including some labeled “NBC Sports” from people attempting to attend the Kentucky Derby.

John E. Hoover at the Tulsa World notes that the Oklahoma-Florida State game will be aired in primetime by either ESPN or ABC.

Amanda Van Benschoten from the Cincinnati Enquirer notes that NBC’s Cris Collinsworth has been named to a national fitness panel.

Alan Babbitt of the Holland (MI) Sentinel says ESPN’s Outside the Lines will air a segment Sunday on the high school basketball team that had a player pass away on court earlier this year.

Bob Wolfley from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel says the Arena Football League’s Mustangs will be heard on local radio.

Ed Sherman from Crain’s Chicago Business explores the latest troubles with Jay Mariotti.

Mariotti’s former paper, the Chicago Sun-Times uses wire copy to construct the latest story on his latest arrest on stalking and domestic violence charges.

John Vornhof, Jr. from the Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal writes that Fox Sports North jumps into the WNBA game this summer.

Scott Dochterman in the Cedar Rapids (IA) Gazette notes that Big Ten Network will air a new original series on conference coaches.

Ben Kaplan of the National Post writes about a new documentary on Donald Trump’s efforts to build a golf course in Scotland that was first chronicled by HBO’s Real Sports.

The Toronto Sports Media blog notes that a Rogers Sportsnet host who weighed in on the gay marriage debate on Twitter regarding Sean Avery’s stance, was fired yesterday.

Cathal Kelly of the Toronto Star says the host, Damian Goddard is standing by his tweets.

The Big Lead looks at the first review of Captain Blowhard’s Grantland site.

The Pretty in Pinstripes blog takes down the SNY “More Sports, More Testosterone” ad campaign that was very inexplicably created by women.

Sports Media Watch says the Miami Heat series clincher over Boston took in a good rating, but not as good as Game 4.

Joe Favorito explores the new magazine being published by energy drink manufacturer Red Bull.

And that is where we’ll end it for today. Lots of links for you today.

Jay The Rat Arrested Again

Former writer for the Chicago Sun-Times and Fanhouse and panelist for ESPN’s Around the Horn, Jay Mariotti has been arrested in Los Angeles again. According to the Los Angeles Times, Mariotti was charged with stalking, domestic violence and assaulting his ex-girlfriend on two separate occasions. He could get as much as five years in prison, if convicted.

Back in August of last year, Mariotti was arrested on six felony charges in regards to an argument with the ex-girlfriend that went from a club to their apartment. Mariotti managed to avoid jail time, however, he may not be able to stemming from the latest incidents.

In September after his sentencing to probation and community service, Mariotti confronted the woman at a restaurant on the same day the court ordered him to stay away from her. And police say just last month, Mariotti confronted her outside another restaurant and allegedly pulled out some hair.

Now Mariotti has railed against athletes who have committed domestic violence and if the police reports are true, has now become one of the people he has regularly criticized. His next court date is June 1. Mariotti has not appeared on ESPN since his first arrest and will likely not appear again based on the latest charges.

Thanks to The Big Lead for the link.

Let’s Try To Do Some Friday Megalinkage

Ok, I have some time to do some blogging this evening and I figure I’ll do the Friday megalinks, something which has been sorely lacking here. Let’s get cracking on the links.

As always, you can check the Weekend Viewing Picks for all of your weekend in sports and primetime TV.

Now let’s do your linkage.

National

USA Today’s Michael Hiestand and Mike McCarthy debate whether the U.S. Army should be throwing $7 million at sponsoring NASCAR.

Speaking of NASCAR, Hiestand talks about Fox using a new camera at the Daytona 500 that can pick up heat fluctuations.

At Quickish, Dan Shanoff feels the new Captain Blowhard project at ESPN.com will succeed.

Andrea Morabito of Broadcasting & Cable looks at Fox Soccer Channel extending its rights deal with Major League Soccer.

Ryan Ballengee of NBC’s Pro Golf Talk says Golf Channel’s Jim Gray was clearly in the wrong to interrupt golfer Dustin Johnson during the 1st round of the Northern Trust Open. Following Gray’s interview with Johnson, the reporter got into a heated argument with Johnson’s caddie which led to Golf Channel removing him from the broadcast for the rest of the weekend.

Emma Carmichael at Deadspin finds an excerpt from a 1990 book which recounts an incident where former Cincinnati Reds pitcher Mario Soto found a way to get revenge on Jay Mariotti.

Dan Fogarty at SportsGrid notes that Tony Kornheiser is wary of blogs and the internet in general. Whatever. Mr. Tony really shouldn’t be talking anymore.

Sports Media Watch notes that the PGA’s Pebble Beach National Pro-Am got a big ratings increase from last year for CBS.

Steve Lepore at Puck The Media says gets info from NBC Sports how Hockey Day in America will be presented on Sunday.

Awful Announcing has the video of an awkward interview between TNT’s Craig Sager and Washington Wizards rookie John Wall.

Joe Favorito says the New Jersey Devils are bringing fans closer to the game by allowing them to live tweet during games at the game and bring bloggers and broadcasters into the mix.

CNBC’s Darren Rovell says a new ruling regarding the use of likenesses could allow athletes to go after video game manufacturers.

Fred Hickman, formerly of CNN, ESPN, YES and Fox Sports Net, has launched his own media training company for athletes. The question is, will Fred actually show up for his training sessions? Fred’s reputation precedes him.

East and Mid-Atlantic

Chad Finn at the Boston Globe wonders what’s going on at WEEI?

Bill Doyle of the Worcester Telegram and Gazette also discusses the WEEI lineup changes.

Newsday’s Neil Best notes that New York Mets tickets are selling well despite the team’s troubles on and off the field.

The New York Times’ Richard Sandomir looks at a new Broadway sports play being produced by the same people who brought “Lombardi” to the Great White Way.

Phil Mushnick of the New York Times attacks ESPN for allowing its personalities to sign endorsement contracts.

Bob Raissman of the New York Daily News says Mets owner Fred Wilpon is not ducking questions about convicted Ponzi schemer Bernard Madoff.

Pete Dougherty from the Albany Times Union says NASCAR has to learn to be able to take punches when people like Tony Kornheiser make silly statements about their sport.

Pete has a composite Spring Training TV schedule.

In Press Box, Dave Hughes from DCRTV.com says the effects of the Orioles leaving the CBS Radio-owned sports station are still being felt now.

Dave talks with former Baltimore Sun sports media writer Ray Frager who’s now the managing editor at the CSN Baltimore and CSN Washington websites.

South

Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald says NFL Network will be all over the Scouting Combine next week.

Tom Jones from the St. Petersburg Times talks about Kornheiser’s NASCAR comments and other sports media issues.

The Chattanoogan previews ESPN’s new documentary on Tennessee’s first African-American quarterback.

Ray Buck of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram says Fox will have plenty of storylines for Sunday’s Daytona 500.

David Barron of the Houston Chronicle writes that the late Dale Earnhardt still casts a big shadow over NASCAR.

Kirk Bohls from the Austin American-Statesman says the traditional Texas-Texas A&M Thanksgiving Night football game might be moved to accommodate the Big 12′s TV contract.

Mel Bracht in the Daily Oklahoman talks with Turner Sports’ Kevin McHale about the NBA All-Star Slam Dunk competition.

Mel has his media notebook featuring Fox Sports MLB primetime games.

Midwest

John Kiesewetter from the Cincinnati Enquirer says former Reds teammates Eduardo Perez and Barry Larkin are reunited at ESPN.

Micheal Zuidema at the Grand Rapids (MI) Press talks with an area native who covers NASCAR for the Motor Racing Network.

Lewis Lazare of the Chicago Sun-Times looks at how Comcast is bringing NBC to work together with its sports networks.

Neal Justin of the Minneapolis Star Tribune notes that the Minnesota Twins have gone all-cable with its new TV deal with Fox Sports North .

Dan Caesar from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch notes that the whole Albert Pujols contract dispute with the Cardinals has become a feeding media frenzy.

West

The Salt Lake Tribune notes that Fox Soccer Channel will pick up a couple of Real Salt Lake MLS games.

John Maffei at the North County Times marks the 25th anniversary of the great movie, “Hoosiers”.

John talks about how NASCAR’s Super Bowl takes place at the beginning of the season, not at the end.

Jim Carlisle from the Ventura County Star says the new Los Angeles Lakers channel to be run by Time Warner Cable is a gamechanger.

Diane Pucin of the Los Angeles Times talks about Jim Gray’s dismissal from the Northern Trust Open.

Tom Hoffarth at the Los Angeles Daily News says the Time Warner-Lakers deal will have far-reaching effects.

Tom catches up on the two weeks in sports media and has his extensive media news and notes.

Tom also writes about Jim Gray being sent home by Golf Channel.

Jon Wilner from the San Jose Mercury News has an extensive look at the Pac 12 TV negotiations.

Canada

Bruce Dowbiggin of the Toronto Globe and Mail notes that CBC’s announcers for the Heritage Classic differ on how the game will affect Montreal and Calgary down the line.

The Canadian Sports Media blog notes that curling is back on TSN this weekend.

And we are done.

Some Mid-Week Linkage

Ok, time for some links on this Wednesday. Let’s provide some for you while I can.

Michael Hiestand of USA Today notes that former CBS college basketball analyst Billy Packer is not enthused about the new TV arrangement for the NCAA Tournament.

I’ve written a story for Dan Levy’s Press Coverage site on what the Los Angeles Lakers’ new regional sports networks will mean for viewers.

Brian Lowry of Fox Sports is not a fan of excess sports coverage like the NBA All-Star Weekend.

Milton Kent at Fanhouse recaps the strange, but very interesting appearances by embattled actor Charlie Sheen on the Dan Patrick Show.

Mark Cina of the Hollywood Reporter also recaps Sheen’s call to DP on Wednesday.

Etan Vlessing of the Reporter notes that ESPN’s new Sunday Night Baseball voice Dan Shulman will return to Canada to provide some baseball commentary for his original network, TSN.

R. Thomas Umstead of Multichannel News reports that Cartoon Network is tapping stars from the sports world to take part in its inaugural awards show.

Mike Reynolds from Multichannel takes a look at the new Time Warner Cable/Lakers regional sports networks.

Marcus Vanderberg at SportsNewser recaps Jay Mariotti’s first public appearance since his arrest on domestic assault charges and the subsequent loss of his jobs from ESPN and Fanhouse.

CNBC’s Darren Rovell takes a closer look at St. Louis Cardinals first baseman Albert Pujols and his contract demands.

Darren says Sports Illustrated did a great job marketing this year’s Swimsuit Issue.

Chad Finn of the Boston Globe has the comments from outgoing WEEI midday host Dale Arnold who is the odd man out in a lineup shuffle.

Chad also writes about the WEEI lineup changes that smack of desperation.

Pete Dougherty of the Albany Times Union writes that ESPN has apparently dropped out of the bidding for the Belmont Stakes, the third leg of horse racing’s Triple Crown.

Jim Williams of the Washington Examiner wonders if NBC will pick up the Belmont to reunite the race with the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness Stakes.

Press Box says WBAL-AM will pick up a slew of Baltimore Orioles spring training games.

David Barron from the Houston Chronicle takes a look at two of the bigger sports media stories from the week.

John Kiesewetter of the Cincinnati Enquirer has Dancing with the Stars professional dancer Cheryl Burke admitting she had a fling with Bengals wide receiver Chad Ochocinco. I know, it’s not a sports media story, but it fascinates me and I like Cheryl Burke, ok?

Bob Wolfley of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel discovers that the Brewers are not on the MLB on Fox schedule.

Paul Sullivan at the Chicago Tribune says the Cubs have found a replacement for the late Ron Santo on their radio broadcasts.

Steve Rosenbloom of the Tribune wants to know if Cubs fans are ready to hear a traditional radio broadcast from now on.

Toni Ginnetti of the Chicago Sun-Times talks with new Cubs radio analyst Keith Moreland.

Ed Sherman in Crain’s Chicago Business writes that the Blackhawks have extended their deal with WGN-TV.

Bill Plaschke of the Los Angeles Times says the new Time Warner Cable deal with the Lakers may end up hurting the team in the long run.

Bruce Dowbiggin from the Toronto Globe and Mail says one local sports radio station might be left behind in a battle of media titans.

The Canadian Sports Media Blog speculates what the 2012 Olympics will look like on the Canadian Olympic Broadcast Consortium.

Dashiell Bennett from the Business Insider sports page notes that ESPN.com’s Bill Simmons has hired Deadspin contributer Katie Baker (and a Friend of Fang’s Bites) for some unknown project at the Alleged Worldwide Leader.

Matt Yoder at Awful Announcing notes that many people were none too happy over ESPN’s experimentation during the Mississippi State-Kentucky game.

Deadspin has obtained a copy of the Colin Cowherd sitcom script. It’s not pretty, let me tell you.

Brad Cohen at SportsGrid tells us how the extremely overrated Oprah Winfrey got the Michael Vick interview.

Dave Kohl of Major League Programs talks about the new Time Warner Cable/Lakers deal.

I’ll leave it there for now.

Time For Some Friday Megalinks

I haven’t given you a full set of Friday megalinks since October 1, so it’s time to do some now. Let’s get to them.

The Weekend Viewing Picks has your sports and primetime viewing.

National

USA Today’s Michael Hiestand and Mike McCarthy debate what can be done to improve baseball’s ratings.

Fanhouse says Jenn Sterger appears to be ready to talk with NFL Security about Brett Favre.

Georg Szalai of the Hollywood Reporter says the FCC is urging Cablevision and Fox to talk in good faith on Monday.

John Eggerton from Broadcasting & Cable says the FCC is calling both Cablevision and Fox on the carpet.

Mike Reynolds at Multichannel News looks at how Time Warner Cable customers can legally watch Monday Night Football and other ESPN programming online.

Mike Farrell of Multichannel says Fox is telling Cablevision subscribers to buy an HD antenna so they can watch network programming.

Kelly Ridell of Bloomberg says the Cablevision/Fox dispute is heading into its second weekend with no apparent end in sight.

Noah Davis at SportsNewser says ESPN Boston will webcast the Head of the Charles event this weekend.

Wayne Friedman at MediaPost explores the story that won’t go away, Timeoutgate, from the Monday Night Football game in Jacksonville.

SportsbyBrooks looks at Jay “The Rat” Mariotti deleting his Twitter account. Good riddance, Jay.

Steve Lepore at Puck The Media notes that TSN has picked up 24 Montreal Canadiens games.

The Sports Media Watch notes that former NBA star Chris Mullin has apparently joined ESPN’s roster of analysts.

SMW says NLCS Game 5 received its highest ratings in three years.

Joe Favorito says a former New York Giant understands the value of a publicity stunt.

Emmett Jones of Sports Business Digest says NBC is asking in excess of $400,000 per 30 second spot for Sunday Night Football, up significantly from last year.

East and Mid-Atlantic

Chad Finn of the Boston Globe profiles Celtics TV duo Mike Gorman and Tommy Heinsohn who have worked together for 30 years starting with two seasons calling Providence College basketball.

Thomas Grillo of the Boston Herald says a Tweet from the New England Patriots helped to prevent a blackout of the team’s game in San Diego this weekend.

Bill Doyle of the Worcester Telegram & Gazette has TNT’s Reggie Miller singing the praises of the Boston Celtics.

Ken Belson and Richard Sandomir from the New York Times says former Texas Rangers owner Tom Hicks is seeing his former team’s success as an outsider.

Newsday’s Neil Best talks with polarizing New York Yankees voice John Sterling.

Neil has his weekend viewing picks.

Bob Raissman at the New York Daily News feels YES’ and ESPN Radio New York’s Michael Kay has been speaking out of both sides of his mouth.

As expected, Phil Mushnick of the New York Post takes his newspaper owner’s side in the Cablevision/Fox dispute. News Corp. owns both the Post and Fox.

Pete Dougherty in the Albany Times Union says NBA fans will overdose on seeing the Miami Heat this season.

In the Washington Post’s DC Sports Bog, Dan Steinberg notes that DC sports icons got to tape new “This is SportsCenter” ads.

Andrew Beaujon at the DC-centric TBD.com notes that co-author of the new ESPN book, Tom Shales is leaving the WaPo after 39 years as its television critic.

Jim Williams of the Washington Examiner talks with NFL RedZone host and former Comcast SportsNet Mid-Atlantic anchor Scott Hanson.

South

Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald says the Heat have terminated their agreement with their flagship radio station and are now looking for a new home.

The Dallas Morning News’ Barry Horn finds a way to jab Newsday’s Neil Best. A couple of years ago, Horn and Best had a friendly war of words in their respective blogs.

The Houston Chronicle’s David Barron talks with NBC’s Rodney Harrison about his statements about hard hits in the NFL.

Midwest

Michael Zuidema of the Grand Rapids (MI) Press talks about the Dan Patrick Show premiering on Fox Sports Detroit on Monday.

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s Bob Wolfley notes that the Big Ten Network will profile a Wisconsin defensive end tomorrow.

And Bob says Joe Namath on his Sirius XM show likes Green Bay’s Aaron Rodgers.

Ed Sherman in Crain’s Chicago Business has his weekly winners and losers.

Phil Rosenthal of the Chicago Tribune writes that ESPN has postponed the airing of a 30 for 30 documentary on the infamous Steve Bartman.

Jeremy Fowler of the St. Paul Pioneer-Press reports that Jenn Sterger won’t talk to the NFL if Brett Favre pays her off. Thanks to Robert Littal of Black Sports Online for the link.

Dan Caesar in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch says ESPN’s College Gameday loves being at the University of Missouri.

Dan says the Missouri Attorney General has weighed in on the Dish Network/Fox Cable Networks flap.

West

Jay Posner of the San Diego Union-Tribune has CBS’ Phil Simms previewing this Sunday’s Patriots-Chargers game.

John Maffei of the North County Times gets Jim Nantz’s favorite San Diego sports moments.

Tom Hoffarth in the Los Angeles Daily News writes that even without a home team, LA still loves watching the NFL.

Tom has his extensive media news and notes.

I’m going to end it there.

The Rainy Wednesday Links

As it continues to rain in the Northeast, time to provide some linkage for you.

USA Today’s Michael Hiestand talks with Fox Sports Wisconsin’s Brian Anderson who’s been doing yeoman’s work for TBS and will call the playoffs for the network again.

Brian Lowry of Fox Sports looks at the monster TV ratings for the NFL in the first four weeks of the 2010 season.

At the Indiana University National Sports Journalism Center, Eric Deggans of the St. Petersburg Times looks at Dan Patrick defying the odds and being a huge success after leaving ESPN.

Marcus Vanderberg of SportsNewser says it was Bill Simmons’ inadvertent Tweet that led to a whirlwind night of speculation over Randy Moss being traded to the Minnesota Vikings.

John Eggerton of Broadcasting & Cable notes that the FCC has sent Tennis Channel’s complaint against Comcast to an Administrative Law Judge.

Ben Grossman of B&C writes that Fox Sports Media Group El Jefe del Mundo David Hill has joined the USA’s bid for the 2018 or 2022 World Cup.

Anthony Crupi at Mediaweek notes that ESPN drew 14 million viewers for Monday night’s Patriots-Dolphins game.

R. Thomas Umstead at Multichannel News mentions that ABC will air bowling once again next year.

CNBC’s Darren Rovell notes that Patriots quarterback Tom Brady may be about to sign with Under Armour. 

Pete Abraham of the Boston Globe talks about NESN Red Sox voice Don Orsillo continuing his broadcasting work in the postseason for TBS.

Dan Lamothe in the Springfield (MA) Republican’s Red Sox Monster blog watched last night’s 30 for 30 documentary on the Greatest Comeback in the History of Sports.

Joe Drape of the New York Times explores how the Big Ten Network changed the landscape of college sports.

Joshua Brustein of the Times says a Miami Heat-New York Knicks game will be the first NBA contest to be aired in 3-D.

Pete Dougherty of the Albany Times Union has the 2010-11 NHL TV schedule for the Capital Region.

At the Washington Post’s DC Sports Bog, Dan Steinberg says Tony Kornheiser has reupped to do his radio show for two more years.

Dan talks about the TV ratings for the Washington Nationals on MASN doubling from last season.

Tom Jones at the St. Petersburg Times says part-time Tampa Bay Rays TV analyst Brian Anderson will become the full-time analyst next season. He’s not to be confused with Brian Anderson who calls the Brewers and will do the MLB Postseason on TBS.

Sarah Talalay of the South Florida Sun Sentinel writes that IndyCar driver Danica Patrick will be the focus of a new comic book. Nice marketing tool. Now win some races, Danica.

Ira Winderman of the Sun Sentinel reports that ESPN 3D, which can be seen by the 36 people who own a 3-D TV set, will pick up two Miami Heat games. 

Barry Horn of the Dallas Morning News says the Texas Rangers are doing afternoon duty today.

David Barron of the Houston Chronicle says General Manager of Fox Sports Houston is leaving to take a similar position at Sun Sports in Florida.

Mel Bracht at the Daily Oklahoman says Cox Sports Television will be aired in Oklahoma City.

John Kiesewetter of the Cincinnati Enquirer has the weekend start times for the Reds-Phillies National League Division Series.

Bob Wolfley of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel fears the Sports Illustrated cover jinx.

At Crain’s Chicago Business, Ed Sherman discusses Jay Mariotti being out of a job.

Sean Jensen of the Chicago Sun-Times speaks with NBC’s Sunday Night Football producer Fred Gaudelli. 

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that today’s court hearing for Fox Sports Midwest Cardinals voice Dan McLaughlin has been postponed. McLaughlin was arrested in August on suspicion of drunk driving.

Dan Caesar of the Post-Dispatch says Fox Sports Midwest will juggle to air both the St. Louis Blues season opener and Missouri’s Big 12 football opener, both of which are scheduled for the same time.

The Idaho Statesman has the Western Athletic Conference men’s basketball ESPN schedule.

Scott D. Pierce, formerly of the Deseret (UT) Morning News, moves to the Salt Lake Tribune and says local fans will have trouble finding this Saturday’s Utah-Iowa State game. 

Ryan Greene of the Las Vegas Sun notes that ESPN’s Kenny Mayne showed his old UNLV quarterbacking skills during a segment on Sunday NFL Countdown.

Tom Hoffarth of the Los Angeles Daily News says former Dodgers Spanish language broadcaster Rene Cardenas is a finalist for the Baseball Hall of Fame Ford C. Frick Award. Unfortunately, so is Tim McCarver.

Tom suggests a 24/7 Bowling Channel.

Bruce Dowbiggin of the Toronto Globe and Mail rates the Canadian home NHL broadcasting crews.

The Courthouse News Service says a mother-daughter courtroom sketch artist team is suing ESPN and the Associated Press claiming they weren’t paid for services during the Tim Donaghy trial.

At Yahoo’s Puck Daddy, Greg Wyshynski handicaps the next NHL TV rights contract.

Matthew Coller at the Biz of Hockey says the NHL looks to hit the motherlode from the next TV rights deal.

Cork Gaines at the Business Insider says the Texas Rangers’ big TV rights windfall could lead to teams abandoning the idea of their own regional sports network.

Deadspin looks at how a supposed private Twitter message from Bill Simmons led to him breaking news that Randy Moss was about to be traded.

The Big Lead notes that an ESPN producer has been arrested on charges of lewd acts.

Sports Media Watch has ESPN/ABC’s Brent Musburger objecting to steroids coverage.

SMW has the weekend overnight ratings.

That will do it. I started this at 9 a.m. and just finished at 2:34 p.m. Leaving the office and coming back several times is not good for linkage.

BREAKING NEWS: Jay Mariotti Announces He’s Left Fanhouse For Good

This just breaking now and happening on Twitter, Jay Mariotti who pleaded no contest to a domestic violence charge last week in relation to beating up his girlfriend earlier this year has announced on Twitter that he’s leaving Fanhouse and getting out of sportswriting for “other media ventures.”

Mariotti joined Twitter rather quietly on October 1 then sent out two tweets tonight:

Column writing has been a labor of love for 25 years, allowing me to see the world and cover some of the greatest athletes and events in sports. But it’s time to step back from the daily sportswriting grind and focus on my other media ventures, including a book project. 

And:

I express deep gratitude to AOL for a fun, productive experience. I wish the talented staff at Fanhouse.com nothing but the best in the competitive Internet world. 

Fox Sports’ Jason Whitlock confirms with AOL that Mariotti is indeed gone from Fanhouse.

So where does Mariotti go from here? Good question. Perhaps he goes and writes that book that he mentioned in his tweet. No matter what, we’ll be watching.

UPDATE, 10:40 p.m.: Leave it to Mariotti to get the final word on the reaction to his leaving Fanhouse:

Look at all of you. Serious announcement, psycho reaction. Please, get lives.

Typical Mariotti. Don’t let the door hit you on the way out, Jay the Rat.

Bringing You A Friday Megalink Thing

I owe you some megalinks from last week so let’s get this done.

Don’t forget the Weekend Viewing Picks.

National

USA Today’s Michael Hiestand and Mike McCarthy square off over whether viewers should care what announcers do off the air and away from the camera.

USA Today’s Sean Leahy has NFL Network analyst Brian Baldinger saying the New York Jets did nothing wrong in the Ines Sainz controversy. For some reason, this story is just not going away. 

At Sports Illustrated, Richard Deitsch has his Media Power Rankings for August and September.

Chris Gentilviso of Time notes that 2010 may be the Year of the Blackout for the NFL. 

At Pro Football Talk, Michael David Smith says all 32 NFL teams will undergo a training program in the wake of the Ines Sainz incident.

Mike says the Lions just barely avoided a blackout in Detroit.

Jason Lisk at The Big Lead feels the NFL blackout policy needs to change.

Ryan Wilson at Fanhouse tells us which athletes are going to “appear” in this year’s “Body” issue for ESPN The Magazine.

Mike Reynolds from Multichannel News says Fox Soccer Channel has signed a rights deal to air French’s top soccer league in the US.

Mike writes that some Comcast subscribers had trouble accessing NFL Network’s RedZone last week.

George Winslow of Multichannel notes that Verizon Fios is adding Syracuse University sports for fans in the upstate New York area.

Paul Thomasch at Reuters notes that Fox is over 90% sold for the Super Bowl in February.

CNBC’s Darren Rovell says Michigan football jerseys are a hot seller once again.

Marcus Vanderberg at SportsNewser reports that Jay Mariotti’s arraignment on domestic violence charges was postponed until October 1.

Sports Media Watch notes that the NFL had its most watched opening week since 1987. 

Even with that good news, SMW discovers that the early NFL window for Fox actually experienced a ratings decline from the year before.

SMW has some various ratings news and notes.

SMW says the delayed men’s final at the US Open hit another ratings low.

And SMW tells us that the US Open women’s final also delivered low ratings. 

At Puck The Media, Steve Lepore looks at the early plans for NHL Network and NHL Radio.

Dave Dahlquist at Macworld says CBS is streaming its entire SEC football schedule on its iPhone app.

David Brown at Yahoo’s Big League Stew blog has a very good interview with Los Angeles Dodgers voice Vin Scully.

East and Mid-Atlantic

Chad Finn of the Boston Globe looks inside the radio ratings between 98.5 The Sports Hub and WEEI.

At the Worcester Telegram & Gazette, Bill Doyle talks about the tremendous Week 1 TV ratings for the NFL.

The New York Times’ Richard Sandomir says Fox failed to follow up after the Philadelphia Eagles’ Stewart Bradley returned to the field after seemingly suffering a concussion.

Newsday’s Neil Best notes that MSG Network has signed a rights agreement with the New York Giants.

Kimberly A. Martin of Newsday says the Jets will not be penalized for its behavior last week against Ines Sainz.

Bob Raissman of the New York Daily News has NBC’s Andrea Kremer’s take on the Ines Sainz
situation.

Dr. Doom and Gloom in the New York Post continues to harp on points that only he cares about.

Pete Dougherty of the Albany Times Union profiles the new program director/midday host of the local sports radio station.

Philadelphia Inquirer columnist Ashley Fox says Ines Sainz brought on the Jets behavior by her improper attire. 

Dave Hughes at Press Box talks about the new partnership between the Baltimore Ravens and Comcast SportsNet’s Baltimore website.

Jim Williams at the Washington Examiner notes that football fans are opting to stay home and watch games in HD rather than go to the stadium and pay expensive ticket prices.

And Jim likes listening to the Sirius Playboy Morning Show not just to hear about women, but for the NFL picks.

South

Carolyn Shapiro at the Virginian-Pilot notes that CBS College Sports is being picked up by a local cable company.

Barry Jackson at the Miami Herald looks at the tremendous TV ratings for the NFL.

Katherine Kington of WTVM in Columbus, GA speaks with ESPN’s Kirk Herbstreit. 

Ray Buck at the Fort Worth Star-Telegram hears from the CBS college football crew on the state of the game today.

David Barron from the Houston Chronicle talks with one of the hosts of Sporting News Radio who made the move to H-Town when the operations moved from California.

Mel Bracht in the Daily Oklahoman says Saturday’s Air Force-Oklahoma game will be picked up for troops stationed overseas.

Midwest

John Kiesewetter of the Cincinnati Enquirer says the Bengals avoided a local blackout on Sunday.

John notes a Chicago sports TV anchor who got some bad advice from her boss when she was working in Dayton.

Tim Twentyman of the Detroit News says the Motor City will not be blacked out this Sunday for the Eagles-Lions game.

Bob Wolfley of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports on the very short leave that Shannon Sharpe took from CBS due to a legal problem that was quickly dropped.

Ed Sherman in Crain’s Chicago Business has his winners and losers in sports business and media this week.

David Haugh of the Chicago Tribune says the Ines Sainz controversy is an example of a woman being unprofessional.

Dan Caesar of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch writes with Cardinals returning to KMOX, it completes sports teams going full circle in the Gateway City.

Dan notes that there’s some late season juggling going on with the Cardinals TV schedule.

West

Brian Murphy of the Idaho Statesman says a local cable system will not pick up CBS College Sports for tomorrow’s Boise State-Wyoming game. 

Jay Posner at the San Diego Union-Tribune wonders what’s going on at one local sports radio station.

John Maffei of the North County Times says fans who want to watch San Diego State play this weekend will have to shell out some extra bucks.

Jim Carlisle of the Ventura County Star wants CBS to stop sending the Oakland Raiders to the local airwaves.

Jim also has the NBC crew previewing Sunday’s Manning Bowl II.

At the Los Angeles Daily News, Tom Hoffarth inquires about the local ESPN Radio affiliate.

Tom speaks with a former Sports Illustrated editor who authored a damaging book on the USC football program.

Tom looks back at a crazy week in sports media in his blog.

The San Jose Mercury News has video of a rather testy exchange between KPIX sports anchor Dennis O’Donnell and 49ers coach Mike Singletary.

Canada

Bruce Dowbiggin of the Toronto Globe and Mail writes that two cable companies are picking up the controversial Rogers Sportsnet One in time for NHL season.

Chris Zelkovich of the Toronto Star wonders if it’s time for a rights charter for sports fans.

The Star’s Rosie DiManno heard from former NHL coach Pat Burns after CTV Ottawa erroneously tweeted today that he had died.

TSN’s Bob McKenzie received the first phone call from Burns.

And we’re done for the night.

Tuesday Linkage

Yesterday was not the day to get sick. So many things happened last night, Jets owner Woody Johnson apologizing to Azteca TV reporter Ines Sainz, Monday Night Football doubleheader, US Open men’s final moving from CBS to ESPN2 and then cutting out for Monday Night Football, Jay Mariotti getting charged on domestic violence against his girlfriend and I went to bed at 6:30 last night. That’ll learn me to get sick.

Anyway, let’s do linkage that I couldn’t get to yesterday. Lots of stuff to do. I’ll try to give you plenty of links.

Starting with Mike McCarthy of USA Today who writes that Jets owner Woody Johnson has apologized to Sainz for the team’s action during her visit to the team’s training camp on Saturday.

Sainz herself appeared on the Today Show this morning to talk about the incident.

I give her credit saying she was not a victim, but at the same time, she wasn’t wearing anything out of hand. Ines is a beautiful woman, but from what I saw, she was being professional. For anyone to say she was asking to be harassed is like saying a person deserved to be murdered. Come on.

At the Indiana University National Sports Journalism Center, Eric Deggans of the St. Petersburg Times cannot believe the reaction to Sainz. 

Sports Business Daily recaps the coverage on Sainz including her saying she won’t pursue any legal action against the Jets.

Caroline Howard of Forbes weighs in on the Ines Sainz controversy.

In Sports Illustrated, Ann Killion says the Ines Sainz story is another example of male athletes behaving badly. 

Sports Business Daily notes that ESPN will not use Fanhouse writer Jay “The Rat” Mariotti in the wake of him being charged with domestic violence.

Back to USA Today, Michael Hiestand looks at the ratings from various events from the weekend.

Hiestand writes about TBS using Ernie Johnson, Jr. as its lead announcer for the MLB postseason. 

Anthony Crupi of Mediaweek says TBS is 90% sold for its ad sales for the MLB postseason.

Fox Sports’ Brian Lowry feels NBC’s Cris Collinsworth doesn’t measure up to John Madden. Really, who does?

Broadcasting & Cable’s Jon Lafayette talks with NBC Sports Emperor Dick Ebersol who has been named as B&C Broadcaster of the Year.

Ryan Nakashima of the Associated Press talks to former Walt Disney Co. CEO Michael Eisner about his decision to buy Cap Cities/ABC in the mid-1990′s, stating that ESPN was really the crown jewel of that purchase.

David Mercer of the AP writes about how fans helped to make the Big Ten Network into a success.

Bill Krueger of the Poynter Institute talks with Sports Illustrated’s Peter King about the changing world of sports writing which includes Twitter.

From Sports Business Journal, John Ourand looks at some of things we learned from the Disney/Time Warner carriage agreement that heavily involved ESPN.

Liz Mullen at SBJ takes a gander at the NFL Players Association possibly decertifying and thus, preventing a NFL labor lockout.

I don’t think I’ve ever linked to Rolling Stone, but I am now. Matt Taibbi takes ESPN Radio Hack Colon Cowherd to task for his stance on unions. Thanks to The Big Lead for the link.

Erik Hayden of The Atlantic can’t believe how both CBS and ESPN2 mistreated the US Open men’s final last night.

Sports Illustrated’s Richard Deitsch looks at the increased amount of 3-D productions in sports.

CNBC’s Darren Rovell says with so many factors now, the season ticket may be going by the wayside.

The Boston Globe’s Chad Finn writes that 98.5 The Sports Hub has overtaken long-time Boston sports radio behemoth WEEI in the all-important men 25-54 demographic rating.

Bob Raissman of the New York Daily News takes the NFL Sunday pregame shows to task for not reporting the Ines Sainz story.

Neil Best of Newsday has Ines Sainz’s reaction to the Jets controversy.

Phil Mushnick in the New York Post says CBS has a powder keg in Shannon Sharpe. 

John Koblin of the New York Observer was incredulous when CBS switched the US Open men’s final to ESPN2. 

Lynn Zinser of the New York Times says the delayed US Open men’s final caused CBS and others to lose money all around.

Pete Dougherty in the Albany Times Union says a local sports radio station has hired a new program director/talk show host.

Pete also has the Capital Region NFL TV schedule for Week 2.

Laura Nachman says Comcast subscribers in Philadelphia will get a free preview of NFL Network’s RedZone this week.

Neal Zoren of the Delaware County Daily Times says Comcast SportsNet Philadelphia does what it can to cover the Eagles. 

David Zurawik of the Baltimore Sun cuts and pastes NBC’s press release on its Sunday Night Football ratings.

Over to the DC Sports Bog and the Washington Post’s Dan Steinberg who has DC NFL team running back Clinton Portis opining on the Ines Sainz situation and all I can say is, “Wow.”

Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio says Portis (actually the DC NFL Team) has issued an apology. 

Travis Haney of the Charleston (SC) Post and Courier says next Saturday’s (not this Saturday’s) South Carolina-Auburn game will be in primetime on ESPN.

Tom Jones from the St. Petersburg Times is disgusted with Stuart Scott, Matt Millen and Steve Young. I’m disgusted with Jones thinking Scott is a real journalist. 

Shannon Owens of the Orlando Sentinel says Ines Sainz and the Association for Women in Sports Media aren’t on the same page. 

Andrew Gribble from an Alabama newspaper (I don’t know which one. The website really doesn’t identify which one) notes that College Gameday is heading to Auburn this Saturday.

WJXT in Jacksonville reports that several “F” bombs were heard on CBS’ NFL coverage on Sunday.

Over to Barry Horn of the Dallas Morning News who writes that more than a million homes in the Metroplex were tuned to Sunday Night Football.

David Barron of the Houston Chronicle has some thoughts on Sunday’s NFL coverage.

David also has the August radio ratings for Houston.

David writes about Jim Nantz’s 25 years in sports broadcasting.

David has Jim listing his top 25 moments that he’s called. 

David says Texans-Colts and Cowboys-DC NFL team did well in the local ratings.

And David talks with ESPN’s Hannah Storm about producing tonight’s 30 for 30 documentary.

Jerry Garcia from the San Antonio Express-News also has some thoughts on the NFL TV coverage.

The Indianapolis Star says ESPN college football analyst Lee Corso is heading to the Indiana University Hall of Fame. 

Don Walker of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel says the Bucks and Fox Sports Wisconsin have announced their 2010-11 schedule.

Bob Wolfley of the Journal Sentinel notes that many NFL TV analysts are in love with the Packers for the Super Bowl.

From earlier this month, Phil Rosenthal of the Chicago Tribune says an extended NFL schedule could wreak havoc with TV schedules in the future.

Terez A. Paylor from the Kansas City Star goes behind the scenes with the Monday Night Football crew at Arrowhead Stadium. 

The Reno (NV) Gazette-Journal notes that a new ESPN Radio affiliate has debuted on the FM dial.

Andrew Blankstein of the Los Angeles Times says Jay Mariotti has been charged with domestic violence in the wake of his alleged dispute with his girlfriend last month. Thanks to The Big Lead for the link.

Mary McNamara of the Times reviews tonight’s ESPN 30 for 30 documentary on the Chris Evert-Martina Navratilova rivalry and friendship.

EPL Talk notes that the shining star of ESPN’s coverage of the World Cup, Ian Darke, is about to become the voice of the English Premier League for ESPN2.

Ballpark Digest says Versus will air the Triple A Minor League Baseball Championship this month as part of a new three year deal.

Sports Media Watch has a few ratings notes.

SMW says the US Open Women’s Final drew its lowest overnight numbers in more than a decade.

Joe Favorito says both Women’s Professional Soccer and the United Football League are trying to find their niches in these troubled economic times.

Alex Walsh over at Sports Business Digest says the ratings for Week 1 of the NFL were very impressive.

Ok, you have plenty of links today and I’m not at 100% so you have a bonus today! I’ll have some press releases later.

The Mid-Week Links

Let’s do your mid-week linkage. I’m stuck at the home office in Rhode Island so while I’m waiting on a few things, I’ll give you links.

Looks like Jay the Rat might have escaped charges as the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office is declining to press charges against Jay Mariotti. The Big Lead links us to the Beverly Hills Courier which reports that the case has been referred to the LA City Attorney’s Office. Mariotti was arrested last month on charges he allegedly beat up his girlfriend. He has not written for Fanhouse and not appeared on ESPN since then.

SportsbyBrooks explains that Mariotti can still face charges. 

USA Today’s Michael Hiestand writes that Fox NFL Sunday’s studio analysts will be making cameo cut-ins on game broadcasts.

At the Indiana University National Sports Journalism Center, Eric Deggans of the St. Petersburg Times lectures the WaPo’s Mike Wise on his failure to understand the new age of online journalism. Very good article.

Milton Kent at Fanhouse says NFL Commish Roger Goodell isn’t happy with Jets coach Rex Ryan’s language on Hard Knocks, but won’t go so as far to fine him.

Milton has a short blurb on Rich Eisen’s new duties at NFL Network/NFL.com. 

To Press Coverage where Dan Levy likes the idea of Rich Eisen doing a weekly podcast for NFL.com.

Brian Lowry at Fox Sports feel announcers ramp up the hyperbole way too much. 

Mike Reynolds of Multichannel News says NESN is launching a national version of its channel to Time Warner Cable systems in the Carolinas and is looking to add more markets.

Mike Shields from Mediaweek writes that ESPN and YouTube have teamed up to encourage fans to upload their own highlights that could be aired on SportsCenter.

Louisa Ada Seltzer of Media Life Magazine says Monday’s Boise State-Virginia Tech game garnered strong ratings for ESPN beating all programming on both cable and network TV.

TV Technology says Sony will sponsor an ESPN 3D college football series.

The great Darren Rovell of CNBC says Boise State continues to hit the marketing jackpot as its football continues to grow in stature.

In Digital Spy, Andrew Laughlin says ESPN UK has hired a new executive to head its channel. 

From All Media Scotland, we find that a Scottish sports reporter is heading across the Atlantic to work for ESPN International in the US.

Michael Bodley of The Australian notes that ESPN International is airing Monday Night Football down under.

All Access reports that Fox Sports Radio’s Tony Bruno and Bay Area sports radio host Gary Radnich will front a new weekly show for Comcast SportsNet California.

Bruce Allen at Boston Sports Media Watch calls out the Curly-Haired Boyfriend, Dan Shaughnessy.

The New York Times’ Richard Sandomir says the director of the 30 for 30 documentary on George and Hal Steinbrenner bit off more than she could chew.

Ken Belson at the Times notes that while some sports arenas and stadiums are just memories to sports fans, their debt remains very much alive to taxpayers.

Pete Dougherty of the Albany Times Union has the NFL Week 1 TV schedule with the games shown in the Capital Region.

The Myrtle Beach (SC) Sun-News’ Coastal Carolina Home & Lifestyle profiles South Carolina native Wendi Nix of ESPN. 

Tom Jones of the St. Petersburg Times doesn’t appreciate a Cleveland Plain-Dealer writer making fun of Tampa.

John Bedell of the South Lake (FL) News-Sun looks at several upcoming film and stage projects on the late Vince Lombardi.

Mark Lorando of the New Orleans Times-Picayune says tonight’s premiere of America’s Game on the Saints’ Super Bowl XLIV win will not disappoint fans. 

In the Dallas Morning News, Barry Horn has the NFL TV Week 1 schedule for the Metroplex.

Richard Olive of the San Antonio Express-News notes a local resident is part of the new Big Break: Dominican Republic that will start airing on Golf Channel later this month. 

The Chicago Tribune’s Phil Rosenthal says the local Fox affiliate has found its sports anchor.

Robert Feder also writes about the Fox Chicago move.

Over to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel where Bob Wolfley tells us that many prognosticators are picking the Green Bay Packers to do well this season.

The Minneapolis Star Tribune begins a new partnership with Fox Sports North for high school sports coverage. 

Helene Elliot at the Los Angeles Times notes that all but one of the Anaheim Ducks games will be available on local television.

Bruce Dowbiggin at the Toronto Globe and Mail says it’s time for the CFL to start building new stadiums.

William Houston at Truth & Rumours returned from a summer hiatus to announce that he’s shutting down. For now. Nice, William.

SportsNewser says NBC News and the National Science Foundation will be teaming up to produce an educational series on the Science of the NFL.

Sports Media Watch notes that ESPN on ABC’s Saturday Night Football got off to a rough ratings start.

SMW also has more college football ratings news.

Steve Lepore at Puck The Media notes that former New Jersey Devil Bobby Holik will be a regular analyst on NHL Network’s On The Fly.

Jared Smith at Awful Announcing can’t believe that there’s another ESPN segment featuring arguing sportswriters.

Brian Packey at AA noticed a boob grab at last night’s Marlins-Phillies game.

Ok, I’ve done all I can to find links. Gotta work. Gotta look productive. Back later.

Tuesday Evening Linkage

We have plenty of stuff to warrant another set of links this evening. Lots of good stuff.

Let’s begin with the main topic of the sports media day and that is the Mike Wise suspension by the Washington Post. WaPo Ombudsman Andrew Alexander weighed in on why Wise was given a month off by the paper. On Monday, Wise decided he would conduct a social media experiment by making stuff up on Twitter.

The Post’s media critic Howard Kurtz has a recap of events that led to the Wise suspension.

Sports Business Daily has a round-up of reaction to Wise.

Joseph Flambeck of the New York Times reports on Wise’s actions.

Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio was a guest on the same DC radio station where Wise hosts a show, but didn’t appear on that show. Yet.

Aaron Morrissey at the DCist wonders what Wise was thinking.

Back to Sports Business Daily which recaps the Jay Mariotti discussion on Monday’s Around the Horn.

Zennie Abraham of the San Francisco Chronicle feels the Mariotti discussion on Around the Horn was classless. Seriously?

Sports Media Watch notes that ESPN has no future plans to use Jay Mariotti.

SBD takes a look at the new chocolate TV ad that stars tennis champion Roger Federer.

Take a look at said ad.

Davud Beasley of Bloomberg reports that Turner Broadcasting has settled a lawsuit from a Texas businessman over the sale of the Atlanta Hawks and Thrashers. 

CNBC’s Darren Rovell wonders if cornerback is about to get its financial due in the NFL.

USA Today has Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio rate the top NFL TV analysts.

Greg Wyshynski at Yahoo’s Puck Daddy says there will be major programming and format changes at the NHL Network. And Greg gives me a nice shoutout. Much appreciated, Greg.

Staci D. Kramer at paidContent says NHL Network has tapped an NFL Network programming exec to help spruce up the channel.

All Access says Miami sports talker WQAM has re-signed morning host Joe Rose for another two years.

Johnny Diaz of the Boston Globe looks at NESN trying to diversify its programming from sports.

Mike White of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette says former Voice of the Pirates Lenny Frattare will be calling high school football games this fall.

Dan Steinberg of the Washington Post’s DC Sports Bog notes that a Comcast SportsNet Mid-Atlantic reporter is emotional about leaving the Nation’s Capital.

Jim Williams of the Washington Examiner writes about the personnel changes at CSN Mid-Atlantic.

Dave McKenna at the Washington City Paper is hoping to see Rob Dibble remain at MASN. 

Shawn Cetrone from the Rock Hill (SC) Herald says an expected economic windfall from an ESPN-televised high school football doubleheader may not be realized.

Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald says WQAM has hired former Miami Hurricanes QB Gino Toretta to host a daily two hour show.

Mike Herndon in the Mobile (AL) Press-Register has ESPN’s Kirk Herbstreit talking about the SEC.

Guerin Emig of the Tulsa World says the long-time voice of the Oklahoma Sooners will be retiring after this football season.

The Minneapolis Star Tribune reports that Fox Sports North will be streaming as many as four high school football games a week on its website.

Natalie Meisler of the Denver Post says Comcast is making this Saturday’s Colorado-Colorado State game available to all of its subscribers in the Centennial State.

Tom Hoffarth in the Los Angeles Daily News looks at the evolution of football instructional guides. 

Allen Panzieri of the Ottawa Citizen notes that the Senators will have all of their games televised for the first time in franchise history.

Sports Media Watch notes that the WNBA playoffs ratings were flat with last year.

Awful Announcing has the video of ESPN’s Chris Fowler ruining a Jenga game.

Dan Fogarty at Sports Grid says former New York Giant and NBC analyst Tiki Barber is now trying to repair his damaged reputation.

And that will conclude our links for tonight. Lots of good stuff.

Giving You Some Tuesday Linkage

After being away from the office for most of the morning, it’s time to give you linkage while I can.

We start off with Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk who notes that Washington Post writer Mike Wise has been suspended by the paper for one month following his fake tweeting on Tuesday.

Dan Levy at Press Coverage talks with Mike Florio about the Mike Wise situation.

Sean Leahy of USA Today has a good feature story on how some ex-NFL players have made the transition to become effective TV analysts.

USA Today’s Michael Hiestand talks about ESPN’s Around the Horn panelists not shying away from the Jay Mariotti topic.

Hiestand also looks at the ratings of some sports on TV this past weekend.

Milton Kent from Fanhouse has NBC’s Tony Dungy and Rodney Harrison talking how a looming lockout in 2011 could affect play late in this season.

Jon Lafayette of Broadcating & Cable writes that ESPN is teaming up with YouTube allowing viewers to upload their own videos which could end up airing on SportsCenter.

Georg Szalai from the Hollywood Reporter says with a deadline looming, it appears ESPN will remain on Time Warner Cable systems in time for college football season.

Mike Reynolds at Multichannel News says ESPN’s family of networks will be all over the opening weekend of the college football season.

Alex Weprin at SportsNewser says MLB will be streaming games on YouTube. In Japan. 

CNBC’s Darren Rovell looks at the new $1,000,000 insurance policy on Troy Polamalu’s hair. No kidding. 

Richard Sandomir of the New York Times notes the 2nd year of the Tennis Channel vs. Cablevision battle for carriage.

The New York Daily News’ Bob Raissman is high on SNY’s Keith Hernandez.

Ken McMillan at the Hudson Valley Times Herald-Record writes that there will be plenty of high school football on the local radio airwaves.

Laura Nachman laments the loss of an ESPN Radio weekend show in Philadelphia.

Eric Wemple at TBD, a DC arts blog, looks at the Mike Wise situation. Thanks to The Big Lead for the link.

Dan Steinberg of the Washington Post’s DC Sports Bog says it’s still unclear why MASN analyst Rob Dibble did not accompany the team on its current road trip.

The Post’s Leonard Shapiro hopes the Dibble flap over Nationals pitcher Stephen Strasburg doesn’t end up causing the analyst to lose his job. 

Jim Williams at the Washington Examiner talks with NBC’s Al Michaels who enters his 25th season of broadcasting NFL games.

Tom Jones from the St. Petersburg Times says a local sports radio host is out of a job.

Sarah Talalay at the South Florida Sun Sentinel notes that the Florida Marlins are providing 3-D views of their new stadium on their website.

Jack McElroy of the Knoxville (TN) News is disturbed over the way Tennessee coach Derek Dooley gave favorable treatment to certain reporters allowing them to attend a mock game. Thanks to Sports Illustrated’s Richard Deitsch for the link.

David Barron from the Houston Chronicle has the local ratings for Saturday’s Cowboys-Texans game.

John Kiesewetter of the Cincinnati Enquirer says Fox Sports Ohio has added a Reds game to its schedule after losing one to Fox Sports.

Ed Sherman in Crain’s Chicago Business says NBC’s Tony Dungy and Rodney Harrison have differing opinions on the Bears’ preseason.

Phil Rosenthal of the Chicago Tribune recaps the Around the Horn discussion on Jay Mariotti.

Bob Wolfley of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has NBC’s NFL analysts talking about the Green Bay Packers.

Tom Hoffarth of the Los Angeles Daily News reviews ESPN’s latest 30 for 30 documentary, on the Washington Little League team that upset Taiwan in 1982.

Tom says NBC Sports Director Bucky Gunts became a running joke during Sunday’s Emmy Awards.

Sports Media Watch looks at how major sporting events fared with various key demographics.

SMW says NFL on Sunday night, even on Fox, is king.

SMW says the Little League World Series Championship Game rated lower than last year.

SMW has some various news and notes.

Christopher Byrne at the Eye on Sports Media noticed that Fox Sports is changing its production to a 16:9 screen ratio.

Deadspin notes that a Miami Herald reporter who quit the paper over the lack of Florida International University coverage, has now joined the school.

Amanda Bruno at Batter-up with Bruno notes that Overstock.com is running an “Ultimate Red Sox Experience” contest.

I think we’ll end it there.

Two Sports Media Issues, Mike Wise And Jay Mariotti

We have a couple of issues today and we go over them in this post.

Earlier today, Mike Wise of the Washington Post thought it would be a good idea to put some fake news on Twitter just to see the reaction. The idea according to Wise would be that other reporters would fail to vet his Tweet and he would be able to say, “I told you so.” The only problem that while other reporters did quote his Tweet, Wise eventually revealed on Twitter and his DC radio show that he made the whole thing up. While he thought he was being funny, people were quickly piling on. And Wise’s bosses at the WaPo quickly fired off a memo to its staff about its social networking policy.

At Fanhouse, Michael David Smith recaps the events that led to a huge downward spiral at the Post.

Dan Steinberg at the Post’s DC Sports Bog has various reaction from the media including the Post.

Mike Florio at Pro Football Talk really went off on Wise. 

To cap it off, Mike Wise talked with On The DL’s Dan Levy at Press Coverage and subsequently apologized.

So what are the lessons learned here? It’s really not a good idea to use your position as a reporter to post false news on Twitter. While the other reporters did attribute the tweets to Wise, he ended up with egg on his face. The whole thing turned out to be one giant hoax and the whole thing boomeranged on him.

Our other issue is the discussion of the Jay Mariotti issue on ESPN’s Around the Horn. This is the program where Mariotti was a regular contributor. The story of Mariotti arrested two weekends ago in an alleged domestic dispute involving his girlfriend has been well documented. So too has the reaction to Mariotti in the media and blogs.

Sports Newser has the transcripts of the reaction of the writers on today’s Around the Horn.

Sports Illustrated’s Richard Deitsch felt it was a good idea for the show to tackle the subject head on.

I do give Around the Horn credit for discussing the Mariotti incident and while it didn’t break ground, it’s more coverage than other ESPN entities have done.

So there you have the two big sports media stories that have been circulating the sports blogosphere today.

The Late Summer Megalinks

We have less than a month to go in summer and with our Labor Day weekend coming next week, we all know that September means school, end of vacations and the like. It also means football in earnest. Where I’m going with this thought I don’t know, but I’m feeling melancholy that the summer is almost done.

Let’s do the megalinks and there are plenty of stories for you to read. Of course, the Weekend Viewing Picks give you what’s happening in sports and entertainment, but please do not point out to me that I’ve omitted the Emmys. It’s on NBC and I do not recommend NBC primetime or late night programming. Ever since the whole Jay/Conan thing, I’ve been boycotting NBC’s entertainment programming. Being a sports media blogger, I can’t boycott NBC Sports.

Now to the links.

National

USA Today’s Michael Hiestand points out that a possible victim of an 18 week NFL regular season might be the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi.

At Sports Business Daily, John Ourand writes that CBS has almost sold out of its NFL regular season ad inventory. 

Milton Kent of Fanhouse says another possible victim to the expanded NFL regular season might be The Oscars.

Milton enjoyed listening to CBS US Open analysts John McEnroe and Mary Carillo square off over the ATP and WTA Tour schedules.

Kelly Riddell and Andy Fixmer of Bloomberg write that a hangup in the Disney/Time Warner dispute is the fees over the ESPN3.com broadband service.

Mike Reynolds at Multichannel News says Gol TV in HD gets picked up by Time Warner Cable in New York.

Lucia Moses at Mediaweek writes that Golf Magazine is feeling bullish about the sport despite its problems this year.

At the Indiana University National Sports Journalism Center, Dave Kindred says journalists who try to build a personal brand do so at their own risks.

CNBC’s Darren Rovell feels a webcast on Ralph Lauren’s website might be the future of sports marketing. 

Darren notes that there’s a prime parking spot available at The Barclays this week.

Emmett Jones at Sports Business Digest notes that Reebok is using an au naturel Kelly Brook to sell shoes.

Emmett says the NHL might create an all-women’s league to help the competitive balance in Olympic hockey.

Sports Media Watch has a few news and notes.

From Yahoo!, Greg Wyshynski of Puck Daddy looks at the five things learned from this week’s World Hockey Summit.

Brett Barrouquere of the Associated Press reports on a Cincinnati Bengals cheerleader who won a huge libel and slander award against a gossip website. 

Bob Stockton of World Tennis Magazine says this year’s US Open Tennis Series garnered good ratings for ESPN2.

East and Mid-Atlantic

Chad Finn from the Boston Globe says Hard Knocks with the New York Jets has become Must See TV.

Brian Ballou of the Globe reports that the son of NESN Red Sox analyst Jerry Remy was arrested this week for allegedly groping a woman.

Richard Sandomir of the New York Times writes that Jay Mariotti is now wearing the shoe on the other foot after being bombastic throughout his career.

Bob Raissman at the New York Daily News feels Hard Knocks is riding the Darrelle Revis train despite his training camp holdout. Is Raissman actually watching the show?

Phil Mushnick in the New York Post says YES failed to cover all bases during an incident in a Yankees-Blue Jays game on Monday.

Claire Atkinson of the Post looks at how NFL fans can now watch games on their cell phones. 

Brett Cyrgalis of the Post writes that a lack of American players will hurt U.S. Open ratings for CBS, ESPN and Tennis Channel. 

Brett has five questions for SEC on CBS analyst Gary Danielson.

In NY Sports Journalism, Barry Janoff has the results of a readers poll of the greatest sports broadcast calls of all-time.

Pete Dougherty of the Albany Times Union says the new local AHL team is planning to be proactive on local TV and radio.

Pete has more on the Albany Devils broadcast hopes.

Pete says Saturday’s Travers Stakes at Saratoga goes to regional television after being on national TV for a quarter century.

Ken McMillan of the Hudson Valley Times Herald-Record has a partial college football schedule for the MSG Networks.

Ken says get ready for preseason hockey.

Steve Sampsell of the Centre (PA) Daily Times talks with ESPN NASCAR analyst Tim Brewer.

The Delaware County Times says College Gameday will be visiting the Villanova campus in February.

Dave Hughes from DCRTV writes in Press Box that the Baltimore Ravens have signed with Comcast SportsNet Mid-Atlantic for most of its TV programming.

Jim Williams at the Washington Examiner talks with ESPN/ABC college football analyst Jesse Palmer on Maryland coach Ralph Friedgen.

South

The Virginia Gazette picks up a story from William & Mary’s newspaper written by Virginia Nadler regarding ESPNU using school students to produce programming.

Tim Clodfelter of the Winston-Salem (NC) Journal says it’s getting down to the wire between Time Warner Cable and Disney. 

The State in Charleston, South Carolina says it’s moving its Go Gamecocks website to a pay model.

Josh Hoke of The State writes that big name high school recruits bring the big lights to town. 

Dave Scheiber of Fox Sports Florida has Rays analyst Kevin Kennedy recalling the moment when he got the networks’ attention.

John Lembo of the Bradenton (FL) Herald notes that ESPN is in town for a high school football game tonight.

John looks at the reasons why ESPN chose Bradenton as a broadcast location.

In the Orlando Sentinel, Shannon Owens has ESPN’s Lee Corso being bullish on the Florida Gators.

Stan Diel of the Birmingham (AL) News says the clock is ticking down in the talks between Bright House cable and ESPN.

Barry Horn of the Dallas Morning News writes that the Texas Rangers continue to rack up the ratings.

Matt Heika of the Morning News says the Dallas Stars will have a new radio studio host this season. 

Ray Buck at the Fort Worth Star-Telegram looks at former Texas Tech coach Mike Leach going to TV this season.

David Barron of the Houston Chronicle notes that the local Little League baseball team is pulling in the ratings.

Mel Bracht of the Daily Oklahoman says ESPN’s Lee Corso hopes to fulfill his new contract with the Alleged Worldwide Leader.

Midwest

Michael Zuidema from the Grand Rapids (MI) Press says high school football will be covered heavily by local TV throughout the season.

Bob Wolfley of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel looks at NFL Films’ new documentary series that will air on NFL Network throughout the fall.

Ed Sherman in Crain’s Chicago Business has this week’s winners and losers.

Phil Rosenthal of the Chicago Tribune looks at the Fanhouse suspension of former Sun-Times columnist Jay Mariotti.

Interestingly enough, Mariotti’s former paper, the Sun-Times, uses wire reports to report on his suspension.

Paul Russo of the Minneapolis Star Tribune writes that the Wild will have all of its games on TV for the first time since entering the NHL.

Paul Christian of the Rochester (MN) Post-Bulletin says a minor league baseball broadcaster still can’t over the death of a player last weekend.

West

Jay Drew of the St. Lake City Tribune looks at the factors, including ESPN, that led BYU to remain with the Mountain West Conference after briefly flirting with the WAC. Thanks to The Big Lead for the link.

Scott D. Pierce of the Deseret (UT) News says BYU has long been owed a bigger slice of the TV pie due to the audience it brings to the table.

Jay Posner at the San Diego Union-Tribune says long-time Padres broadcaster Ted Leitner will return for another season.

To the North County Times where John Maffei talks with Texas Rangers/San Diego Chargers voice Josh Lewin who will also be doing duties for Fox this weekend.

At the Ventura County Star, Jim Carlisle writes about Notre Dame requesting NBC to reduce its commercial breaks for football games this season.

In the Los Angeles Times, Diane Pucin has CBS/NBC/ESPN2/BBC/7 Network analyst John McEnroe’s controversial comments about women’s tennis schedule being too demanding for its stars.

Joe Flint of the Times says an 18 game NFL schedule could bring a new TV partner and a permanent date for the Super Bowl. 

Tom Hoffarth of the Los Angeles Daily News looks at the Sport Science franchise which ESPN picked up from Fox Sports Net.

Tom has more with Sport Science host John Brenkus who has been the human guinea pig for the show.

Tom also reviews the week in blogging and more.

Mark Glover of the Sacramento Bee says high school football is growing in the national spotlight.

Matt Phelps and Megan Managan of the Kirkland (WA) Reporter preview an ESPN 30 for 30 documentary on a monumental Little League World Series upset from the early 1980′s.

Canada

Bruce Dowbiggin of the Toronto Globe and Mail wonders when a local sports radio station will name a morning show host.

Chris Zelkovich of the Toronto Star says the war of words over the new Rogers Sportsnet one is really heating up.

And we’re done. Thanks for reading.

DEVELOPING: Jay Mariotti Suspended From Fanhouse

This broke while I was away from my computer. AOL has suspended columnist Jay Mariotti from Fanhouse and a spokesman has said he will not write anything new for the web service for the foreseeable future. Richard Deitsch from Sports Illustrated who’s been breaking a lot of news lately, got the statement from AOL and tweeted it.

I’ll post it for you in its entirety here.

Statement from an AOL spokesperson: “We are continuing to gather all the facts. In the meantime, we have suspended Jay Mariotti and are not featuring any new work from him.” 

It comes five days after Mariotti was arrested in Los Angeles on domestic assault charges in an incident involving his girlfriend.Mariotti posted $50,000 bond and has not been heard from since.

His other employer, ESPN, has not made any statements or conducted any disciplinary action against Mariotti at this time. And since the show on which he regularly appears, “Around The Horn” is off the air this week anyway, Mariotti is in essence, serving a suspension, but we’ll see if ESPN takes any action against him in the near future.

In the meantime, Mariotti sits somewhere in Los Angeles in hiding and wondering if he’ll be employed at this time next week.

UPDATE, 12:10 p.m.: On the DL’s Dan Levy has heard from ESPN and a spokesman has told him that Mariotti will not appear on “Around The Horn” next week and will not comment further.

Doing Our Tuesday Links

Let’s get some linkage done while I can.

Starting with Sports Illustrated’s Richard Deitsch who looks at the arrest of Jay “The Rat” Mariotti over the weekend and ESPN’s Jenn Brown endorsing Icehouse Beer.

Rich Rovito of the Business Journal of Milwaukee reports that ESPN has apparently put the kybosh on Brown’s endorsement contract.

Richard tweets that he is not responsible for ESPN nixing the deal. 

Nando Di Fino of the Wall Street Journal looks at the lack of reporters rushing to Mariotti’s defense following last weekend’s arrest on domestic assault charges.

John Ourand from the Sports Business Journal notes that NBC Sports Emperor Dick Ebersol was spotted at Golf Channel headquarters in Orlando leading to speculation that Comcast will tap the Emperor to lead its sports division when it takes over NBC.

Fox Sports’ Brian Lowry looks at the ESPN/Time Warner Cable dispute. 

Mike Reynolds from Multichannel News writes that FoxSoccer.com is expanding its broadband subscription service.

R. Thomas Umstead of Multichannel says DirecTV will be offering its Sunday NFL Ticket to non-subscribers on broadband.

John Eggerton at Broadcasting & Cable says MASN has picked up a carriage agreement in North Carolina, but it’s still not the one it really wants.

Bill Cromwell at Media Life Magazine looks at the very good overnight ratings for Sunday’s Vikings-49ers preseason NFL game on NBC.

At the Indiana University National Sports Journalism Center, Eric Deggans of the St. Petersburg Times says the Mariotti arrest, the Tiger Woods divorce and Jason Whitlock’s LeBron James-like announcement on leaving the Kansas City Star shows the sports media today is in a state of flux.

USA Today’s Michael Hiestand has the ratings for selected events from the weekend.

Nick Bromberg of Yahoo! Sports advises the IndyCar Series to break away from Versus. 

CNBC’s Darren Rovell says a company matching athletes for simple internet ad campaign is doing quite well.

Darren notes that Washington Nationals pitcher Stephen Strasburg has made about $3 million for the team in the games he pitched.

Mike Hale of the New York Times reviews tonight’s 30 for 30 offering on Michael Jordan’s trek through minor league baseball.

Richard Sandomir of the Times says MLB is searching for the person or persons responsible for leaking classified financial data for several teams. 

Bob Raissman at the New York Daily News feel that it’s about time YES jumped on the Roger Clemens steroids bandwagon.

In SB Nation New York, broadcasting historian David Halberstam lists the top 25 sportscasters in New York.

Pete Dougherty at the Albany Times Union has the WNBA playoffs TV schedule for this week and beyond.

Pete says the ESPN networks will be all over the FIBA World Championships from Turkey.

Laura Nachman says the Philadelphia CBS affiliate is promoting a former Eagle to back up sports anchor.

In the Washington Post’s DC Sports Bog, Dan Steinberg looks at the battle of two former DC NFL teammates, Joe Theismann and John Riggins discussing current QB Donovan McNabb.

Mark Story in the Lexington (KY) Herald-Leader writes about former Kentucky quarterback and tremendous Cleveland Browns bust Tim Couch becoming an analyst for Fox Sports Net this fall.

Sarah Lundy at the Orlando Sentinel reports that ESPN and Bright House cable are negotiating a new carriage deal.

Mike Bianchi of the Sentinel says now that Tiger Woods divorce from Elin Nordegren is final, sports journalism will never be the same. Thanks to Gail Sideman of the public relations firm, Publiside for the link.

Dave George at the Palm Beach Post says ESPN’s Kirk Herbstreit is happy to be talking college football.

In the Dallas Morning News, Barry Horn has a few thoughts on the Cowboys-Chargers game production from last week.

The Morning News says Texas Rangers pitcher Cliff Lee is brandishing ESPN Radio hack Colin Cowherd, “a liar”.

The Houston Chronicle’s David Barron says ESPN’s Craig James and CBS College Sports’ Mike Leach are talking a lot, but not about each other as a lawsuit looms.

Mel Bracht of the Daily Oklahoman has his sports media notebook.

John Kiesewetter in the Cincinnati Enquirer says Fox has picked up a Reds game for national consumption next month.

Ed Sherman of Crain’s Chicago Business notes that Jay Mariotti’s arrest is driving traffic to various blogs.

Don Walker of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel says a Big East TV Network could generate significant revenue for the conference.

Warren Gerds of the Green Bay Press Gazette says Aaron Taylor will get increased duties at CBS College Sports this season. 

From the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Derrick Gold says Cardinals TV voice Dan McLaughlin took a two game leave after a DUI arrest last week.

Dave Noreiga of KSL-TV in Salt Lake City, UT says BYU leaving the Mountain West Conference and becoming an independent hinges on ESPN. 

Tom Hoffarth of the Los Angeles Daily News has an extensive review of tonight’s 30 for 30 documentary.

Chris Zelkovich of the Toronto Star says last Friday’s Blue Jays game against the Red Sox topped the ratings in Canada. 

Jim Matheson of the Edmonton Journal says the Oilers have a new play-by-play man.

In the Biz of Baseball, Maury Brown wonders who’s responsible for leaking financial data from several MLB teams.

Maury says a new study shows that independent blogs are the least trusted media sources among sports organizations.

Pete Toms in the Biz of Baseball looks at the importance of Regional Sports Networks to baseball.

Ben Koo of Koo’s Corner examines what happened to sports blogging social media site Ballhype which collapsed this week. A bit of disclosure, Fang’s Bites was a member of Ballhype and I really appreciated the boost it gave me when I joined three years ago.

Deadspin notes that Tiger Woods is back in the media’s good graces again.

A.J Daulerio at Deadspin looks inside the Jay Mariotti arrest.

SportsbyBrooks says Fanhouse has yet to turn off the comments on Mariotti’s archives.

And we’re finished here.

Back To Monday Linkage

Now that the wedding hangover is just about over, I’m back at work, also blogging and ready for another week in the dog days of August. Let’s go.

USA Today’s Michael Hiestand has CBS’ Phil Simms discussing the enigma that is Brett Favre.

CBSSports.com’s Dennis Dodd says eight Big 12 schools are in discussion to start their own TV network. This would not include Texas which is developing its own channel. My head is spinning.

At the Indiana University National Sports Journalism Center, Jason Fry wishes beat writers would use Twitter for reporting and not complaining.

CNBC’s Darren Rovell says the Shake Weight is a big hit. Just looking at the ads, how to use it seems so wrong. Very wrong.

Mike Reynolds at Multichannel News writes that Gol TV will launch in HD on a 2nd affiliate after a successful launch on DirecTV earlier this month.

Phil Swann at TV Predictions says DirecTV will offer Sunday NFL Ticket online to non-subscribers. 

Phil Mushnick at the New York Post says the Roger Clemens steroids cases drudges up more problems for MLB.

Ryan Sharrow of the Baltimore Business Journal looks at the Ravens signing with Comcast SportsNet Mid-Atlantic to air their regular season programming.

Dan Steinberg of the Washington Post’s DC Sports Bog says Al Michaels’ halftime interview with Brett Favre bumped a previously taped piece between Bob Costas and DC NFL team coach Mike Shanahan. 

Tom Jones at the St. Petersburg Times has a look at the weekend in sports TV.

Ed Sherman with Crain’s Chicago Business says former Sun-Times columnist Jay Mariotti has put his career in jeopardy with his arrest on domestic assault charges.

Chicago media critic Robert Feder says Mariotti’s arrest brought up some old wounds between he and his former Sun-Times colleague Roger Ebert.

Dusty Saunders of the Denver Post feels Vin Scully is truly a treasure.

Dylan Hernandez of the Los Angeles Times writes about Scully’s announcement to return for the 2011 season.

Tom Hoffarth of the Los Angeles Daily News says SoCal led out a collective sigh of relief upon hearing of Vin’s return.

Tom has various reaction to Vin’s announcement.

Tom says while Vin apologized for making the announcement, Tom says the media should be apologizing to him for making this all a big deal.

Tom has your SoCal sports calendar.

Bruce Dowbiggin of the Toronto Globe and Mail says a Canadian sports TV network has parted ways with one of its long-time personalities.

Chris Zelkovich at the Toronto Star feels Buck Martinez has greatly improved the quality of Blue Jays telecasts on Rogers Sportsnet.

I don’t know how Deadspin did it, but the site somehow got classified financial information on four Major League Baseball franchises. And it also got one more.

Maury Brown at the Biz of Baseball tries to make sense of it all.

At the Sports Bank, Paul M. Banks had the chance to talk with softball star Jennie Finch and what’s next for her as she’s retiring from the sport. He talks with her about her legacy. And he also talks with her about what’s next for her, either owning a softball team or going into television.

The Big Lead notes that NBC’s Al Michaels and Cris Collinsworth giddily talked about gambling at the end of last night’s Vikings-49ers game. 

The Miami Herald’s Dan LeBatard writes a guest post for The Big Lead in which he understands, but also fears the reprisals on Jay Mariotti.

Kurt Allen at Midwest Sports Fans says Mariotti is another in a long line of troubles at ESPN.

That’s all for now.

Back to the Linkage Grind

On a very rainy Sunday in the Northeast, let’s give you linkage which you have been sorely missing over the last few days. As you might know, I’ve been at a wedding and got back late on Saturday. I did provide some fresh material while I was gone and I thank Sports Illustrated’s Jimmy Traina for including Fang’s Bites in his A.M. Hot Clicks on Thursday and Friday.

Let’s do the linkage.

A strange story came out of Los Angeles on Saturday and it’s very disturbing. ESPN and Fanhouse blowhard Jay Mariotti, best known as Jay The Rat to Chicago Sun-Times film critic Roger Ebert, was arrested Saturday and eventually released on $50,000 bail following an alleged domestic assault incident involving his girlfriend. Of course, ESPN has no comment, but I would not expect the organization to talk at this point.

According to SportsbyBrooks, this incident could be the death knell for Mariotti’s career at ESPN which was about to take off.

SBB also notes that prior to this alleged incident, Mariotti had been a noted critic of athletes who commit domestic abuse. 

Sports Illustrated’s Richard Deitsch tweets that Fanhouse’s editors will continue to monitor the story. We’ll also keep an eye on this story. There are several Mariotti detractors who are privately crowing about this.

Mike Reynolds of Multichannel News says MSG Network’s high school sports channel is expected to go high-def by next year.

Mike also looks at the new carriage agreement between the NFL Network and the National Cable Television Cooperative which could bring the channel to Cablevision, Charter and Suddenlink systems.

At the Indiana University National Sports Journalism Center, Dave Kindred says sometimes the best stories suddenly appear out of thin air.

The New York Times’ Richard Sandomir says this year’s ratings declines should not affect talks between the PGA Tour and its network TV partners, CBS and NBC.

Over to the New York Daily News where Bob Raissman feels Jets holdout Darrelle Revis could find himself on TV should he not sign a contract before the new regular season starts.

The New York Post’s Phil Mushnick is making another preposterous argument.

Pete Dougherty of the Albany Times Union wonders if ESPN’s Jenn Brown should be endorsing beer.

Press Box notes that the Baltimore Ravens have made an agreement to air their regular season programming on both WBAL Plus and Comcast SportsNet Mid-Atlantic.

Jim Williams of the Washington Examiner looks at the Ravens returning to Comcast SportsNet.

Jim talks with Washington Capitals and Wizards owner Ted Leonsis about the possibility of forming his own regional sports network.

Tom Jones of the St. Petersburg Times has a few tidbits from ESPN College Gameday analyst Kirk Herbstreit.

Sarah Talalay from the South Florida Sun Sentinel says the Miami Dolphins are bringing the nightlife experience to fans at whatever its stadium is called this week.

Iliana Limon of the Orlando Sentinel says Conference USA learned from the Mountain West’s mistakes and have plenty of freedom in new rights deals with CBS College Sports and ESPN.

We move to the Dallas Morning News and Barry Horn who talks with former Cowboys coach and current Fox NFL Sunday analyst Jimmy Johnson about his Survivor experience.

Mel Bracht of the Daily Oklahoman says College Gameday co-horts Herbstreit and Lee Corso agree on which teams will play in the Big 12 Championship.

John Kiesewetter of the Cincinnati Enquirer notes that ESPN2 among other networks are showing old footage to show the Queen City’s skyline.

Phil Rogers of the Chicago Tribune says filmmaker Ken Burns will take a hard look at the steroids era when he premiere’s his addition to “Baseball” this fall.

Bob Wolfley in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel looks at Peyton Manning’s pursuit of Brett Favre’s records as projected by the Indianapolis Star.

In the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Dan Caesar notes that some local viewers will be able to watch SEC Network games.

Dan writes that a Post-Dispatch colleague no longer has a sports radio talk show gig.

Kevin Baxter of the Los Angeles Times looks at the return of Vin Scully to the Dodgers booth next season.

Steve Friess of LA Weekly has a lengthy story about the late Mike Penner, the Los Angeles Times sports writer who became Christine Daniels and later committed suicide.

Steve also looks at what happened to Daniels’ blog and why the records no longer appear at the Times.

Maury Brown of the Biz of Baseball also has a story on Scully’s return. 

The Sports Media Watch notes that MLB actually beat preseason NFL head-to-head.

SMW has its weekend ratings predictions.

Steve Lepore at Puck The Media says CBC will air 10 AHL games taking the place of the NBA’s Toronto Raptors which received low ratings.

Over at SB Nation NY, Steve ranks New York’s color analysts.

Joe Favorito says the New York Yankees may be defending MLB champs, but they were really big champions in the local community this past week.

And we’ll end there for now.

Developing the Tuesday Links

I keep getting news or releases that I need to post, thus delaying my gathering of the links. Well, I think I have a window to get these done now.

USA Today’s Michael Hiestand has the ratings of various sports programs from the weekend.

The Sports Media Watch notes that HBO Real Sports host Bryant Gumbel revealed this morning that he had lung cancer surgery.

The Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame has announced its Class of 2009 and it includes legendary broadcasters Dick Enberg and Keith Jackson.

CNBC’s Darren Rovell writes that the Heisman Trophy ceremony doesn’t necessarily attract viewers because of close votes.

On The DL’s Dan Levy writing in the Sporting News that the holiday season has been one for media buyouts and internet shutdowns.

Eric Deggans of the St. Petersburg Times has an open letter to Comcast executives regarding the purchase of NBC at the Indiana University National Sports Journalism Center.

At his regular place of employment, Eric writes about how the Tiger Woods story is forcing the mainstream sports media to play catchup with TMZ and US Weekly.

Eric also talks with TMZ’s Harvey Levin about the Tiger Slam.

Comcast SportsNet New England reports that NESN Red Sox analyst Dave Roberts is leaving the network to join the Padres front office.

From the New York Times, Richard Sandomir writes about Showtime airing a show devoted to NASCAR starting in February 2010.

Michael Shain of the New York post wonders if the NCAA Tournament will become an all-cable affair.

Keith Groller of the Allentown (PA) Morning Call says two Sunday programs did not shy away from sensitive topics.

Dan Gross of the Philadelphia Inquirer writes that despite getting arrested the night before, former Eagles wide receiver Freddie Mitchell began his new radio gig on Monday.

The Baltimore Sun’s David Zurawik liked how ESPN called out the Ravens on Monday Night Football.

From the Bradenton Herald, John Lembo writes that ESPN’s Dick Vitale continues to raise money for the battle against cancer and will mention two Florida residents who lost their lives to the disease.

Sarah Talalay of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel says NFL Commish Roger Goodell once again warned Miami to keep the Stadium formerly known as Joe Robbie current to risk not seeing the Super Bowl for a while.

Sarah says Dunkin’ Donuts is providing free tickets for the Dolphins’ home game against the Houston Texans on December 27.

Barry Horn of the Dallas Morning News says his newspaper and a local sports radio station have signed a new content sharing agreement.

Barry says the Cowboys will be the featured game on CBS this Sunday.

John Kiesewetter of the Cincinnati Enquirer discusses the addition of Ohio State announcer Paul Keels to the Reds TV team.

Ed Sherman from Crain’s Chicago Business says despite playing a bad game in their win over St. Louis, the Bears garnered good ratings on Sunday.

Ed says it’s apparent that the Chicago Tribune won’t be hiring Jay The Rat.

Bob Wolfley of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel says ESPN heaped praise on the Packers during Monday Night Football.

Tom Hoffarth of the Los Angeles Daily News is trying to get the hang of this Twitter thing.

William Houston in Truth & Rumours says not only will the Winter Olympics be aired in English and French in Canada, but also in aboriginal languages.

Reuters reports that ESPN has won the rights to air 23 English Premier League games in Ireland starting next season.

Owen Gibson of the Guardian says ESPN has been awarded the rights to air a majority of FA Cup games next season.

BBC Sport says ESPN picks up the slack for Setanta Sports which collapsed earlier this year.

Louisa Ada Seltzer of Media Life Magazine looks at the possibility of the NCAA Tournament expanding and going to cable.

Back to the Sports Media Watch and some college football ratings news.

The Big 12 Championship drew good numbers for ABC.

Opposite the Big 12 Championship, the ACC Championship on ESPN dropped.

SMW notes that the game that decided the Big East title, Cincinnati and Pittsburgh, also rated well for ABC.

And the BCS Selection Show on Fox dropped again.

Bill Gorman at TV by the Numbers says last week’s Patriots-Saints game steered ESPN to a cable primetime win.

We conclude with Kristine Leahy and today’s edition of The Five at WEEI.com.

That’s it for now. Lots of links on this Tuesday.

Late Night Linkage

Here are some links for you on this late night Monday going into early Tuesday.

First a favor to ask. My lovely friend, Steelergurl, is asking you to fill out a survey on NFL and new media. It won’t take more than five minutes of your time. If you’re an NFL fan, she wants to know how you get your NFL news, what news sites you visit, what blogs you read, which players you follow on Twitter, that type of thing. I appreciate if you could fill out the survey. Steelergurl thanks you in advance.

Now to the links.

Sports Illustated’s Richard Deitsch gives us his Bucket List, the list of sporting events he would like to witness before he passes. Richard is one of 16 SI writers who provided their lists for a special feature on the magazine’s website.

CNBC’s Darren Rovell has video of two interviews he conducted while at one of the nation’s largest horse sales.

The Sports Media Journal’s Ray Frager looks at the merits of inducting cockroach Art Modell into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. If Modell ever gets in after he moved my beloved Browns to Baltimore, I vow never to mention the Pro Football Hall of Fame on this blog again.

Speaking of the Pro Football Hall of Fame, Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio suggests changing the format of the induction ceremonies.

From the Boston Sports Media Watch, Bruce Allen learns that the Boston Globe has filled the vacancy left when NBA beat writer Marc Spears left for Yahoo! Sportts.

Newsday’s Neil Best caught up with Luis Tiant on the night before the ESPN documentary, “The Lost Son of Havana” on his trip to Cuba aired Monday. Neil also reviews the documentary.

Neil says Friday’s Red Sox-Yankees 15 inning classic was a ratings bonanza for YES.

Pete Dougherty of the Albany Times Union writes that the NFL and PGA scored in the ratings on Sunday.

Brian Kaminski of the Tarentum Valley (PA) News Dispatch writes about a fan winning a one year contract to be on the air for a Pittsburgh sports radio station.

Jim Williams of the Washington Examiner goes over Michael Vick’s interview on 60 Minutes this Sunday.

Jim talks about Comcast SportsNet Mid-Atlantic extending their exclusive content deal with the Washington Redskins.

Tim Lemke of the Washington Times reports that the deal allows CSN to exclusively air the Redskins’ exhibition games in HD.

Andrea Adelson from the Orlando Sentinel writes about the first two stops of the college football season for ESPN’s College Gameday.

John Kiesewetter of the Cincinnati Enquirer says the local Fox affiliate is expanding its high school football coverage.

Ed Sherman of Crain’s Chicago Business debunks a SportsbyBrooks report that Jay the Rat is moving to the Chicago Tribune.

In the Chicago Daily Herald, Ted Cox has Jay The Rat saying the deal has yet to be finalized.

But SportsbyBrooks is standing by its story.

I’m at the point where I just don’t care about Jay the Rat.

Vince Horiuchi of the Salt Lake Tribune writes the local NBC affiliate will not air a poker game show because of the owner’s stand on gambling.

MLB Network airs its second minor league game ever next Monday.

Golf Channel says it will stream coverage of Day 1 of the Solheim Cup which is the women’s version of the Ryder Cup.

Chris Byrne of the Eye on Sports Media has scanned the SEC’s media policy for your perusal.

Holly Anderson of Yahoo! Sports also looks at the new relationship between ESPN and the SEC that forged the new media policy.

Owen Gibson of the Guardian writes about ESPN’s entry into the UK airing English Premier League games.

Matt Eley in The Publican says ESPN has won the rights to air Italy’s Serie A league soccer in the UK.

That will do it for the late night links.

Time for the Monday Linkage

Let’s do linkage for today. Lots of stuff to get to.

My back is killing me today. I slept on my side the other night and now, my upper back is hurting like an MF’er. I couldn’t sleep last night and I just got up at 5 a.m. No choice.

Doing your links now.

Reid Cherner of USA Today says the NFL Hall of Fame induction ceremonies could have used a time limit.

Forbes Magazine conducts an interview with New York Daily News publisher Mort Zuckerman who talks about the newspaper industry and suggests that sports betting be allowed at newspaper websites.

Incoming ESPN NFL insider Adam Schefter pays tribute to SI’s Peter King on his induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame’s writers wing.

SportsbyBrooks reports that Jay The Rat Mariotti will join the Chicago Tribune on September 1.

Phil Mushnick from the New York Post can’t get enough of steroids mentions when it comes to David Ortiz.

CNBC’s Darren Rovell is going to be closely watching a horse sale that’s taking place at Saratoga tonight and tomorrow.

Pete Dougherty of the Albany Times Union says Jets fans will be able to see all of the team’s exhibition games this month.

Kevin McNamara of the Providence Journal says the Big East is looking to eliminate the byes from its basketball tournament to attract ESPN. The network did not air the first day due to the byes for the first four teams.

Iliana Limon of the Orlando Sentinel says Conference USA’s upcoming TV negotiations will be key to the conference’s survival.

Rodney Page of the St. Petersburg Times reviews the weekend in televised sports.

The Dallas Morning News’ Barry Horn offers a Happy Anniversary to local sports personality Norm Hitzges.

Ed Sherman from Crain’s Chicago Business wonders if advertising on practice jerseys is just the beginning of more revenue streams for the NFL.

Dusty Saunders in the Denver Post says the local CBS affiliate sold plenty of advertising for its Broncos-centric programming.

Chris Zelkovich of the Toronto Star likes the CFL on TSN studio crew.

Bruce Dowbiggin of the Toronto Globe and Mail says TSN should have delved further into the concussion issue during a CFL game on Saturday.

David Tanklefsky of Broadcasting & Cable writes that Twitter can help the media, but also scoop it as well.

The Rookies blog wonders about Linda Cohn constant Tweeting and blogging despite ESPN’s new social networking policy.

The Sports Media Journal’s Keith Thibeault didn’t like Deadspin’s publishing the Josh Hamilton pictures over the weekend.

From the Sports PR blog, Christy Hammond looks into how Twitter made the news with ESPN and the NFL last week.

The Arena analyzes what ESPN should do and will do when it comes to Twitter.

The Sports Media Watch reviews what happened last week in a very good video.

Steve Dittmore from the University of Arkansas isn’t too keen on Tulsa bidding for the 2020 Olympics.

Here’s the latest edition of The Five hosted by Kristine Leahy on WEEI.com.

That’s all for now.

A Back To Work/Still Holiday Weekend Links

Some of you may have gone back to work today. Some of you might have extended your holiday weekend today. Whatever situation you’re in, linkage doesn’t stop so we get some today. I’m in a bit of withdrawal from having morning tennis over the last two weeks and with Howard Stern still on vacation at Sirius XM, I’m a bit lost for morning listening today. So I delve further into the linkage for you.

USA Today’s Michael Hiestand went to the AT&T National this weekend to see the small army CBS Sports employs for a PGA Tour event.

CNBC’s Darren Rovell talks to Andy Roddick’s Mojo (remember the American Express ads?) to see if indeed, he has it back.

Phil Mushnick over at the New York Post praises Tim McCarver for speaking out against Fox’s cutting to Manny Ramirez’s at-bats on Saturday.

Bill Conlin of the Philadelphia Daily News also gives McCarver some love for his anti-Manny statements.

Members of the Philadelphia Inquirer feel Fox Sports ripped off Phillies fans with the Manny cut-ins on Saturday.

Dave Hughes of DCRTV.com writes in Press Box that a Baltimore radio station has picked up a Sunday afternoon NFL package.

Jim Williams of the Washington Examiner says the 4th of July holiday weekend had a distinct European flavor on sports television.

Tom Jones of the St. Petersburg Times looks at the weekend in television sports.

Barry Horn in the Dallas Morning News previews tonight’s 4th and Long episode.

Ed Sherman in Crain’s Chicago Business warns of the return of Jay “The Rat” Mariotti to the Windy City in some capacity.

Thomas V. Bona of the Rockford (IL) Register Star writes about NFL Network and ESPNU joining Comcast’s digital tier at the end of this month.

Dusty Saunders of the Denver Post writes that John McEnroe was a man of few words during yesterday’s Wimbledon’s men’s final.

However, Chris Zelkovich of the Toronto Star feels John and his partner, Ted Robinson spoke too much!

Bruce Dowbiggin of the Toronto Globe and Mail goes over Wimbledon and a host of others subjects.

Alex Weprin of Broadcasting & Cable reports Golf Channel and Donald Trump are talking about a new documentary on his efforts to build a huge golf course and resort in Scotland.

Mike Reynolds of Multichannel News looks back at the Wimbledon men’s final.

Mike Farrell of Multichannel says the sale of the Montreal Canadiens could give an unexpected boost to Cablevision, the owner of MSG Network and the New York Rangers.

Mark Newman of MLB.com says Yankees online in-market streaming starts on Wednesday.

Phil Villarreal of the Consumerist blog says getting the NFL Network on Comcast systems may still cost you extra.

Shane Bacon of the AOL Fanhouse blog tells us that ESPN/ABC won’t show next week’s Open Championship in HD!

Joe Favorito says the CFL and the UFL fought to get attention.

And that’s going to do it for the links for now.

Links for Your Thursday Night

Time for some linkage finally. For the 4th of July holiday weekend, the posting may be sparse. It depends on the schedule. Friday will have your usual posts, Primetime & Late Night Viewing Picks, Weekend Viewing Picks, Follow Friday and the megalinks. I know Saturday will be busy so I may not be able to provide links. I hope that Sunday will be a lazy day so I can do the Videos of the Week and other features for you. Keep your RSS feeds updated and if you follow me on Twitter, you’ll certainly know what is posted.

Let’s get to the links.

USA Today’s Michael Hiestand has TBS’ baseball analysts talking about the All-Star Game.

Matthew Futterman of the Wall Street Journal talks with new NFL Players Association chief DeMaurice Smith.

Tom Van Riper of Forbes says attendance and TV ratings are proof that two teams in the Baltimore-Washington area cannot work.

Richard Sandomir of the New York Times writes what many of you have been saying regarding NBC’s coverage of Wimbledon. It’s time to end the tape delays.

The Sports Business Daily has a roundup of columns denouncing NBC Sports for its Wimbledon coverage.

CNBC’s Darren Rovell writes an open letter to Lance Armstrong urging him not to participate in this month’s Tour de France.

The Nielsen Ratings Wire blog tells us that NASCAR fans are very loyal to buying American brand cars.

Ken Schott of the Schenectady Gazette reports that a local sports radio show is taking the Friday holiday off.

Alan Pergament of the Buffalo News has a dozen TV picks for the holiday weekend and Wimbledon, MLB and the NFL Network are included.

Ed Barkowitz of the Philadelphia Daily News says Eagles QB Donovan McNabb will star in a new IHOP commercial.

Ray Frager of the Sports Media Journal has highlights of a conference call no-talent hack Colin Cowherd and Michelle Beadle conducted in advance of their new ESPN2 show. Ray also has some “reflections” on the MASN simulcast of the Scott Garceau/Anita Marks radio show.

Jim Williams of the Washington Examiner has a look at ESPN The Magazine’s Ultimate Franchise ratings.

Tim Lemke from the Washington Times says the NBA’s long relationship with McDonald’s is over.

Tim writes that NBC’s coverage of Wimbledon is angering tennis fans across the country.

Angela Henderson of the Huntington (WV) Herald-Dispatch is happy that NBC is reuniting volleyball announcing team Chris Marlowe and Paul Sunderland this weekend.

Barry Horn of the Dallas Morning News writes that a local sports radio host is resurfacing on the airwaves this week.

Mike Leggett of the Austin American-Statesman went fishing with ESPN college football and basketball announcer Ron Franklin.

John Kiesewetter of the Cincinnati Enquirer says Fox Sports Ohio starts its University of Cincinnati sports coverage on Monday.

The Cherry Creek (CO) News says Dish Network abruptly pulled Tennis Channel as of June 30.

Tom Hoffarth of the Los Angeles Daily News writes that ESPN Classic is bringing back reruns of the old “Sports Challenge” game shows hosted by Dick Enberg.

Mark Medina of the Los Angeles Times talks with the Sparks’ Lisa Leslie about her participation in “The Superstars”.

Bruce Jenkins of the San Francisco Chronicle writes NBC’s coverage of Wimbledon has been inadequate and dreads ESPN2′s covering this year’s U.S. Open.

The Toronto Star’s Chris Zelkovich says Canadian TV won’t be part of the Toronto Indy IRL race.

Brian Bennett of ESPN.com says the Big East Football Confernce and ESPN Regional Television have announced the schedule for this season’s syndicated package.

Multichannel News says Speed is ready to launch what it calls “Big Block Thursday” later this month.

Anthony Crupi of Mediaweek writes that just under 4 million viewers watched the Confederations Cup final between the U.S. and Brazil on ESPN.

Joe Favorito says despite the hard economic times, NASCAR continues to build its brand and its fan base. Joe adds that during the Tour de France, Lance Armstrong will be all over social media.

Deadspin says Jay “The Rat” Mariotti is being rumored to join the Chicago Tribune.

Friend of Fang’s Bites Maury Brown of the Biz of Baseball looks at the new MLB.com app for the Palm Pre.

Steve Donohue of the Contentinople blog chronicles how the Yankees in-market online streaming deal came about. And Steve talks with YES President Tracy Dolgin about the deal.

That’s it for tonight. Don’t forget the usual features on Friday. And actually, I do have one more press release post for tonight.

Beginning of the Workweek Links

We have lots of material on this first real workday of 2009.

We begin with David Scott of Boston Sports Media Watch who jumped on NESN for botching the end of the Boston College-North Carolina game.

The lovely Jessica Heslam of the Boston Herald has the tepid NESN explanation of what happened.

Jessica reports that WEEI has signed Big Show blowhard Glenn Ordway to a new contract.

We now have the arrival of Jay The Rat on the internet. Tom Mantzouranis of AOL Fanhouse reports that Jay Mariotti along with the lovely Lisa Olson, formerly of the New York Daily news and Kevin Blackstone will be writing for the site.

Michael Hiestand of USA Today writes that CBS Sports has signed Bill Cowher to a contract extension for 2009. Michael says former Detroit Lions GM Matt Millen could return to TV full-time, especially after his performance this past weekend on NBC.

Newsday’s Neil writes that NBC plans to have Millen join its Super Bowl coverage.

Now let’s go to some stories from the Sports Business Journal. The SBJ has an in-depth section on college sports media. The following stories are from that section.

First, John Ourand talks about ESPN and CBS trying to make their numbers work for their new college football contracts.

John writes that regional sports networks are also trying to stay ahead of the changing landscape in college sports.

Michael Smith discusses how colleges are trying to manage their web content.

Michael looks at how Raycom Sports is fighting to keep the rights to the ACC after losing the SEC syndication rights to ESPN.

And the SBJ lists the people to watch in college sports media.

Now to stories from this week’s SBJ issue.

Tripp Mickle and John Ourand give us the major players in the Olympics US TV rights negotiations.

Tripp says the United States Olympic Committee is going into overdrive to sell sponsorships for the 2009-2012 period.

John Ourand has some predictions for the sports media in 2009.

Don Muret profiles the architect who helps to fix sports stadium projects when they go awry.

There’s the Terrible Towel and now Terry Lefton says the Super Bowl gets a “trophy towel”.

Eric Fisher says the NFL is now marketing high definition online game replays.

Jon Show says golfer Vijay Singh has agred to make Stanford Financial the dominant logo on his bag and clothing.

Plenty of links from the SBJ and thanks to Bill McGrath for letting me know what stories are available each week. It’s greatly appreciated.

The New York Post’s Phil Mushnick feels the NFL Wild Card games were overloaded with statistics and useless replays. This is the first time in months that I actually agree with Mushie.

The Baltimore Sun’s Ray Frager shares some notes that he scribbled during the Ravens-Dolphins game yesterday. And Ray says Baltimore watched the NFL playoffs even when the Ravens weren’t involved.

Tom Jones of the St. Petersburg Times reviews the weekend in TV sports.

Barry Horn of the Dallas Morning News wonders why it took so long for Bill Cowher to announce that he’s not going to coach in 2009. Barry also looks at the weekend in the NFL. Finally, Barry sees Morning News colleague Tim Colishaw taking a sports radio gig.

Ed Sherman of Crain’s Chicago Business talks about the ratings success of the NHL Winter Classic. And Ed talks about Jay Mariotti joining AOL Fanhouse.

Paul Sullivan of the Chicago Tribune says the MLB Network shows some early promise.

Leonna Heuring of the Sikeston (MO) Standard-Democrat writes that a local native who competed for the Miss USA title and now a model, will appear in a Super Bowl ad.

Dusty Saunders of the Rocky Mountain News says the MLB Network is off to a “perfect” start.

The San Francisco 49ers have announced that Ted Robinson will become its radio voice starting next season.

William Houston of the Toronto Globe and Mail writes that the death of a junior hockey player has sparked debate among Canada’s hockey analysts.

Chris Zelkovich of the Toronto Star says TSN’s Gord Miller and Pierre McGuire went a bit overboard with the praise at the end of the Canada-Russia game during the World Junior Hockey Championships.

Thanks to the Big Lead for the following links. Apparently, Jason Whitlock of Fox Sports.com has lost his mind, attacking fellow writers and wanting someone to police us sports bloggers like AJ Daulerio of Deadspin. Of course, Deadspin reponds.

This will do it for now. More later.