No More Talkin' Tigers on the Radio

I don't know how many of you had streamed or downloaded our appearances over the past two weeks on WTKQ's The Morning Ticket with Pat & Todd, but I'm not going to be talking on the radio again any time soon.

Unfortunately, the powers-that-be at FM Talk 100.5 decided to go in the proverbial different direction, and as of last Friday, pulled the plug on the show. Any disappointment I felt over that is a trifle compared to what two radio hosts who suddenly don't have a show must have experienced. Fans of WDFN in Detroit learned this week just how brutal the radio industry can be. (And though I'm late on it, that's something I'd like to write about in the next couple of days.)

I'm obviously biased, but Pat Johnston and Todd Guerne are two talented, nice guys who deserve better, and will hopefully get it. And if you follow the conversation over at Bless You Boys, you know Todd's suddenly become an active part of the BYB community, and it's great to have a new voice and more participation - especially at this time of year.

So I should probably leave it there, and thank Pat and Todd for a wholly unexpected opportunity, as short-lived as it turned out to be. It's incredibly flattering that they thought enough of what we do here to want to talk about the Tigers on the radio each week. And it was a lot of fun.

Talkin' Tigers on the Radio: Any Closer to a Closer?

Where will the Detroit Tigers turn to find a closer? The Quest For Relief (or lack thereof) was the main topic of discussion in my chat with WTKQ's The Morning Ticket with Pat & Todd.

Are we really looking at Fernando Rodney being the man in the ninth inning this summer? Is that a possibility that should terrify Tigers fans? Or is there still a chance a free agent reliever could come to the rescue? If so, are Jason Isringhausen or Brandon Lyon up to the task?

We also talk a little bit about signing Justin Verlander long-term to avoid arbitration, and whether or not trading Magglio Ordonez is really a good idea.

Thanks once again to Pat Johnston and Todd Guerne for having me on, especially before a big football weekend (and in lieu of the Detroit Lions hiring Jim Schwartz as their new head coach).

You can listen to an embedded audio clip below (I think I've installed a better audio player this time) or download the file from the accompanying link.



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Talkin' Tigers on the Radio

I was invited onto The Morning Ticket with Pat & Todd on Saginaw's FM Talk 100.5 this morning to talk about the Detroit Tigers. We're hoping to make this a weekly thing during the baseball season.

After a tortured search during last night's Florida-Oklahoma national championship game, I found a program for Windows that would allow me to record streaming audio. And I got it synced up with my thingermajigger just in time to record my appearance.

For those of who have followed the Detroit Tigers' offseason closely, you'll already be familiar with what Pat, Todd, and I discussed. And if not, I really sound like I know what I'm talking about.

(Except when I got two pitchers mixed up, which was a little bit embarrassing. Can I say, "Hey, it was early - and I was a bit nervous and hyper"? Well, I just did.)

Anyway, I think it went pretty well for our first time out. But I should let you judge for yourself. As Tony Kornheiser would say, I'll try to do better the next time. And hopefully, the Tigers give us a little more to talk about in the weeks to come. Thanks to Pat Johnston and Todd Guerne for having me on. That's a fun show they have going.

You can listen to an embedded audio clip below or download the file from the accompanying link. (At least, I hope so. This is the first time I've tried this.)



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For Those Who Had to Watch, We Salute You

Before turning the page on 2008, I have to post one more thing about Motown's gridiron heroes, the Detroit Lions.

This isn't about the firing of coach Rod Marinelli. That was a no-brainer. The man was the worst ever at his job. No one else has ever gone winless in a 16-game season. How the hell do you bring that guy back? So no surprise there.

No, this post is to stand and give a slow clap to the poor guy who had to watch all of the crappy football southeastern Michigan's most prominent professional and college teams inflicted upon its fans this year and describe it those of us who followed the games on radio. Yes, he was paid for it, as a professional broadcaster. But he also surely paid a price, having to endure some soul-crushingly bad football.

We're talking about Jim Brandstatter, color analyst for both the Michigan football and Detroit Lions radio broadcasts. Out of the 28 games he called this season, Brandstatter provided commentary for only three victories. Michigan went 3-9. The pitiful Lions failed to win a single game. He witnessed the worst season Michigan football has had in 46 years. And as we've already covered, the Lions set NFL history for losing all 16 of their games.

Hey, at least we had the option of turning off the TV or radio. (And I did that more this year than I ever have.) Not Brandy. Hopefully, the strength and discipline instilled in him when he played for Bo Schembechler at Michigan helped him through this.

Salutes must also be given to my buddy Big Al, who live-blogged every single one of the Lions' incompetent performances, in addition to posting related news and commentary each day at The Wayne Fontes Experience. (I thought blogging about the Detroit Tigers was tough.) And to my fellow SB Nation blogger Sean Yuille, who authors blogs devoted to both University of Michigan sports and the Lions. Man, that's a tough year.

Can we please turn the calendar on 2008 in Detroit sports? (Except for the Red Wings. You guys are doing a hell of a job and shouldn't be overlooked. Even though I kind of just did that.) 2009 can't possibly be as bad. Can it?

Happy Hour 04/06: You Know, I Never Liked That Guy

I won't make a habit of recycling content from Bless You Boys over here, but I think this case deserves an exception. Not only is it an outrage, but frankly, I still feel bad about not showing more blogger solidarity the last time Colin Cowherd showed disrespect for the blogosphere, and wish I'd have chimed in at the time. Hopefully, this makes up for it in some regard.

I originally found out about this indirectly when I wanted to link to The Big Lead for a story on Curtis Granderson. Then I read Deadspin's account of it, and later Big Al's.

If you're not familiar with the story, this is basically what happened: For whatever reason, Cowherd thought it would be funny to flex some nationally syndicated radio muscle and use his audience to take down some unsuspecting (yet apparently successful enough to attract such attention) blog. So he asked his listeners to flood TBL with hits, thus crashing the server and taking the site down (where it still remains as I write this).

This is the same guy, mind you, who previously thought blogs were so insignificant that he could just swipe their material without proper credit or attribution.

Why would Cowherd do such a thing? I have no idea, but a conspiracy theory is gnawing at me. The Big Lead has aired out a lot of ESPN's dirty laundry in its year-plus of existence, so maybe someone at the network decided to strike back. So who on the ESPN Radio roster would abide such a request? Mike & Mike and Dan Patrick still have some professional and journalistic integrity to them, and likely wouldn't accommodate such a fool's errand.

Hey! Let's go with our resident corporate stooge, the one who will do anything we ask him to do. Get Cowherd! He already hates blogs for exposing him as an unoriginal fraud and complete tool. Tell him this will get his show on in a couple of large markets that won't put it on the air. And if he hesitates, threaten to take away that three-minute segment of his that we bury at the end of the Sunday morning SportsCenter.

Again, I don't know why Cowherd would do this, other than to try and defend the corporate interests and big markets he frequently sucks up to (unlike his predecessor, Tony Kornheiser) from something they all don't really comprehend, and therefore feel threatened by.

And I don't know what possible recourse could cause his radio show as much damage as he caused The Big Lead. Probably the most productive counter-measure is to follow The M Zone's lead and express your disapproval to those who can actually do something about it. Either leave a comment for ESPN's ombudsman or e-mail presidents of ESPN and ABC Radio.

♦ george.bodenheimer (at) espn (dot) com

♦ john.hare (at) abc (dot) com

It's bad enough Cowherd (or should I say "Schrutebag") gets away with 15 hours of lame radio a week. He shouldn't be able to get away with being a bully and an @$$hole, too.

The Last Word on Tommy? Part 1

I've probably embarrased myself by declaring so much love for Tony Kornheiser's show on Washington Post Radio before, but he had two interviews last week that I think could be of interest to Michigan basketball fans. So during this lull, before John Beilein is officially introduced as the Wolverines' next coach (and in the meantime, Maize n Brew has given him a checklist to go over), I figured this could be a good way to pass the time.

Last Thursday, Kornheiser talked to his old buddy John Feinstein about the Final Four, and more specifically, Kentucky's interest in Billy Donovan. Toward the end of the interview, however, Mr. Tony snuck in a question about Tommy Amaker, whom he still holds a curiosity for because he's a "local kid" from northern Virginia, and - as Michigan fans might hurt to remember - he was considered something of a future coaching star when he arrived in Ann Arbor.

I've transcribed the conversation about Amaker for you to read (which I hope I'm allowed to do), but if you'd prefer to listen to it yourself, the show is available via podcast. (You can also download the show directly here.) If you're pressed for time, the Amaker stuff is from the 51:27 to 53:33 mark.

Tony Kornheiser: What's the deal with Tommy Amaker?

John Feinstein: I wish I knew the answer to that. To me, Tommy has everything that should make him a successful college coach. He's a bright guy, he came out of a great program, he learned from a great coach, he's someone people like when they meet him. He's gotta be great in the homes. You know, any mother has gotta look at Tommy Amaker and say, "I want my kid to be with him for four years." He recruited some very highly rated high school players when he was at Michigan, and they never, ever lived up to their alleged potential.

TK: Mm-hmm.

JF: And this year, they were seniors. He had four seniors on the team this year. You know what's interesting about a situation like this? They're playing Ohio State the last Saturday of the regular season, they're up six with three and a half to go... and they don't score again, they lose the game. If they win that game, they're in the tournament, and Tommy is still the coach.

TK: Right.

JF: It's that slender a margin sometimes. You know, that's the business. And Tommy understands that. Every coach in the business understands that, that there can be one play - literally - that decides a coach's future one way or the other. And in this case, they didn't get it done in a couple of games in the last two or three years. They're about three wins away from being in the NCAA the last three years, and he's probably got a contract extension, but they didn't win --

TK: Will he get another Division I, high profile job, for his next job, or will he have to do sort of what Matt Doherty did, and go way down?

JF: I don't know about how far down he'll have to go. But he'll have to take a step down. He's not getting a Big East job. He's not getting an ACC job, you know? And again, knowing Tommy, he might, at this point in his life, be saying, "maybe that's more the route I wanna go. Maybe it'd be more fun for me to coach at that next level now. I made a lot of money." His wife's a psychiatrist. It's not, like, you know, they're gonna be hungry. Maybe he might enjoy that next level down more. I don't know. I'm purely speculating on that.

On Friday, Kornheiser also asked Jay Bilas about Amaker, and... you can probably imagine how that went. But I've transcribed that in a second post, which you can read below.

The Last Word on Tommy? Part 2

On his Friday Washington Post Radio show, Tony Kornheiser had ESPN analyst Jay Bilas on as a guest, presumably to talk about the Final Four. However, Kornheiser brought up Tommy Amaker (as he did with John Feinstein the day before) at the beginning of the interview, and it ended up dominating almost the entire segment.

As you might have guessed, Bilas had quite a bit to say on the subject as he stuck up for his good friend and former teammate. If you've been following this story for a while, some of this stuff will probably be familiar to you, as Bilas said many of the same things immediately after Amaker was fired by Michigan. He also made the comparison to Gary Williams, which Rob Parker also tried in Amaker's defense.

Again, I've transcribed the dialogue, which is a bit longer than the conversation with John Feinstein. But if you'd prefer to listen to it yourself, the show is available via podcast. (You can also download the show directly here.) If you're pressed for time, the Amaker stuff is from the 33:00 to 43:00 mark.

Tony Kornheiser: This is interesting - and if you don't want to talk about this, you can actually say on the air, "I don't want to talk about this" - but your teammate for years at Duke, the point guard at Duke, was Tommy Amaker. I think I'm correct on that, right?

Jay Bilas: Yes. Oh yeah. We played for three years together. We coached for three years together.

TK: I'm quite certain he's a dear friend of yours.

JB: Yes.

TK: And he did not succeed - at Seton Hall, the jury was out, but at least he made the tournament - and he did not make it at all in Michigan. He's personable, and he's smart, and he's accomplished - and he would seem to be a perfect candidate to be a big-time basketball coach. And I wonder why it's not working?

JB: Well, I think it did work at Seton Hall. You know, he took over a program that was in bad shape, and he turned it into a winner, and he recruited a bunch of great players, including Eddie Griffin, who wound up being a top pick in the NBA draft. And they did get to the Sweet 16, and then he left for Michigan.

And when he took over at Michigan, I'm not sure... Listen, I'm not in the business of making excuses for friends or otherwise, but --

TK: Right, right.

JB: -- but what I think happened is, when he took over Michigan, that place was in a hole like I can't imagine. He was there for six years; five of the six years, they were on probation. They were forbidden from going to the NCAA Tournament one of the years that they were qualified to go, and I think would've gone his second year there.

And Tony, when you look - just for example - if you looked at Gary Williams, and when he took over at Maryland, and the hole that place was in --

TK: Terrible.

JB: -- it was very similar to what Michigan was going through. Michigan fired Steve Fisher, they hired a guy named Brian Ellerbe that actually coached at Loyola-Maryland, and lost there, and wound up the head coach because they fired Fisher at Michigan. So it was similar to what Maryland had gone through - without the horrible tragedy, the Bias death - but hiring Bob Wade, and then [Williams] taking it over.

Amaker's record at Michigan, in his first six years, was better than Gary Williams' first six years at Maryland. But Michigan didn't have the patience to see this thing through. And I'll tell you one thing that most people don't know. He had a point guard there named Daniel Horton; graduated not this year, but last year. I think it was three years ago.

Horton had gotten in an altercation with his girlfriend, and the school decided to suspend Horton - through the basketball program - for the entire season. Now, Amaker didn't agree with that. I certainly agree with it when I heard about it. But Amaker remained silent about it; he did what the school wanted. But the truth was, Horton was being suspended for what Steve Fisher did, not for what he did. And I thought it was wrong, because you should treat each kid the same, and handle each of these things the same.

The football program didn't have to worry about that, because the basketball program had been through a horrible scene where they cheated, and they had to pull all their banners down --

TK: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

JB: -- they had to vacate five years of games. Five or six years of games. Including two Final Four appearances. And that's what they were punishing the Horton kid for. And that's one of the reasons they didn't make the tournament that year. So it's those kinds of things that we can look at it from afar and say, "Six years, no tournament - he's gotta go."

But while Michigan's sitting there, talking about "everybody wants this job"... If so many people really wanted that job, and it was so great - and it is better now than it was when Amaker took it over - why didn't Tubby Smith go there? He went to Minnesota!

TK: Yeah...

JB: The truth is, it's not that great of a job. It's a good job, it's a Big Ten job. But they're going to wind up with... you know, they're gonna get a good coach. They're gonna wind up hiring either a mid-major coach like Chris Lowery or someone like him. Or Kevin Stallings from Vanderbilt, or something like that. And that's what Michigan is dealing with right now, because their facilities are awful.

Amaker and his staff had to drive from their office to practice. They couldn't, like, walk downstairs or walk in the same building. They had to get in their cars and drive to practice - which is ludicrous.

TK: What happens to a guy like Tommy Amaker now? Is it sort of like with Matt Doherty, where you have to take a couple of steps down? Do you get out of coaching altogether? How does it work?

JB: Well, he's so versatile, he could do a number of different things. But he's going to stay in coaching. And he'll, I'm sure, be interviewed for things. But Tommy, he keeps things very close to the vest and very quiet. He's a very dignified person, and handles things, in my judgment, the right way.

TK: Yeah, he's a local for us. I mean, he's from northern Virginia, so it's why I bring it up.

JB: Listen, I don't want to sit and wax poetic about Tommy all day...

TK: You can.

JB: But there's no player I played with that I admire more than Tommy. None. He was the best teammate I've ever had, and remains one of my best friends. Not because of any other reason than he's an unbelievably good guy, a good person. I'd hire him today, if I had a job - whatever it was. I think he's a big-time basketball coach. And I think he will be, again, in the eyes of sort of the casual observers. But what does a guy do in his position? He probably won't get the big-time job now, like a Big Ten job or something like that. He probably will have to take what some people would think is a step down.

But he's a really good coach, and a really good guy. This is something that happens in basketball, which is why it's important that you always take into account the circumstances of any job you take. There are some jobs that you're better off not taking, even though they may be great later on, because the circumstances aren't going to be in your favor during that time period. And if you don't turn it right away - and Tommy did turn it; he went to postseason and he won 20-plus games three times while he was there - he just didn't get over that NCAA Tournament hump.

You know, Tony - one other thing: Look at Stan Heath. He went to two tournaments in a row and Frank Broyles fired him.

TK: Yeah, at Arkansas.

JB: So there's no rhyme or reason to it.

Again, consider the source. Bilas obviously can't be objective about this, though he raises a good point about how much Michigan continued to punish itself for the sins of the Steve Fisher era.

After Bilas got off the phone with Kornheiser, however, Mr. Tony pointed out the folly of the Gary Williams comparison to his co-host. Even if Amaker and Williams initially found themselves in similar situations, Williams had Maryland at the top of the ACC in six years. Amaker, as we're painfully familiar with, couldn't even get Michigan into the NCAA Tournament within that same period. And now, all parties are moving on.

Happy Hour 02/27: T.K. on the Radio

I don't know how many people reading this were fans of Tony Kornheiser's old ESPN Radio show, but it holds a special place in my heart. To me, it was everything I could've wanted from a radio program. Not only did one of my favorite columnists and his cohorts talk sports, but they also discussed music, TV, and most importantly to me, movies (with one of my favorite film critics, Stephen Hunter).

As I'm sure many of you can relate to, I worked a few jobs in my twenties that ravaged my soul. Not that there's anything wrong with being a delivery driver, shipping/receiving clerk, or bakery manager. I worked for horrible people. But one thing that got me through many of those miserable days was that show. I could listen to it in the truck, shipping dock, or behind the counter.

I liked that Kornheiser discussed subjects besides sports (as he put it, the show was for sports fans who read the rest of the newspaper, too). And instead of athletes who generally say nothing but cliches, he talked to his colleagues, the writers who had some information and opinions to share. Best of all, it was funny. And without being stupid or resorting to juvenile "guy talk." He respected his listeners for being smart.

Actually, my love for Mr. Tony on the radio began even before those ESPN days, when I spent a week in Baltimore interviewing for an internship I eventually didn't take, and I listened to him on WTEM-AM while driving around. And when I went back to school at Iowa (which thankfully had a nearby affiliate), I actually tried to plan my class schedule around 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. That didn't work so well, and sounds absolutely crazy now.

But that was no longer a conflict for me when T.K. left ESPN Radio in 2004. (A month or so before that, however, I managed to get an e-mail read on the air, which was a small joy I was able to share with absolutely no one who cared.) And I think you could see that coming because there seemed to be quite a bit of friction (which made for entertaining radio) between Tony and his bosses over the content of the show (and his tendency to make fun of SportsCenter's talking heads). If you listen to his successor, Colin Cowherd, you can hear what the folks in Bristol likely preferred. It's polished, corporate, and slap-happy.

I don't want this to become a Tony Kornheiser Show retrospective, since you can get that at Wikipedia, but when he returned to WTEM nine months later, I was so excited I wrote about it on my personal blog and just wanted to post a link to that. Gratuitous? Shameless? Whatevs.

Anyway, all of this is just a hugely long-winded way of saying that Mr. Tony is back behind the mic, doing his thing for Washington Post Radio, and it's pretty much the show he was always meant to do - some sports (largely from a D.C. perspective), with pop culture and current events. (Although he talks about American Idol far too much, and is a little too sore about Dan Steinberg, who he calls "The Cheese Boy.") Unfortunately, his longtime loyal sidekick Andy Pollin (Andy Polley!) can't be with him this time, but he has a rotating set of cohorts to indulge his various neuroses. (TNT's David Aldridge joins him this week.)

But the best thing of all is that the new show has embraced the 21st century (which should amuse anyone familiar with Mr. Tony's curmudgeonry) and is available each day via podcast. (Even better, whoever's doing the recording and editing figured out that we don't need to hear D.C. weather and traffic.) Oh, if only I'd had this technology 10 years ago. But I am a happy man today. Of course, the show still stinks.

Happy Hour 01/22: The Tao of Chuck Wilson

As something of a follow-up to Friday's post about Chris Sheridan pouring gasoline on the smouldering embers between Rasheed Wallace and Flip Saunders, I thought I'd post a link to an interview from the latest Baseball Prospectus Radio podcast.

This weekend, Will Carroll and Brad Wochomurka talked to Chuck Wilson, formerly of ESPN Radio, and now the host of "On Deck" on XM Radio. Among the many topics they discussed were the many changes in sports broadcasting during Wilson's career - especially with sports talk radio.

How are athletes interviewed these days? What sorts of questions are they asked? Is the idea to make the writer look good, because he was "tough" in the eyes of readers and listeners? No one wants to be accused of asking soft questions. But does a different approach elicit better, more thoughtful answers, and thus everyone learns something about the game?

While listening to the interview, I couldn't help but think about what happened with Sheridan and 'Sheed last week. What was really the story? Was it the tension between 'Sheed and his coach? Or had it become what Sheridan wrote for ESPN.com? And did he really help matters by writing the next day about how he was confronted at practice? Isn't that essentially making himself the story? Even if the article later went on to explore that tension and what may have caused it, which is arguably what he should've done in the first place?

I thought it was a really insightful chat, and of course, the discussion later turns toward the coverage of baseball and how it's approached from so many more angles than it used to be. Writers, managers, scouts, and executives aren't afraid to look at the conventional wisdom of the game and ask "Why?" anymore, resulting in a much different experience with the game.

Does anybody else miss the old days of ESPN Radio with Wilson and Tony Bruno doing late-nights? I spent many a Friday and Saturday night driving home listening to those guys. And you just don't hear the same kinds of long-form interviews Wilson used to have on his "Legends" series anymore. Certainly not on the radio.

The podcast can be downloaded here or from the Baseball Prospectus site itself.

Expect nothing and you won't be disappointed

I meant to get to this yesterday, as it would've been more timely, but the day seemed to get away from me - and took my precious computer/blogging time with it.

Anyway, I was listening to some sports talk radio while tooling around town, and caught a promo for Sean Baligian's show, "It Is What It Is," on Detroit's WDFN-AM. In the teaser, Baligian mentioned blogs and his surprise at how many there are now. Was he really going to talk about blogs on his show? Okay, cool. So I made a point to tune in (which, frankly, I usually don't) because I wanted to hear where he'd go with this.

After an hour or so of Tigers talk to begin the show, he finally got to the promised topic. Baligian admitted he wasn't much of a blog reader, and didn't see himself becoming much of one. But he acknowledged their growing popularity and said the right writer or topic (say, TSN's Bob McKenzie) might attract his interest. And then he put it to the audience. Were blogs a part of any listeners' daily reading/checking/surfing routine? Had anyone opted for reading blogs over ESPN, CBS Sportsline, or other sports sites?

Hmm, this could be interesting. Here was a guy acknowledging a popular trend, yet admitting he wasn't much into it, but wanted to learn more from his audience. To me, that sounded like the beginnings of some good sports talk radio. And who knows what direction the discussion might take? What if a blogger called in? Would any particular blogs (gee, none come immediately to mind) be mentioned?

Unfortunately, the segment took a direction right into a wall. And after hitting that wall, it kind of slid slowly down, like a semi-rancid slice of bologna. Now that's not necessarily Baligian's fault. Talk radio usually goes where the listeners take it. A host can try to steer the discussion, but if people are calling in with "humorous" suggestions for whom they'd like to see a blog from (for example, Ron Artest), rather than talking about whether or not sports blogs add something to the general discourse or provide a compelling alternative to what the mainstream media offers, then that's how the show will go.

Wah wah waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh.

And it's not like I suddenly thought I was listening to NPR. I didn't have high hopes. But I did have some hopes.

When I joined Brian for a Michigan baseball game a couple of months ago, one of the things we talked about was how much less we checked traditional media sites for scores and analysis. By the time, say, the Detroit Free Press website has something about last night's Tigers game, we've probably already read at least two or three things about it. We checked the score at ESPN.com. We stopped by Billfer's site, or a handful of others. If we didn't catch the game, a news account might be nice. But if we did watch it, we wanted something more immediate, and more in line with what we were thinking and feeling.

That's what blogs give us. And that's what I hoped to hear on the radio Tuesday morning. But I didn't. And it was probably a mistake to expect otherwise.

After I switched from the radio to my iPod, I realized this was another reason blogs had become such a daily part of my routine - both as a reader and writer. When I'm not getting what I want from the newspaper, TV, or radio - sources I was previously accustomed to - I'm either going to find someone else who's saying what I've been thinking, possibly discover something I hadn't previously considered, or just create the damn stuff myself. And I think many, many more fans are beginning to feel that way.

Your instinct was in the right place, Sean. But the execution just wasn't there, man. Maybe you (or your listeners) will get it right next time. Or maybe I'll have learned not to have any expectations.