New Orleans 117, Orlando 123:Much-maligned Vince Carter erupted for 48 points and the Magic rallied from 17 down to beat the Chris Paul-less Hornets. It’s a big week for the Magic, who have a day off before traveling to Chicago and Cleveland for back-to-backs heading into the All-Star break. The Magic are six games behind the Cavs for the 1st seed in the East. Darren Collison, the UCLA rookie filling in for CP3, had 27-9 with four steals for his third straight pretty good game. Much too early to tell if he could be the team’s next point guard should the financially-strapped franchise have to trade Paul. Read the rest of this entry »
Super Bowl Ratings: The Super Bowl between Indy and New Orleans - not exactly primo TV markets - was the most-watched show in TV history, knocking the M*A*S*H series finale from the top spot. (Fun fact: Never seen more than eight seconds of M*A*S*H. Still, the number of people who watched that episode in 1983 is staggering for a number of factors.) An estimated 106.5 million people watched the Saints beat the Colts (last year's number for Pittsburgh-Arizona: 99 million). The NFL has done a tremendous job creating hype for this game - it is now an 'event' with two weeks of build-up and endless hype about the commercials. The snowstorm in the northeast helped. Next year, the game goes to FOX. [Wash Post] (61)
Left to right: Anne V, who we think will be on the 2011 cover; in bodypaint, Abbey Clancy, WAG of England soccer player Peter Crouch; Jessica White, the former girlfriend of Terrell Owens; and also in bodypaint, Sarah Brander, WAG of awesomely-named soccer player Bastian Schweinsteiger.
“Sumo’s enfant terrible Asashoryu, one of the sport’s most successful wrestlers despite a career dogged by scandal and controversy, has quit amid claims that he drunkenly attacked a man outside a Tokyo nightclub.” [Independent] Read the rest of this entry »
Chris Berman, one of ESPN’s longest tenured on-air talents, is being heavily pursued by the NFL Network, a source tells The Big Lead. According to the source, the NFL Network is putting the full court press on Berman – whose contract expires May 10, on his 55th birthday – and it isn’t a sure thing that he’ll return to Bristol. ESPN PR had no comment. Read the rest of this entry »
NBC: After years of doing nothing online, NBC is finally trying to ramp up its sports dealings on the web. It acquired Pro Football Talk last year and has now created Hardball Talk (baseball, obviously) and Pro Basketball Talk. Considering how far NBC is behind its TV competitors online - Fox Sports and CBS Sports - this mountain will take years to climb. In addition to luring bloggers, we hear that Ira Windeerman of the Sun-Sentinel will be contributing to NBC's basketball site. It'll be interesting to see if more papers are going to let their underpaid writers contribute to online outlets while everyone slugs it out for clicks and eyeballs. [SBJ] (16)
NBA Ratings: Overall, ratings on TNT are up. Regionally though, some numbers are surprising. Teams like the Lakers (197k), Cavaliers (130k) and Celtics (83k) are drawing good numbers. But what is the deal with nobody watching the Oklahoma City Thunder (12k)? The Bobcats, another team on the rise, is also not a good TV draw in Charlotte (10k - although that number is up significantly from last season). The numbers for all teams can be found here (subscribers only); if you need to know a specific team, ask in the comments and we'll post. [Sports Business Journal] (41)
Recruiting and Lists: The best cornerback in the NFL is Darrelle Revis. In 2004, when he was coming out of high school, Revis was ranked as the 36th best cornerback in the country by Scout (and 41st overall, as five junior college players were listed ahead of him). Perhaps more staggering is that in 2002, Aaron Rodgers, one of the more promising young QBs in the NFL, was not even ranked as a high school prospect. [Mercury News] (46)
Photographed by this person; tweeted by the world.
For those who don’t think we’ve written enough nice things about Drew Brees after his flawless performance yesterday: Yes, he just became part of NOLA lore, and yes, winning a Super Bowl in our opinion vaults him into the ‘best QBs in the league‘ discussion, right there with Brady, Manning, and Roethlisberger. Peter King omitted Roethlisberger, but we’ve got him in there because no QB in the NFL has been better in the 4th quarter in the last five years than Big Ben.
Stephen A. Smith: He's writing again for the Philadelphia Inquirer. His first piece is on the 76ers. Presumably, he flew down from Miami Friday to watch their game against the Hornets, hence the dateline. Then, he flew back to Miami in time to offer up perhaps the most self-serving media tweet of 2010. [Inky] (18)
Stephen A. Smith: He’s writing again for the Philadelphia Inquirer. His first piece is on the 76ers. Presumably, he flew down from Miami Friday to watch their game against the Hornets, hence the dateline. Then, he flew back to Miami in time to offer up perhaps the most self-serving media tweet of 2010. [Inky]
New Orleans 117, Orlando 123: Much-maligned Vince Carter erupted for 48 points and the Magic rallied from 17 down to beat the Chris Paul-less Hornets. It’s a big week for the Magic, who have a day off before traveling to Chicago and Cleveland for back-to-backs heading into the All-Star break. The Magic are six games behind the Cavs for the 1st seed in the East. Darren Collison, the UCLA rookie filling in for CP3, had 27-9 with four steals for his third straight pretty good game. Much too early to tell if he could be the team’s next point guard should the financially-strapped franchise have to trade Paul. Read the rest of this entry »
