ESPN’s Fascination With All Things New England Continues
Uncategorized June 11th. 2007, 3:51pm
A reader sent us this outstanding ESPN screengrab from last week, one in which the only NFL team that seemed to matter to the four-letter was the New England Patriots.
What’s neat is that this screengrab comes on the heels of the Ombudsman’s ‘Tyranny of the Storyline’ column. And hey, when we said earlier this morning that Tom Brady would win ESPN’s bizarre ‘Ultimate Athlete Tournament,’ we weren’t kidding. He’s as much of a lock as Greg Oden going first in this month’s NBA draft.
The tip comes via a reader of Stampede Blue, who enjoys that blog and wanted us to mention it.
28 Responses to “ESPN’s Fascination With All Things New England Continues”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
June 11th, 2007 at 3:52 pm
Yes but to be fair, they did the same exact thing with Manning and the Colts about three weeks ago.
They seem to be just rotating out teams that have big story lines.
Who wants to bet that ‘Dallas Cowboys week’ is coming next?
June 11th, 2007 at 3:55 pm
They are the best team in the league (on paper) and have the most stars, so whats the big deal?
June 11th, 2007 at 3:59 pm
They had three stories about the Colts at the same time? You sure?
Jay – suggest you go read the ‘Tyranny of the storyline’ column by the ombudsman.
June 11th, 2007 at 4:27 pm
Greg Oden is going first?
June 11th, 2007 at 4:31 pm
Yup, Miguel. I would take Durant, but the Blazers will take Oden.
June 11th, 2007 at 5:11 pm
Most major websites customize their content depending on where the reader’s IP address is located or what the reader’s click-history “tells” (take Amazon for example).
So if this reader is in Boston (or their proxy firewall is), they’re going to get Patriots/Red Sox content.
June 11th, 2007 at 5:16 pm
As “that reader” who sent TBL this screenshot, I must confess I am located in the NFL abyss that is Los Angeles, so the IP address theory holds no water. In all fairness, ESPN did a similiar feature on the Colts when Len P. visited their “summer school” session a month back. If ESPN is trying to make Colts-Pats the new Yanks-Sox they’re being counterproductive. Every time they say the Pats have the Super Bowl in the bag, they take away from the rivalry. But this is ESPN we’re talking about here.
June 11th, 2007 at 5:16 pm
I noticed this, also. What’s funny is that a few years ago, when the Pats were winning all those Super Bowls, it seemed like ESPN was all over the Colts; you couldn’t turn on the channel during football season without seeing Manning’s mug or hearing Dungy talk about some evangelical bullshit. Now the Colts are on top and all you hear about is Brady and Randy Moss.
June 11th, 2007 at 6:58 pm
Just want to give you guys an heads up:
I called the people at Guinness and they are looking into whether the president of ESPN broken a record by putting every New England-based athlete’s balls in his mouth at the same time.
You’ll know more when I do.
June 11th, 2007 at 7:36 pm
In that case BSanders, I’d agree with you that ESPN is in overkill mode
June 11th, 2007 at 8:27 pm
In Simmons chat today, he took Sopranos and NBA questions for about an hour. Finally Seth from Cleveland asked [direct quote] “Will you be taking any baseball questions today? (Other then about the Red Sox?) “.
The next 3 questions were about: Lugo and his crotch-pulling, Dice-K, and Yanks/Sox. Two more Sox questions later in the chat (re: JD Drew, and Sox bandwagoners) until he finally took a question about the Brewers. That was the last baseball question.
June 11th, 2007 at 9:13 pm
In defense of that screengrab, only the first article was all about the Patriots. It was a story about Moss.
The second one was about free agent signings, and they chose to show a picture of Adalius Thomas, even though he only had one paragraph in the John Clayton piece. The link makes it look like a feature on Thomas.
And the third was just that lame “the best” discussion, where Brady was chosen by some of the talking heads.
My point is, that screengrab looks like 3 Patriots stories, when in fact, it is only 1.
June 11th, 2007 at 9:28 pm
“Brad Nathan (Washington DC): Fantasy football talk is never too early. Would you go with Maroney or Addai?
Bill Simmons: I’m scared of Maroney this year… worried about his shoulder. He’s the one X-factor for the 19-0 season. ”
Simmons, please.
June 11th, 2007 at 9:50 pm
First off, love The Big Lead and happy bsanders37 sent them the pick. To answer a few questions: As a Colts fan, I can never recall a moment where ESPN had not one, not two, but three featured NFL articles on their site relating to one team. It’s never happened with the Colts. If it did, I’d have done cartwheels. Even when Manning was shattering records but still losing to the Patriots, they did not give him and his Colts the same kind of off-season ball-washing this ESPN is doing for these Patriots. This team blew an 18 point lead in the AFCCG (first to do that), and has been utterly dominated by Indy for two years in a row.
Yet, their coverage of the Patriots suggests NE is the NFL Champion and not the Colts.
The bottom line here is there are 31 other teams, two of which actually got to the SB instead of NE, but rather than actually REPORT the sports they cover, ESPN goes with “what’s hot.” And right now, Randy Moss on the Patriots is hot. As a Colts fan, I accept this. But for the love of God, can we get some objectivity PLEASE! It’s also no coincidence that on the day of those three featured stories, ESPN’s NFL Live did a full show dedicated to (you guessed it) The Patriots.
And regarding “the best team on paper”– no one gives a shit about the best team “on paper.” San Diego had the best team “on paper” last year. They haven’t won a playoff game since Stan Humphries was their QB. It stands to reason that a media outlet like ESPN should do its friggin’ job: Report sports. Instead, they go for the hot topics because they are more interested in ratings and hits than in actual fucking news.
This is why their “Ombudsman” is a total joke. This network bought shares in the AFL and then (miraculously) started reporting scores and showing highlights for the league. Hack-tastic.
June 11th, 2007 at 10:00 pm
This man summed it up perfectly.
As long as Red Sox-Yankees pulls better ratings than the NBA Finals … it’s what we’re going to get.
June 11th, 2007 at 10:16 pm
The difference between the Chargers being the best team on paper last year is just what you said, they havent won a playoff game in forever… remember how the Pats won three SBs not too long ago? And got to the AFC championship game last year? Now we add the best FA on the market and a top flight WR. So yeah, it does matter that this team is the best on paper, because we have recent history of winning, the best QB and the best coach in the league. Its a little different than the worthless Chargers being good… if the Colts added Thomas and Moss, wouldn’t everyone be talking about them? Fans of losing teams need to cool off their jealousy.
June 11th, 2007 at 10:27 pm
Obviously the Patriots fanboys are going to come on here and talk up their team … but the fact remains … overkill. Ignoring everyone else and talking up the teams that drive hits/ratings, etc.
Not to mention, it’s lazy. Instead of coming up with a compelling story about, say, the Rams or the Bills, we get navel-gazing from the sofa about Patriots garbage that’s already been talked about to death this offseason.
June 11th, 2007 at 11:33 pm
I think there was overkill during the Pats mini-camp and the hype about Moss.
The Colts had a quiet offseason as they usually lose a few palyers but never seem to sign FAs.
The Pats stole the show early via FA and no one else has kept pace.
The fact this is still news proves it is the offseason.
Up to now Denver meanwhile has done pretty well and so have the 49ers, but none have draw of Moss working will Belichick and Brady.
When TO went to Dallas it was the same thing and now w the Tuna gone – no more stories….
June 12th, 2007 at 12:01 am
I’m a Bears fan, I saw this, and I thought it was ridiculous. Other Colts fans have voiced their opinions already. Now what was that about fans of losing teams?
June 12th, 2007 at 3:15 am
Well TBL, how about you write a compelling post about the Rams or the Bills, instead talking about Lost all the time (overkill) or dedicating an entire post to how fat you think Serena Williams is. Maybe lowly and undiverse ESPN will follow suit.
June 12th, 2007 at 3:17 am
ESPN has long been a New England sports website. And yes, it does appear that the Patriots are defending Super Bowl Champions. It is the Patriots and Red Sox all day, every day. Thank God, the Celtics and Bruins are not any good or it would even be worse than what it is. Which is pretty bad.
June 12th, 2007 at 3:22 am
Big Blue Shoe- The word ‘News’ suggests information about new events. The Super Bowl that you speak of was months ago. Since then, your Colts have done nothing to warrant being part of the ‘News’ other than allow their defense to become even weaker. The Patriots have done quite a bit in this offseason to warrant writing about. Simple and plain.
Would you prefer that they write a bunch of articles about the Colts resigning Dan Klecko?
June 12th, 2007 at 3:32 am
Paul, do you have an update on the insertion of testicles into the mouth of the president of ESPN?
June 12th, 2007 at 4:01 am
I remember watching about every edition of NFL live and Sportcenter and remember one thing that i kept noticing; they never talked about the Pats last year even though they were the 5 ranked team overall during the season, then ESPN would keep avoiding the Pats even though they beat the hardest teams in the playoffs. So Im ok with the surge of NE news all of the sudden. Maybe ESPN would talk about other teams than the Pats and Dolphins if they did anything besides lose.
(
P.S. The guy who said that Colts have Pats dominated in the last 2 years needs to look in a dictionary, dominating is not winning by only 4-7 points as the Colts have against the Pats in those 2 years.)
June 13th, 2007 at 12:18 am
the pats will definetly go to the super bowl
June 13th, 2007 at 3:36 pm
Responding in kind:
kcjen: The Colts have indeed dominated the Pats the last two years. In 2005, they dropped 40 points on the Pats in Foxboro and won by double-digits. In 2006, also in Foxboro, they intercepted Brady 4 times and led from start to finish. In the second half of the AFCCG, the Colts scored 31 points and racked up almost 400 yards of total offense, completing the leargest comeback in AFCCG history. If you don’t consider those three games dominating, I don’t know what to say to you.
BigBlueDouche: Cute name. Off-season signing and all that crap are not the news I’m talking about. We’ve seen the articles about Randy Moss and Adalius Thomas. Now, I don’t want to see anything more written about them until they actually fking do something, especially Moss. signing a bunch of high-priced and high-profile players means NOTHING in the NFL. This has been proven over, and over, and over again. Why is it news when it is PROVEN not to guarantee anything?
Folks, it is the job of most news outlets to report the news and find compelling stories. There are 32 teams in the NFL. And while NE has made a lot of off-season signings, that does not mean they warrant wall-to-wall coverage.
And no, NE is not making the Super Bowl. Their defense is simply too old and too slow to stop the Colts. Bruschi and Harrison are done. Asante Samuel will not play for them again, and aside from him the NE secondary stinks. And despite NE getting all these offensive players, they simply don’t stack up to the Colts offensively.
June 13th, 2007 at 4:54 pm
Oh, and by the way, ESPN has written yet another article about the Patriots. That’s 4 frontpage featured articles in less than a week: http://www.stampedeblue.com/story/2007/6/13/123855/552
June 13th, 2007 at 5:34 pm
Ok…did some moron really say the the Pats are “definitely” going to the Super Bowl? Are you really that one-sided to predict this 3 months before the season starts? That takes away any legitimacy from any comment you make. Whose to say that Tom Brady doesn’t tear his hamgina while trying to impregnate every model in the victorias secret catalog? Or how is Randy “me me me” Moss gonna react the first time he gets blown up by that human cruise missile wearing number 21 in the colts defensive backfield while running one of those little crossing patterns that Belicheck loves so much. I think he might decide “take a few plays (or games) off” after that.
And I can’t let that best QB comment go unnoticed either. Your only justification for that is the # or rings. But by that argument you could say the Trent Dilfer is better than Marino…and who would agree with that. I think even Dilfer himself would laugh at that. Bottom line is you’ve never seen Tom Brady try to win without a championship caliber defense on the other side of the ball. He’s entered every game of his career with the luxury of saying I will most likely win this game if I can put up 17 points. That will make even average QBs look great. Does anybody remember that this dude was benched for a freshman when he was a senior at Michigan? He’s a great QB, don’t get me wrong, but Manning is revolutionizing the position. Anyone who doesn’t see that, doesn’t know football. Brady runs a system….Manning IS the system. I’ll concede that Belicheck is the best coach, as much as I hate his grumpy, cut-off hoodie wearing, hobo ass.
I have no problem with the overexposure of the Pats and can’t wait until it all comes crashing down. I personally think it’s hilarious that the Pats are so freaked out about losing to the Colts last year that they are selling their souls to for a bunch of guys with questionable character (at best). C’mon they drafted a safety who’s better known for trying to “stomp out” an opposing player than for his play on the field. Karma is well on it’s way to sending their asses in the direction of the Bengals or the Redskins….or both. So PLEASE ESPN…keep singing their praises….I love the “I told you so” role.