ESPN Full Circle
I caught a good chunk of the ESPN Full Circle coverage of the Miami-FSU game last night. They had a traditional broadcast on ESPN. ESPN2 was 8 different camera angles at once, plus a steady crowd shot as the background panels on the HD feed. But the most intriguing coverage was on ESPNU, where Colin Cowherd was holding court from the radio studio.
The idea, which Cowherd was pumping all week on his morning radio show, The Herd, was that he would basically be doing his show with the game going on in the background. It sounds zany, but Cowherd and ESPN pulled it off very nicely.
Most of the ESPNU screen was taken up by the game. And most of the game was being shown by the SkyCam, not the traditional 50-yard line camera that ESPN was showing. (The SkyCam is that camera that floats above the playing field and is constantly moving. The Sports Sauna is a fan.) In the bottom left corner was a little picture of Cowherd gabbing into a radio microphone, wearing a collared shirt with no tie or jacket and generally pretending he didn't realize they had a camera on him, like Mike and the Mad Dog or Mike and Mike do for their respective video feeds. If and when someone else was talking, their picture would appear on the right side of the lower portion of the screen, opposite Cowherd's face. In between those two pictures ESPN could throw up stats. Below all this was a traditional scrolling scoreboard that showed results and stats from this past weekend.
Cowherd did a spectacular juggling job. He had to fill almost three and a half hours, with very few commercial breaks (for some reason). He seemed to have a handful of ESPN personalities standing by constantly that he could throw to. He had Todd McShay, a college football analyst, with him in the studio the whole time, but Todd did not contribute with the consistency of a co-host. He only talked when Cowherd tossed to him. He had a couple guys, including Mike Hall from DreamJob, back in a TV studio actually dressed up that he could toss to, either to have them appear in the tiny right hand corner picture or to take up the whole screen for their own brief 2-man gabfest.
I caught Rece Davis' appearance at the very end of the game in the radio studio. He is very different speaking off the cuff than he is speaking from a teleprompter. Not as smooth, but still not bad.
Doug Gottlieb also called in at the end of the show and proved to be incredibly cynical and annoying. Vintage Gottlieb.
In the middle of the game, they had the NC State coach, who had been the offensive line coach at FSU, do a phone interview. Cowherd did well to get him to talk about FSU and NC State all while the game was going on.
When I first turned it on, Cowherd was talking to Mike Golic on the sideline at the game, and Golic was very good. The two radio personalities both handled the interview radio show style - more conversation than report - and I found that so effective I wish every sideline reporter would do that.
Throughout the telecast, Cowherd read e-mails from viewers, which ranged from insightful to opinionated to silly.
If he was feeling fiesty, Cowherd could start to ask the producers to do different things, like change camera angles or pipe in the commentary feed from ESPN.
I like Cowherd, and it was fun to watch him work. He has thick eyebrows and looks vaguely like Smith from the Matrix. Overall, I really liked the experience mostly because it's a fun change of pace. Cowherd was entertaining and it felt like he was another guy in the room talking about the game on TV. It was also a nice way to have the game on in the background while I was doing other things.
I suspect that Miami and Florida State fans probably did not like this version because Cowherd and Co. were incredibly opinionated, especially at the tail-end when they started ripping the quality of play and calling both teams overrated. I probably wouldn't like it as much for a hugely important game that one of my teams was playing in. In that case, I'd opt for the more serious traditional broadcast. But otherwise, good stuff ESPN!
The idea, which Cowherd was pumping all week on his morning radio show, The Herd, was that he would basically be doing his show with the game going on in the background. It sounds zany, but Cowherd and ESPN pulled it off very nicely.
Most of the ESPNU screen was taken up by the game. And most of the game was being shown by the SkyCam, not the traditional 50-yard line camera that ESPN was showing. (The SkyCam is that camera that floats above the playing field and is constantly moving. The Sports Sauna is a fan.) In the bottom left corner was a little picture of Cowherd gabbing into a radio microphone, wearing a collared shirt with no tie or jacket and generally pretending he didn't realize they had a camera on him, like Mike and the Mad Dog or Mike and Mike do for their respective video feeds. If and when someone else was talking, their picture would appear on the right side of the lower portion of the screen, opposite Cowherd's face. In between those two pictures ESPN could throw up stats. Below all this was a traditional scrolling scoreboard that showed results and stats from this past weekend.
Cowherd did a spectacular juggling job. He had to fill almost three and a half hours, with very few commercial breaks (for some reason). He seemed to have a handful of ESPN personalities standing by constantly that he could throw to. He had Todd McShay, a college football analyst, with him in the studio the whole time, but Todd did not contribute with the consistency of a co-host. He only talked when Cowherd tossed to him. He had a couple guys, including Mike Hall from DreamJob, back in a TV studio actually dressed up that he could toss to, either to have them appear in the tiny right hand corner picture or to take up the whole screen for their own brief 2-man gabfest.
I caught Rece Davis' appearance at the very end of the game in the radio studio. He is very different speaking off the cuff than he is speaking from a teleprompter. Not as smooth, but still not bad.
Doug Gottlieb also called in at the end of the show and proved to be incredibly cynical and annoying. Vintage Gottlieb.
In the middle of the game, they had the NC State coach, who had been the offensive line coach at FSU, do a phone interview. Cowherd did well to get him to talk about FSU and NC State all while the game was going on.
When I first turned it on, Cowherd was talking to Mike Golic on the sideline at the game, and Golic was very good. The two radio personalities both handled the interview radio show style - more conversation than report - and I found that so effective I wish every sideline reporter would do that.
Throughout the telecast, Cowherd read e-mails from viewers, which ranged from insightful to opinionated to silly.
If he was feeling fiesty, Cowherd could start to ask the producers to do different things, like change camera angles or pipe in the commentary feed from ESPN.
I like Cowherd, and it was fun to watch him work. He has thick eyebrows and looks vaguely like Smith from the Matrix. Overall, I really liked the experience mostly because it's a fun change of pace. Cowherd was entertaining and it felt like he was another guy in the room talking about the game on TV. It was also a nice way to have the game on in the background while I was doing other things.
I suspect that Miami and Florida State fans probably did not like this version because Cowherd and Co. were incredibly opinionated, especially at the tail-end when they started ripping the quality of play and calling both teams overrated. I probably wouldn't like it as much for a hugely important game that one of my teams was playing in. In that case, I'd opt for the more serious traditional broadcast. But otherwise, good stuff ESPN!
posted by Prof. A at 8:45 AM
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