JE Skeets joins the show to talk about The Basketball Jones and the move for the entire crew – Skeets, Tas, JD and Matt – over to The Score. It’s an incredible situation for them, and as we’ve stated before, we could not be happier for the crazy Canadians.
But first…Skeets was in the hospital getting his severely sprained ankle looked at, which leads to a conversation about the waiting room happenings, including a homeless guy in a wheelchair who asked for a bite of Skeets’ sandwich. Why isn’t this a reality show? Like Cops, with freak injuries and blurred out faces of horrified people in the ER waiting room just looking to get a few stitches. If it is, I need to find this show.
Turns out, Skeets loves the idea, and hospitals in general. He actually had a PAPER ROUTE inside a hospital when he was a kid. INSIDE A HOSPITAL.
Okay, onto the Jones. We discuss the swanky new set, and how long it will take for one of their friends to start showing up every day, standing outside the enormous city street-view windows with signs making fun of them. Three days in and I’m shocked it hasn’t happened yet. We also discuss the potential changes he expects now that they are part of The Score. Will we get more comedy bits in addition to the daily show (and rumored weekly audio-interview show)? Is he at all concerned that he’ll need to be more of a comedian now that they’ll (possibly) be expected to come up with more funny bits? Oh, and of course, when’s the TV time gonna start?
We also talk about his departure from Yahoo, and if he’s concerned that he went from one of the most trafficked basketball blogs in America to relative anonymity in the States working for a Canadian TV company. Sure fans of the Jones will still go, but what about the Yahoo traffic that would watch the show’s embed? What about his itch to blog? Will that be part of the gig at The Score? And — his words — how stupid is he to leave Yahoo?
But there’s a flip side. How stupid is Yahoo — my words — for letting him go? Why does The Score see the value in the future of podcasts like The Jones, but Yahoo didn’t? Or maybe Yahoo sees the value, but didn’t feel it was worth the money of bringing in four people. So is The Score forward thinking, or overvaluing the concept of podcasts? This leads to a brief and hopefully not haughty conversation about the future of our little industry and how it fits with MSM sites.
Congrats again to the Jones. Yahoo’s loss is Canada’s gain.
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We jump from the conversation with Skeets to an email asking if we’d talk about Mike Dunleavy’s situation. No. We won’t. But we do use that to jump to a discussion about why in the world anyone would be a Clippers fan. We run — more like a slow jog — through the list of cities with two teams in the same sport to try and figure out why you’d root for one and not the other. It makes sense why you’d be a White Sox fan in Chicago, especially if you live on the South Side. It makes sense why you’d be a Mets fan in New York if you live in Brooklyn (former Dodger/anti-Yankee country) or Queens. Even in the surrounding areas, if your family used to root for those teams, it makes sense to keep allegiances. But why a Clippers fan? There’s no history or geographical breakdown (like, say, the Jets and Giants even) that would make you a Clips fan. Is it cheaper ticket prices? Hatred of the Showtime persona?
We spin this to a talk about Manchester United, and how all the fans of United hate the Glazer family, much like Clips fans hate Donald Sterling. The difference, and the reason why Man City hasn’t stolen all of their fans…Man Utd wins. A lot.
For more on the Glazer situation, including Beckham’s role after the Champions League match yesterday, read it at The Sporting Blog.
TALKIN’ BASEBALL:
Torii Hunter thinks that…well, here’s the quote:
“People see dark faces out there, and the perception is that they’re African American. They’re not us. They’re impostors,” he told Bob Nightengale. He added, “As African-American players, we have a theory that baseball can go get an imitator and pass them off as us…. It’s like, ‘Why should I get this kid from the South Side of Chicago and have Scott Boras represent him and pay him $5 million when you can get a Dominican guy for a bag of chips?’”
It’s actually a pretty good line. And he’s not entirely wrong (/dances on egg shells). We discuss if it’s nothing more than the diversity of sports in America. Do we play too much to succeed at certain sports? If we spent an entire generation just playing one major sport — say soccer — would we be more competitive? To Hunter’s point, if more kids started playing baseball instead of basketball or football, would there be so many “imposters?” It’s not really their fault for being good, right?
SPECULATION STATION:
Did you hear “Donavon Mcnabb” was traded to “San Fransisco”? Did you believe it? Some people did. We run through the whole situation and how it happened yesterday, starting with our post at TSB (and independent work from other sites as well) and ending with a huge apology from the owner of Gridironfans.com
One more point about yesterday…comparing on of our best athletes to a terrorist is not funny. Ever. Bad day for the internet yesterday. And no, you’re not getting a link to that one.
Thanks to Skeets and thanks for listening.
Tags: Basketball Jones, Canada, Clippers, David Beckham, Donovan McNabb, Manchester United, Skeets, Torii Hunter
I’d say pretty much everywhere in Europe we have strong second, third and fourth sports. UK has rugby and cricket, Central Europe has cycling and skiing, Northern Europe has the winter sports, then there’s a lot of basketball and ice hockey spread around the whole Europe. F1 is big everywhere. So, you know, it’s much much less monotone than you’d think.
I’d say in terms of popularity soccer is what football is to you guys in the USA. And our equivalent to the NBA, MLB and NHL depends on the region but there definitely isn’t an empty place there.
Did nick figure out his Clearwater plans? I have family in the area, and I would suggest hanging in tarpon springs for good greek food (though the tourist season) is in swing. if you don’t want a hotel on the water, check out the Tahatian for a surreal experience, but don’t expect wi-fi.
also, want to hear on the HTC. need a bluetooth phone myself and not sure if I like the fancy phones or not. i still like my cheap ones because i’m very tough on them.
Hey Jarrod
There was a whole moment where the guys essentially said they weren’t sure about other sports and IN FACT ASKED FOR FORIEGN LISTENERS TO CHIME IN.
Of course, perhaps they were looking for it without the condescending tone.
“I enjoy the show, but you have fallen foul of the most common error of American sports people – you think you are the only participants.”
No, I think they were pretty up front about not being sure about it and ASKED for input.
You seem to have fallen foul of the most common error of a large portion of non-Americans – you have an enormous chip on your shoulder when it comes to the US that blocks your ears to what is actually being said.
Yes, we neglected to mention Australia. But let’s be honest, your points aren’t making that great of a case. Sav Rocca? One NBA player and one WNBA player? I’m not sure either of those contend with filling out an entire league. But yes, the res tis duly noted.
Dan, Dan, Dan,
One minute you are promising that you only talk about things where you have knowledge, then you start spouting off about every country only having 1 major sport. I am not going to talk about Asia or Europe, and they will have their own cases, but what about Australia?
While I am biased, Australia has a very strong case to being the juggernaut of sports (per capita at least, possibly just overall).
Population is ~23m. We are recognised as dominant champions in Rugby League and Cricket (and Netball). We are 3rd in the world in Rugby Union. We have our own football code (Australian Rules Football) that dominates 4 of the 6 states in terms of particpation and viewership (well above rugby union and rugby league).
We have players dotted around the US leagues in Baseball, Basketball (No 1 draft pick Andrew Bogut! and Lauren Jackson) and American Football (Andrew Graham, Sav Rocca, Mat McBriar).
Olympics: Australia finished t-18th in Winter olympics medal count (no decent snow here!). We were 5th in the Beijing medal count.
Oh, and by the way, Australia has qualified for the Soccer World Cup, and was in the quarters of the last one (losing to Italy on a dsubious penalty) and has hordes of players playing Premier and Ero leagues (many more Aussies than Americans). We are also ranked 23rd iin the world.
Not to mention car racing, horse racing, golf, tennis (lleyton hewitt, Pat Rafter).
Please have a think before speaking about international sports next time. I enjoy the show, but you have fallen foul of the most common error of American sports people – you think you are the only participants. I had hoped better of you than Simmons, Hench, et al.
Thanks for listening to the rant.
jarrod
Hi guys,
After all the hype, it was nice to finally hear sheets — I’m a big fan of both of your shows.
Re: two city towns, Ive lived in the bay area for about six years now and it seems like a class/race thing. I’ve seen giants hats while riding Bart in the eb and quite a few raiders jerseys on muni in sf. It makes me smile bc I grew up in San Diego (during the Ryan leaf years) and I never saw anyone wearing merch there.
Keep up the good work.