ON THE DL

Ian Eagle Talks Sports Broadcasting Camp For Kids. Plus Cliff Lee A Phil and How Beers Can Quell Racism

Ian Eagle joins the show to talk about his sports broadcasting camp for kids, but first, we talk about the big news in sports.

Cliff Lee (and Ben Francisco) was traded to the Philadelphia Phillies in exchange for prospects. The Phillies got a top of the rotation starter without having to give up anyone on their major league roster or any of their three top prospects, including pitcher Kyle Drabek.

Sure Roy Halladay is a better pitcher than Lee, but if you look at each deal that was on the table, the Phillies seemed to have made the right one.

We talk about Toronto GM JP Ricciardi and wonder what he was thinking asking for so much for Halladay. Did he price himself out of the market? And who will be with Toronto longer -- Halladay or Ricciardi?

We also talk about the collateral damage from a blockbuster trade. For weeks, everyone has wanted a piece of Kyle Drabek. That has to get to a kid, right? And what about someone like JA Happ, who had to pitch for the Phils last night, not knowing if he’d be traded that day, or even if the outing could determine if a blockbuster trade went through.

There has to be a lot of pressure on these young kids, especially the farmhands, and we discuss how much of that is put on them by the media who swarm in around deadline day.

Inside the Press Box:

I chat with Ian Eagle of, well, everywhere on TV you find him. Most notably, Eagle is one of the play-by-play men for CBS, calling both NFL and NCAA games for the network for years. You can also find him doing golf, tennis, and I’m sure if you needed a guy to do a call for your backyard badminton match, he’d be there in a flash.

This week is Eagle’s annual sports broadcasting camp, where he and fellow TV sports personality Bruce Beck teach kids how to become professional broadcasters. The camp is for kids ages 12-17 and they cover everything from calling games to hosting sports talk radio to conducting interviews. Some kids even get to call a live Somerset Patriots game over the radio.

I’ll be writing more about the camp over at The Sporting Blog later today, so be sure to check that out.

Eagle and I also talk about how technology impacts calling a game. Will Twitter become a part of the booth? He talks about doing the French Open call with Justin Gimelstob who was ‘commentweeting’ the matches. Yes, Gimelstob was the color analyst for a match while tweeting about the match as well. We

discuss if this could move to football -- if Twitter were as popular two years ago, could that have been Tony Kornheiser’s role in the MNF booth -- and talk about how sometimes technology might be too good for its own good. In other words, could analysts be so enamored with instant feedback from viewers and listeners that they forget to stay focused on the game in front of them? Where is the balance?

And yes, it wouldn’t be our show if I didn’t beg for Eagle to create a sports broadcasting fantasy camp for people in their early 30s, maybe who do a podcast, to come up and work a camp like his.

Political Safari:

Wanna have a beer? The President is having one tonight, and according to reports, it’ll be Bud Light. His guests tonight will be Henry Louis Gates, the Harvard professor who was arrested for breaking into his own home, and Sgt. James Crowley, the Cambridge cop who did the arresting. Crowley will be sipping a Blue Moon (with orange we assume) while Gates will be drinking Red Stripe.

He must be a terrorist. At least that’s what some conservatives must be thinking when Gates requested a NON-AMERICAN beer. We discuss the

beer bash and wonder how much of a photo op it will be. If it’s out on the lawn, will we have candid shots of the trio laughing it up? Will they play horseshoes? Will it be awkward, or could it possibly be as laid back as any beers between a black guy, a white guy, and a half black half white guy ...who happens to run the country. And is Shaq invited?

The talk takes a more serious tone when we discuss another report of a Boston-area cop who sent a letter to some fellow National Guard friends, and the BOSTON GLOBE, calling Gates, “a banana-eating jungle monkey.” Officer Justin Barrett, 36, also called the Globe reporter he was writing in reference to a ‘hot little bird with minimal experience’ and said she should get him coffee and a donut, going so far as to explain what kind he wanted.

Let’s leave the sexist remarks alone and looking at the racist remarks. Look, there are a lot of stupid racists in the world, most of them aren’t stupid enough to send a letter explaining exactly how racist they are to the newspapers. Especially when, in this case, said racist is a local cop (who is on leave and will most likely be fired).

The best line, however, is this: "I am not a racist but I am prejudice [sic] towards people who are stupid and pretend to stand up and preach for something they say is freedom but it is merely attention because you do not get enough of it in your little fear-dwelling circle of on-the-bandwagon followers."

I see a t-shirt coming -- “I am not a racist, but I am prejudice [sic] towards people who are stupid.”

Me too, Officer Barrett. Me too.

This isn’t the only blatant racism in the news lately. On Philly.com is a gripping and sad story of a lawsuit where black employees of a local --

and city run -- trash plant have been discriminated against for years. Black workers have to walk five flights of stairs to use the bathroom when an unoccupied facility was just 25 feet away. The white workers used that restroom on many occasions, the lawsuit claims.

And that might not even be the worst of it.

Again, we know that racism exists, it’s just a shame that it still exists like this. Please read this article. It’s hard to imagine stuff like this still goes in our local cities.

Housekeeping:

We think we’re having a show tomorrow. Rachel Nichols may be joining us as well. And no, not the woman in GI Joe. The woman who spent two summers with Brett Favre’s gardener.