Hank covers the over 50 bad jewish handicapper demographic. He appeals to my father

Try a senior at Duke majoring in Broadcast Journalism and Media Studies with a direct relationship with ESPN, as some here know.

Hank Goldberg isnt the most exciting person to watch on television but he's a mainstay as is Janine Edwards (who doesnt appeal to a younger audience but is quite good at what she does), Randy Moss, etc. They're the people who have anchored the sport for some time.

What would you have ESPN do? Axe some of the knowledeable people who might not make good tv and replace them with some tits and a few one liners, or try to marry the two together? Maybe you should freshen up on "Media 201".

not sure how many caught the last few minutes of college gameday when they had the analysts dressed as jockeys making selections for the BC...gimmack? sure but I found it funny and it let a bunch of non-racing fans know what would be on the channel next.
I thought the coverage was great overall, Kenny M. breeding peice was hysterical...I enjoyed seeing Jerry B. peice about the starting gate from before the derby again. The enlish guy was a nice addition too.
My complaint with all telecasts is that they don't spend enough time in the paddock and on the post parade...I want to see horsese warm up and how they behave for saddling etc. But I fully understand why they don't do that and in order to appeal to the widest range of viewers they can't just show endless hours of horses in the walking ring and paddock, because the casual fan doesn't want to see that.

Agreed. Needed a better veiw of the horses in the walking ring and post parade. Too many people in the walking ring and some of us like a good visual before finallizing your bet.

Overall, I think the ESPN Coverage was very good. Few things I would like to see improvement on:
- More visibility of race fractions
- More visibility of multi race will-pays
- and they HAVE to get the prices up faster and more often.

I'm all for appealing to a wider audience, but I have to think horseplayers are still the bread and butter. It was a pain to keep flipping to TVG to get the prices.

To me, BC payouts are among the best advertising you can get...

After I had placed my bets at the local teletheater, I came home to watch the ESPN broadcast with my daughter and others (we had a small B.C. party). Other than my daughter and myself, none of the others knew any of the horses except Bernardini. We had a little game where everyone picked a horse in each race, threw in $1, and whichever horse finished in front of the others won the pool. It's fun for the non-racing fans and they seem to enjoy it. In years past, they've picked their horses from the post parade. These people that I'm trying to get involved in horseracing biggest complaint was "why aren't they showing us the horses"? While they did think Mayne's piece was funny and the gate piece interesting ( I liked it too), I still think there was enough time to at least show a post parade.

Not showing the post parade or the call to the post for each race undermined the pageantry of the sport. Also I miss NBC's majestic music. For a superlative day of racing in a sport of kings, it seemed more like gritty college football quality coverage. Then again, college football and NASCAR do better than horse racing for ratings, but I don't like this move to ESPN at all. And Trevor Denman was dreadful.

very good post
 

you really said it all. show the horses ! The production folks lost site of horses. It became too much of a slick production of magazine pieces, a classic advertising mantra of selling the sizzle and not the steak ! When your friends who don't know horse racing are saying " why aren't they showing the horses", that says it all. Its not just us hardcores saying it . :cool:

Pretty good follow through by ESPN, too. They kept showing the Classic finish throughout the night.

--Dunbar

I was going back and forth all day between ESPN and TVG. I thought my timing was just off and that was why I kept missing the post parades.

So they actually didn't show the post parades? That is unbelievable. That is crazy. What in the world were they thinking? I think the post parade is standard coverage for any horseracing telecast. To not show the post parade is indefensible.

They'd show maybe 2 or 3 of the horses in the parade from an angle that just did not present the horse. You wouldn't even know who was running.

How does Jeanine not appeal to the younger audience? She is well spoken well dressed and is extremely passionate about what she does. Yesterday you could tell she was about to or had cried because of the events of the Distaff. She is the sort of woman, who now that I am in my 20's would want to be friends with and if I was still younger would choose as a role model. Class act in my opinion.

I really hope she gets some sort of media award within the horse racing industry for her coverage with Barbaro.

Kenny Mayne is just too funny for words. I love what he brings to the program and Moss is a great balance to him.

Couldn't agree more. I think she has universal appeal with all ages because of these qualities you describe.

The ESPN telecast was very good beyond not having Durkin. As I've said repeatedly before, Durking was made to call those races. But Denman was ok... beyond botching the Street Sense call.

Nick Luck was a nice addition. So was bringing in the guy from the European Betting company to analyze the European Turfers. Quint Kessenich was not there though... He's always been ok, but he really shot himself in the foot with that interview with Harry Aleo last year. Inexcuseable. I'm assuming he's done for good.

The only other issue that I had, was the on-track audio problems when trying to get interviews with the jockeys. But that's understandable since they're up on horse-back and it's a tough problem to shake out.

I would have liked to see the finish times and also the payoff's a little more often, but ESPN did a pretty good job.

I thought when Javier Castellano fell off Pine Island and when he was taken off in an ambulance that Jerry Bailey would split from the ESPN broadcast and go beg Albertrani to let him ride Bernardini!!!

i wanna see more horses and less people.....i thought the churchill feed was great. i requested it be put back on at the otb (they switched to espn for the classic)

Hey, I went on record saying Janine is more than adequate at what she does. She's informative, classy, and comes across very well... but that doesnt mean she'll appeal to a non-racing fan group of young men. I happen to think she's very attractive, but lets be honest, she probably is going to wow the demographic ESPN is hoping to hook. She's not going anywhere... and shouldnt go anywhere... she should have her spot as long as she wants it... she bring a lot into the mix... but my point was, instead of cutting these seasoned professionals, they'll be adding new people into the mix. It wasnt a knock on Janine.

Sorry there is T & A aplenty in this world. I hardly doubt some young non racing young male is going to anticipate the upcoming Stakes race on ESPN because of them offering something they can get everywhere. :rolleyes:

Then you'd be SHOCKED! Its why Jillian Barberi and the likes are stars now. Dont ever over-estimate the penis. :D

Ditto. Then I went to Brisbet to get the CD feed, as I usually would if I'm not getting all the visuals I want from a track. Bummer! No streaming feed. Exclusivity may be necessary for TV program contracts, but simulcasting is a whole different ballgame. Can't those genius network honchos figure that out?