Because it seems recently that people have been arguing more and more about whether ESPN has a beef with OSU and has a love fest with the SEC I figured I'd lay out some facts and observations and allow people to discuss on one forum topic instead of all of them. These observations/ facts are in no order and feel free to add or refute anything on here.
1. ESPN is a for profit organization owned by Disney that, while reports the news, does search for ratings. Recently, the SEC has been the most accomplished conference and therefore a casual tv watcher would want to see the best conference.
2. ESPN has contracts with every major conference, but does have a contract with the SEC to host the SEC Network.
3. Ohio State has the largest following of any college football team in the country and therefore any information both good and bad will be amplified on all media networks in particular ESPN. The past few years haven't been so great to tOSU and therefore the negative coverage has been shown quite a bit.
4. Many of those who think that ESPN is against OSU point to the fact that there was a lot of coverage of both proven and alleged infractions. With regards to other schools i.e. Miami, UNC, Oregon many believe that there seemed to be little coverage in particular on Sportscenter.
Believe what you want and feel free to discuss within this forum, but to be honest I get tired of reading a back and forth argument on mulitple forums a day. I enjoy 11w and everyone who posts on the site and I just want to consolidate the discussion to a single forum for everyone.
It seems like the back and forth got worse after the Pryor thread.
I stand by what I believe(whethere it's about Herbstreit or ESPiN), but the arguing is getting a bit old. I think the downvoting has made it worse.
"YOLO" = I'm about to do something extremely ignorant/stupid & I need an excuse to do it.
I agree. I like the voting system, but when people get downvoted, whether warranted or not, they get defensive and an argument ensues I'm just trying to have any discussions occur here as opposed to clogging up other boards.
Exactly! On top of that people probably assume the downvote came from the person they're arguing with(which seems to be rarely the case).
I think i've given out less than 20 downvotes since this all started.
We probably need a Buckeye vent thread. lol
"YOLO" = I'm about to do something extremely ignorant/stupid & I need an excuse to do it.
You mean the thread before this one? Learn to spell, man!!
I think the only actual thing that ESPN does to intentionally antagonize the OSU fanbase is Mark May. I'm being dead serious. I think he is encouraged to piss us off (& some others but we are the largest - we get the the worst of it). I believe Lou Holtz is the good cop in the scenario & that they've probably figured out people will watch just so they can be angry with Mark & happy with Lou...But they will watch.
Aside from that, I don't think there is a grand plot. I believe our scandal got lots of airtime because they knew we would watch & the OSU haters would watch as well. Win win for them. More eyes on their advertisers products equals more revenue equals win. That's my OSU/ESPN nutshell view. But Mark May who I'm sure is biased already, but that never ending stream of garbage coming out of his mouth - that's by design IMHO.
Edit: that said, I do think they do/did a shit job of reporting sports news in general & sensationalize & spin things to death.
The world is full of kings & queens who'll blind your eyes & steal your dreams - it's heaven & hell - Ronnie James Dio.
1. Absolutely agree they sensationalize everything, and they don't care which person, player, or team they sensationalize
2. Mark May is a Pitt homer, constantly has sour grapes that they suck, and can't get over it
3. Lou Holtz's blabbering bullshit makes Lee Corso's stroke look like Pulitzer Prize winning reporting. He would Pick Notre Dame to win if they were playing the Patriots, on astroturf, with 10 players.
How is this all relevant? ESPN has gone down the shitter, HARD, the past few years. But at least they are equally shitty in everything they do, and towards every team they cover.
"It is a man's own mind, not his enemy or foe, that lures him to evil ways." - Buddha
With as much $ I give to Disney every year, they better start pimping the Buckeyes.
It's too bad that Steven A Smith doesn't cover College Football. I find him to be one of the most credible and insightful journalists out there. I just hope that we get to see him interview UFM before 60 Minutes scoops him up.
Any of you guys listen to Mike and Mike this morning. One of the first things Greenburg says is, "If Louisville and Florida played in November Florida wins no questions". While that is a possibility it gets old from the network when a BIG team loses its, "they are horrible". If an SEC team loses its, "well they should of , could of, won bla bla". They gave Louisville very little credit. Bridgewater and Louisville out played UF for 60 minutes.
I agree, I posted an article in another thread and my only issue I have with ESPN is it seems more that the SEC is the most dominant conference. I agree that they ahve won the past 6 National Titles, but especially this season Florida, Georgia, LSU, and South Carolina were in the top 10. When they lost it was the "SEC" and they barely dropped, but two teams lost to lower ranked teams, 1 barely beat a team 8 spots lower and while Georgia won by 14 it was a close game until about halfway through the 4th quarter. Obviously looking at tOSU there were very few games in which they dominated and blew out another team, but if you have 4 top 10 teams all ranked higher than their competition it shouldn't be that close. I think more my issue is not with ESPN, but more with the media and voters in the AP poll who think that the SEC is great and the BIG is awful. I think what happens is the SEC wins one marque OOC game, and everyone assumes it is the same thing over again. While they have had the single best team in the past 6 years, this does not correlate to the best conference. So because ESPN is the main sports media outlet it seems that people blame them, and while I don't think they are without fault, I think it is more the media as a whole and most of us recieve our media from ESPN.
The biggest problem I've had with ESPN is it thrusting its own agenda into its own news, especially when that news is relevant to a real problem. The biggest case in point being the ESPN/USA Today Poll. Why is ESPN involved in a poll that helps decide who plays for the national title? Isn't that a HUGE conflict of interest? I've always believed true journalism and true news reporting cannot have an ounce of bias, otherwise it's just op-ed, which is fine. We all have opinions. However, I do not believe opinions should matter in a court of fact over who the best teams are. Only ESPN is arrogant enough to think their opinion is the only one that should matter. Hogwash.
ESPN is biased against OSU because they hated watching the Buckeyes dominate under JT because they believed he was too perfect. Purity drives them nuts. Its made them cynical (likely fallout from the baseball steroids era). Nobody can ever be that good and that successfull without being a POS. That's their cynicism. So when JT and OSU got caught they naturally jumped on the chance to stick their forks in us. Much like what they did to Tiger Woods after his mess.
They also don't like the OSU fanbase. We're loud, proud, supremely confident and we severely dislike ESPN and let them know that. What better way to drum up attention, headlines, ratings and readership than to repeatedly kick the beehive? Naturally, we want to sting them for that. Problem is tuning in and watching fatass Mark May dis OSU is precisely what they want.
"Sherman ran an option play right through the south" - Greatest.Civil.War.Analogy.Ever
1) ESPN has NOTHING to do the the ESPN/USA Today Coaches poll(the coaches is conveniently left off...it is voted on by the coaches. It is simply the name of the poll.
2) They hated JT because of his purity but love Tebow? And don't bring up the SEC and that's why the loved Tebow...you didn't mention that once, you said they hate everything pure. And ESPN did not "jump" on anything. They "reported"(and I use that term loosely) what other outlets such as SI, Dispatch, Sportsline, etc dug up. Our isssues received more coverage because we had something new come out every other month...making the whole scandal draw out longer. And it wasn't just ESPN that broadcast all of OSU's issues...EVERY sports outlet gave it front page coverage. But for some reason, some of you only want to fixate on ESPN.
3) Every elite program has a fanbase that is "loud, proud, supremely confident" and they all think that ESPN hates them. If you look at it objectively, ESPN gives OSU equal coverage on positive and negative stories...but like most ppl that already have there mind made up they focus on stories that affirm their beliefs.
Edit - I do agree about Mark May, although I think it is more a character he created than what ESPN tells him to do.
This is spot on, the espn hates Ohio State act is getting old.
"You'll be proud of our young people in the classroom, in the community, and most especially in 310 days in Ann Arbor, Michigan on the football field."
just like trev alberts
I dont know karate but i do know crazy and i'm not afraid to use it.
&
Its all about the B10 network. Espin has a major hard on for Delaney, they wanted to knock us down a peg (being the leading B10 team) because they are salty over the network. Think about it, all of the revenue that the network generates could be going to Espin. They want a college football monopoly for them to control and drive the narrative on. Look at what they did to the big east! Outside of PSU, think about all the other scandals compared to tOSU: Oregon, South Carolina, UNC, Auburn, Miami. Its crazy.
I'm hoping that Fox or NBC will try to become a bigger player for College football, just to keep Espin honest.
See above about why our scandal(s) received more coverage. All these other schools had only one or two issues that all came out at the same time(even Miami's issues all came out under the same bombshell piece).
And you point about the B10 network kind of makes no sense...otherwise ESPN would also have a hard on for the Pac-12 and Texas as they both have their own networks...yet noone ever brings that up.
longhorn network is owned by ESPN
I was just about to edit that out...fair point. But still doesnt change anything.
I agree I was just letting you know, upvote for accetping your mistake
12Pac games were on Fox this past fall, and Pete was a media darling. Its all there, Espin plays a game of hardball that we dont really see or expect from a "News" organization.
ESPN's hatred toward Ohio State is because of the Big Ten Network. Plain and simple. Ohio State is the flagship program, so it takes the most heat. The bias really started around the time that BTN was announced, and it is solely to discredit the product that the BTN airs.
You must type quicker than me JamesLee203! Beat me to it!
To those who believe that ESPN hates Ohio State, why do you watch ESPN? I don't believe they hate OSU and I refuse to watch the network unless OSU is playing.
The fact is ESPN has a bit of a monopoly on sports in general. They are still the "world wide leader in sports".
But you don't have to watch. No one is forcing any of us to watch them. I don't. I don't care what any of their talking heads have to say about anything. I only watch games on ESPN.
"ESPN is for-profit." That's exactly why they have a seemingly disproportionate problem with the Big Ten. When the BTNetwork lauched, ESPN lost millions of dollars that they were making off of their PPV ESPN Gameplan package.
"The SEC has the most accomplished conference." By what criteria? The MWC has the best BCS bowl win percentage. Ohio State has the most BCS bowl wins of any team in the nation. Ohio State, Notre Dame, and USC have the most Heismans. If you were referring to the national title, that is a self-fulfilling prophecy. If your conference has the most highly ranked teams BEFORE ANY FOOTBALL IS PLAYED in August, you have an inherent advantage at just getting to the national title game. The more a conference gets to a national title game, the more chances they have to win it. There is no greater driver of August perceptions of team quality than ESPN. Period.
And it's because of....
ESPN's megadeal with the SEC, as well as their virtual monopoly on the entire bowl season, is a conflict of interest. It's an unfounded event in the history of American universities that they would allow this. And for some reason, they not only allow it...but they seem to love it.
" Many of those who think that ESPN is against OSU point to the fact that there was a lot of coverage of both proven and alleged infractions." I highlighted "alleged" because ESPN was the one doing the alleging without proof. They even launched a lawsuit against Ohio State trying to get their mitts on Pryor's email account, which cost Ohio State about a million dollars in legal costs, to try to dig up stuff that they didn't have.
Actually ESPN did very little of their own investigative reporting...our own hometown paper is the one that brought up the car allegations and SI is the outlet that dropped the Doerhman piece. To be fair I'm not sure who dug up the Talbot info. ESPN simply reported on this(notice I never said credibly)...reporting does not equal digging. And so what if ESPN sued for the full email records....did you see how redacted the documents were? That certainly gave the appearance there was more there.
ESPN may have lost money intially off the BTN, but they have new deals in place and the only games the really lost were the low rated matchups between IU-Pur, or OSU-Ill, etc. The marquee, money making games are still on ESPN.
And the SEC is perceived by ALL outlets to be superior(not saying a fully agree, but that is the national perception). ESPN, Fox, SI, CBS, etc are all on the SEC machine, not just ESPN. And whether it is justified or not, when your conference wins 6 straight titles you are going to get the benefit of the doubt when it comes to preseason ranking(and this is more an issue of needing to postpone rankings until after the season starts rather than any one outlet hyping certain teams).
Competition is a good thing, it sounds like more and more is coming into the market place of 24 hour sports networks. ESPN cares about ratings only as many have pointed out. They compete against non sports related programming. A relistic "rival" in sports programming may make them get their act together.
But maybe I am wrong? Look what competition has done to news? SPIN SPIN SPIN, nugget of "news", SPIN SPIN SPIN.
Well there are unbiased news sources, and the ones that you're talking about aren't as highly respected, but that's about as much politics as I'll even allude to before I drop it. That said, news networks, if they have a leaning, have a personal agenda, which is why the spon comes in. Sports news isn't so polarizing.
Who f%*#@%g cares.
Seriously, guy? It is the biggest factor in determining this sport's national champion. Obviously, a LOT of people care.
Ya guy seriously. ESPN runs a business, they will ride the SEC gravy train until the next conference is the hot ticket. Continuing to discuss this topic is about as annoying as if I blogged whined about how Fox News is anything but fair & balanced, and MSNBC rides a liberal agenda.
Because ESPN remains the employer of Mark May and Mark May is a dill hole! Now you can start a post about why do people hate Mark May so much (it has already been done fyi) but the guy does openly hate OSU, and ESPN keeps him in plain view every f*ckin time I have to watch some highlights, so defacto, ESPN is biased to OSU!
I believe the SEC point has been appropriately pointed out so far. Its because they are a money train and rednecks love sports. Why do you think NASCAR gets so much billing on ESPN? Because rednecks watch it. *sorry if I'm being racist to rednecks!
I had forgotten that Disney owned ESPN. It is not just the world wide leader. OSU hatred probably goes all the way to the top.
are you trying to say that Mickey Mouse is behind all this? Is Donald in on it too? You know goofy is just the Shill. He doesn't know what is actually going on.
although that Chip and Dale are crafty little bastards too.
It's actually Minnie Mouse running the whole thing...You know what they say about every good man...
The world is full of kings & queens who'll blind your eyes & steal your dreams - it's heaven & hell - Ronnie James Dio.