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Bill Raftery: ESPN Didn’t Realize What It Had in Sean McDonough Until 6 OT Big East Tourney Classic

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Bill Raftery: ESPN Didn’t Realize What It Had in Sean McDonough Until 6 OT Big East Tourney Classic

For about a decade (2002-2012), the trio of Sean McDonough, Jay Bilas, and Bill Raftery would entertain college basketball fans each Monday on ESPN during Big Monday or with their broadcasts at the Big East Tournament. Of course, most people remember the trio calling the memorable six-overtime game in 2009 between Syracuse and Connecticut. 

The trio joined the Big East Rewind Zoomcast, which was the show’s 100th episode, and Raftery (now at FOX) mentioned that the broadcast for him highlighted how important McDonough is at ESPN and that it was a great thing to watch a play-by-play man in action. 

“The thought I’ve had ever since. We all knew how talented Sean was and I don’t think ESPN appreciated him enough,” said Raftery. “That game I think solidified, not that he needed any pat on the back, his career. They knew they had a gem. It was his show. It was a play-by-play man’s delight. The action, the turmoil, the competitiveness.”

Bilas echoed the same thoughts and thought it was a master class in how a broadcaster could meet the moment in a classic game like that. He was also proud that neither him nor Raftery stepped on any one of his calls as the overtimes kept progressing. 

“We are all really proud of the broadcast. It was somewhat of an unremarkable game up until the overtimes started. I think if the game had ended in regulation, we would have been like it was just another really good Big East Tournament game,” Bilas said. “What a pleasure it was to listen to Sean work. The pride that Raf and I took was we did not get in the way of his calls. It was just a master class in meeting the moment. It was a stunning thing to be a part of.

“That’s the beauty of working with Sean. He did all the heavy lifting and then Raf and I could just jump in here and there. It was easy for us. The beauty of that trio was I really enjoyed everything on the air, but it was off the air that made it off-the-charts fun. We were always laughing, god forbid you would make a mistake because the other two would jump you and never let it go.” 

McDonough mentioned that he remembers when Raftery told him he was thinking of leaving ESPN for FOX. While McDonaugh was sad, he said that working with both him and Bilas was great because either the gamer would be fun or they would be able to make a less interesting game fun for the viewer. 

“I remember when Bill called and he said he was thinking about leaving ESPN. It was a much better deal. I said we will come visit you, you have to go. But, it was really sad. I don’t want to offend anyone, but I know it’s fair to say I knew at that moment I will never have as much fun doing this with any group in any sport as I did with these two,” McDonough said. “You couldn’t have had more fun. You looked forward to Sunday when you were heading out because you were going to be with two of your best friends and people you loved and admired the most. You knew you were going to be a part of an entertaining show. If the game was great, these guys had all the great information. If it wasn’t, we would try to make it fun.” 

As for Bilas, the journey got him to do something he didn’t like doing before a game, which was going into the locker room. He saw Raftery was not going into the locker room pregame for more information, but instead to catch up with people. 

“Raftery couldn’t wait to go into the arena. I never wanted to go into the locker room before a game, but Raftery went in and he wanted to see people because he genuinely loved them. It wasn’t because he was looking for information. Everyone in those arenas were friends. Through Sean and Raftery, especially in the Big East, which I was somewhat of a newbie to, I was able to develop friendships because of the friendships he has.” 

Jonathan Peterlin: Will People Watch Detroit Pistons Games Just to Witness Historic Losing Streak?

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Jonathan Peterlin, filling in for Ken Carman and Anthony Lima on Wednesday morning’s program on 92.3 The Fan, has witnessed historic losing streaks before. The Cleveland Cavaliers lost 26 consecutive games during the 2010-11 campaign, the first year without superstar forward LeBron James after he decided to sign with the Miami Heat. Moreover, the Cleveland Browns compiled a winless season in 2017, marking the first time in the history of the NFL such a result had been attained in a 16-game regular season schedule. In fact, there was an 0-16 parade held in the city of Cleveland acknowledging the team’s difficulties.

On Tuesday night, Little Caesars Arena was filled to capacity as fans watched the hometown Detroit Pistons lose to the Brooklyn Nets by a final score of 118-112. After beginning the season with a 2-1 record, the team has now dropped 27 straight games, marking the most consecutive losses in NBA regular season history. The Pistons have not qualified for the NBA Playoffs over the last five seasons, and the organization is approaching two decades without its last NBA Championship, heightening concerns for a team that has had several high-end draft picks and young talent in recent years.

“I’m like, ‘Alright, I’m going to talk about it the next day,’” Jonathan Peterlin recollected in thinking about his preparation for the show. “It’s not one of those things where I thought, ‘Let me tune in to see the Detroit Pistons game and see how that goes.’”

When the Pistons broke the record on Tuesday night, there seemed to be considerable interest in the event. Various mobile applications sent notifications to users informing them as to what had just taken place, and there were many recaps and stories authored thereafter. The Pistons take on the Boston Celtics Thursday night at 7:30 p.m. EST/4:30 p.m. PST, the team with the best record in the Association thus far, in a game that experts predict will extend this losing skid to 28 straight games. The team did have a five-point lead during the fourth quarter on Tuesday, but the effort to seal the win turned out to be fruitless thanks to a subsequent 13-0 run by the Brooklyn Nets.

“They have fans in attendance with bags over their head, which is always a very comical sight,” Peterlin said. “You have the whole entire crowd chanting [for the owner] to sell the [team], but the part that got me a little agitated was that it felt like people were there not necessarily to support the Pistons. They were there to see history, and it all felt very odd to me.”

The game was televised locally on Bally Sports Detroit and YES Network, along with radio broadcasts on 97.1 The Ticket and WFAN. Part of the alluring factor of this game ostensibly came from a combination of schadenfreude, disbelief and a desire to witness the unfolding of a historic event. Jonathan Peterlin reminisced on how upon being assigned to cover the 0-16 Browns parade, his boss informed him that it would be a moment he would never forget. Incredulous at the time, he came to realize that the assortment was true, with callers throughout the year seeming to want to continue losing games. After some time, these calls began to give off a sentiment of “fun-bad;” that is, trying to find revelry and amusement in the futility.

“How long can they go where they don’t win games? How long?,” Jonathan Peterlin said of the Pistons. “If this streak goes to 40, will you start tuning in to Detroit Pistons basketball games just to see how long an NBA team can go winless?”

CBS Tops Christmas Day With 29 Million Viewers for Raiders/Chiefs

BSM Staff
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Despite equally favorable matchups in the evening and primetime slots, it was CBS’ early afternoon matchup between the Las Vegas Raiders and Kansas City Chiefs that won Christmas Day. The 1 PM ET contest hit 29 million viewers across CBS and Nickelodeon, the largest audience for a December 25 game since 1989.

Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio reported the news from CBS, also adding that the positive reception from the football weekend would only increase the chances of the NFL finding a way to play games on Christmas next year when it falls on a Wednesday, even though league execs have stated they don’t plan on playing games outside of the usual Sunday/Monday/Thursday/Saturdays.

Florio also mentions that the final piece of the NFL Christmas Day puzzle has yet to be revealed — the 4:30 PM ET FOX broadcast between the New York Giants and Philadelphia Eagles. NFC East teams generally bring viewers, as seen with the Dallas Cowboys and Miami Dolphins viewership total from Christmas Eve and the record-breaking Eagles-Chiefs Super Bowl rematch from Week 11.

Front Office Sports added separately that the game reached a peak audience of 37.2 million.

The Athletic’s Jeff Schultz Announces Retirement

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After a 42-year career in sports journalism, Jeff Schultz has announced his retirement from the medium, revealing the news in his final column penned for The Athletic published on Wednesday morning. Within the piece, he explained how it is likely his final column anywhere, although he has learned “never to say never in sports, or in life.” At this time though, he feels he is making the right decision and following through on something he considered since the end of 2021 when his contract with The Athletic was expiring.

“The Athletic has been great. The job has been great,” Jeff Schultz wrote. “And to you, the readers, from those who followed me from a newspaper to a website, to even those who I think was always out to get your favorite team or athlete, thank you. I learned a long time ago that the passion of sports fans cuts both ways and that should never be squashed. I can’t imagine sports without debate.”

The venerated reporter received his start in the industry covering a high school football game for the Santa Monica Evening Outlook. Out of college at California State University, Long Beach, he worked at the Los Angeles Daily News where he worked as a staff writer for four years before transitioning to a senior role at the San Jose Mercury News upstate.

In 1989, he began a 29-year stint with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution where he covered various sports teams in the city, including the Atlanta Braves and Atlanta Falcons. Schultz left the outlet in 2018 to join The Athletic as a senior writer focused on Atlanta sports, something he referred to as a difficult decision but a change he made because of his belief in the outlet’s product.

“The interviews, the reporting, the writing, cultivating relationships, building sources, earning trust – I could do that stuff forever,” Jeff Schultz explained. “I learned a long time ago I could write a critical column and still have a working relationship with people if they believed you were being fair.”

Aside from the wear and tear that comes with trying to conjure ideas for future columns, Schultz realizes that he has missed too much time with his family and friends. Being away from sportswriting, he wants to focus on his family and will continue to sit on the boards of two non-profit organizations related to recovery and mental health initiatives.

When news breaks, Schultz remarked that he will miss trying to uncover information, having conversations from people on both sides of the stories and the adrenaline rush that comes with the job. Conversely, he will not miss arriving early and staying late to cover contests with a game credential. Nonetheless, Schultz is undecided if he is leaving sports and writing for good, but at the moment, he is content with concluding this part of his career.

Schultz has been part of The Athletic from its inception in 2018 and hoped that the outlet would last at least two years upon its launch. Five-and-a-half years later, he recognizes that changes have been made, including its ownership by The New York Times Company, and averred that there will be more alterations down the road. Earlier in the year, The Athletic laid off 4% of its newsroom and became the primary source for sports news when The New York Times eliminated its sports department.

Dave Ramsey: My Retirement Will Include Continuing to Host The Ramsey Show

BNM Staff
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Dave Ramsey quietly began shifting branding away from himself and more towards the Ramsey Solutions brand in recent years, but he says he doesn’t see any retirement in his immediate future.

During an appearance with The Iced Coffee Hour on YouTube, Ramsey was asked about any impending retirement plans. He said he had no idea of stepping away from his nationally syndicated radio program any time soon.

“I’m 63, I’ve been scaling back for a long time,” Dave Ramsey said. “Four years ago, I quit working on Fridays. Does that count? It’s a step in the right direction. We moved my son — 12 years he’s been working here, and the operating board moved him into the President’s role in January…he and I get to work together, so we’re having a blast working together.

“Some day, I’ll retire. But retirement for me, I’ll still do the show. As long as I make sense. If I quit making sense and I start hurting the brand, then we’ll have to take me off. Then I’ll become completely irrelevant and an angry boomer. I’m close now, maybe!,” he joked. “I’ll continue to speak as much as I can. I enjoy those things, so that will be my retirement.”

Dave Ramsey continued by noting that when he began approaching the age of 60, he recognized the importance of moving the brand to become more focused on Ramsey Solutions rather than just Dave Ramsey. He revealed that the company wanted to feature a 50/50 split in revenue between revenue tied him and then the rest of the company in 2022. However, in 2023, 78% of the company’s revenue came from “non-Dave” sources.

Dan McLaughlin Joining The Opening Drive on 101 ESPN in St. Louis

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After Carey Davis shifted to afternoons on 101 ESPN, the station was left seeking a morning co-host. It found one in Dan McLaughlin.

McLaughlin will join The Opening Drive morning program helmed by Randy Karraker and Brooke Grimsley on a somewhat regular basis, according to his comments this morning.

“We’re looking forward to it,” Karraker said to McLaughlin Wednesday morning. “Welcome to officially full-time.”

“I’ll be with you for a few days, not all the days, but a few days every week coming in with you and Brooke,” he said. “The station has been great to me. … When you guys approached me about doing this, I thought about it and it didn’t take long. But I thought this makes a lot of sense. … For me to come in a few days a week and hang out with your guys is a lot of fun for me.”

Carey Davis departed The Opening Drive last week to join The Fast Lane with Anthony Stalter and Jamie Rivers, to strengthen the program due to Rivers’ commitment to Bally Sports Midwest broadcasts of the NHL’s St. Louis Blues.

Dan McLaughlin will be a familiar voice to St. Louis sports fans. He was the television voice of the St. Louis Cardinals 24 years before being removed from the club’s broadcasts after being arrested for his third DUI in December of last year. He also previously contributed to 101 ESPN, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Jay Binkley: NFL Has ‘Taken Over Television’

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Jay Binkley: NFL Has ‘Taken Over Television’

Throughout the NFL season, there is a level of criticism and vitriol directed towards game officials, usually centering around a controversial call that affects the outcome. With the legalization of sports betting in more than 37 states after the U.S. Supreme Court deemed the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act (PAPSA) unconstitutional in Murphy v. National Collegiate Athletic Association (2018), some of the outcomes have fiscal ramifications for the fans. Jay Binkley, who was filling in on Fescoe in the Morning on Wednesday on 610 Sports Kansas City, spoke about how certain calls from officials during the games tend to annoy him.

With the NFL teams bringing in $18.6 billion in revenue and in the early stages of new national television rights contracts, the league could experience further windfall as time goes on. Yet the league does not consider its officials to be full-time employees, a designation that Binkley believes could cause fans to perceive certain calls being missed. Innovations in technology, however, have the potential to provide new capabilities that could improve on the enforcement of league rules.

“Do you want high-quality officials or do you want the assistant principal and basketball coach calling a game where millions of dollars are at stake; where the largest television audience ever is watching a game, like the Super Bowl last year,” Binkley said. “Again, they only take the best of the best, but these guys still have part-time jobs.”

Last year’s Super Bowl matchup between the Kansas City Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles drew an average of 115.1 million viewers on FOX, FOX Deportes and other digital platforms. The data, according to data from Nielsen Media Research, made the contest the most-watched television program in American history.

The league has also capitalized on the holidays, attaining large audiences on Thanksgiving and Christmas Day. Earlier in the week, CBS and Nickelodeon combined to average 29.2 million viewers in the Chiefs game against the Las Vegas Raiders, rendering the matchup the most-watched NFL Christmas Day game since 1989. The average audience across FOX, CBS and NBC on Thanksgiving Day was 45.4 million, representative of the largest average NFL audience on the holiday.

“It’s the No. 1 pastime in this country [and] it is the No. 1 hobby for Americans to do is to sit down and watch football as a family,” Jay Binkley said. “It has taken over this country, [and] it has taken over television. Just wait until – it should be this week – the top-30 shows in the United States [for] the last year, they’ll be probably 20 or 21 live football games on there, and the Chiefs will be on there several times.”

Early reports suggest that the NFL could be interested in playing more games on Christmas Day next year despite the holiday falling on a Wednesday. The National Basketball Association typically has a slate of games on the day as well, with five matchups occurring throughout the day on ABC and ESPN. Aside from Christmas Day, the NFL also held its first-ever Black Friday football game, emanating from MetLife Stadium in a matchup between the New York Jets and Miami Dolphins. The league recently revealed that it is expanding its international schedule of games to eight for the 2024 campaign, including matchups in London, England; Munich, Germany; and São Paulo, Brazil.

“Use whatever technology you can do to get things right,” Jay Binkley asserted. “It’s all we ask for – just get things right. It’s getting tougher now because the camera angles are so good. The margin for error is not there; our patience is wearing thin when people have money decided on the line whether you call something or don’t.”

Throughout the year, the Kansas City Chiefs have been a ratings juggernaut, frequently being televised in prime-time slots and/or featured afternoon segments. With the popularity of quarterback Patrick Mahomes and tight end Travis Kelce, along with the rest of the star-studded supporting cast, the reigning Super Bowl champions have regularly captivated viewers and football fans from around the country. If the season were to end after Week 15, the Chiefs would be playing in an NFL Wild Card round matchup against the Buffalo Bills.

Peacock, NBCUniversal’s over-the-top (OTT) streaming service, will be the exclusive home of one of these games taking place on Saturday, Jan. 13, 2024. Should the Chiefs be scheduled to play on that day, Jay Binkley believes the team will end up being featured in the slot to drive viewership. The deal with the league, reportedly worth $110 million, will mark the second NFL contest exclusive to the streaming service on the season.

“The only good thing about the Bills-Chargers game on Peacock last week was I learned that we have Peacock in my family, so I can watch Peacock,” show producer JT Noah said, elucidating on how it comes in a bundle with Xfinity Cable.

Binkley expounded on how he goes about watching football games, utilizing two televisions in order to consume as much of the action as possible. The part of the media landscape he finds to be laborious today is in having to continuously enter and exit different applications to watch programs. Various cable television remotes have a functionality permitting viewers to quickly return to the previous channel they were watching, preventing hassle in toggling between different shows and networks.

“I like flipping channels like normal human beings have always been able to do since the invention of remote controls where you can flip between games just by pushing a button [instead of] getting out of an app and going back in and letting it circle because your WiFi’s down for a bit,” Jay Binkley said. “It’s amazing how backwards we’ve gone.”

FOX Sees 31.5 Million Viewers for Christmas Eve Dolphins/Cowboys Matchup

BSM Staff
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The ratings are pouring in from Christmas weekend and the numbers are massive. FOX Sports reported 31.5 million viewers tuned in for America’s Game of the Week between the Dallas Cowboys and Miami Dolphins, the time slot’s best performance since 1995.

Outside of Thanksgiving Day, Cowboys-Dolphins was this season’s most-watched NFL telecast on any network, which drew ratings 13 higher percent compared to last year’s Week 16 game between the Philadelphia Eagles and the Cowboys.

America’s Game of the Week on FOX is also the most-watched program on television and averages just under 25 million viewers (24,930,000), an increase of 2 percent over last year.

Jerry Recco: Taylor Swift Effect on NFL Game Viewership is Over

BSM Staff
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The NFL engaged in an advertising campaign ahead of its 2023 regular season where a session was taking place to author a script. WFAN host Jerry Recco wonders just how believable that campaign was.

With some skeptic fans claiming that everything that takes place in the league is predetermined prior to kickoff, the league presumably decided to play off of the idea for a creative spot with cameo appearances from several NFL players. One storyline that many people did not seem to see coming, however, was in the frequent attendance of award-winning singer and songwriter Taylor Swift, who is in a relationship with Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce.

Although the team has been struggling of late, the presence of Swift at the games is ostensibly being viewed as a net positive for the league. Nationally televised games where she made an appearance were being scrutinized about how often they would show her early on. Moreover, FOX Sports sideline reporter Erin Andrews was being lauded as the potential catalyst for the romance, pleading Swift to give Kelce a chance over the summer on her podcast, Calm Down, with network colleague Charissa Thompson.

Swift was once again present in a suite from GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium to witness the team’s Christmas Day matchup against the Las Vegas Raiders, ending in a 20-14 defeat. Analysis of the Chiefs’ play of late pins many of their struggles on the offense, specifically on receivers who are unable to consistently catch passes thrown by quarterback Patrick Mahomes.

Despite the recent shortcomings, the game remained a draw on television with an average of 29.2 million viewers across CBS and Nickelodeon, the most-watched NFL game on Christmas Day since 1989. Ratings from Nielsen Media Research began implementing augmented tracking of out-of-home (OOH) viewing and integrating the metric into national television ratings beginning in September 2020.

“The whole country lost its mind when Taylor Swift began showing up at football stadiums,” Jerry Recco said Wednesday morning on WFAN. “I felt as if she showed up in Kansas City on Christmas and it was like, ‘Meh.’ I feel like it’s over – not her popularity; I don’t mean that – [but] I feel like the whole world watching because she’s showing up [is over].”

“Yeah, I never really quite bought into that,” replied Chris Lopresti, who was filling in the morning time slot. “I think early on, the appeal was for the Swifties; it’s like they’re tracking her every movements, right? I don’t think the football fan was tuning in because of Taylor Swift.”

Earlier in the year, the Boomer & Gio program on WFAN and CBS Sports Network received a call from a listener explaining how fans were watching games just to get a glimpse of Taylor Swift. There were numerous instances where broadcast personnel discussed plans to implement Swift within the broadcast. In an interview with TIME for the “Person of the Year” honor, Swift remarked that she has no idea when she is being shown on the television broadcast, explaining that she is showing up to support Kelce.

The eight NFL games that Swift has been in attendance at thus far – which have been televised across CBS, FOX, NBC, ABC/ESPN, and Amazon Prime Video – have an average viewership of 23.38 million. The Chiefs have a 5-3 overall record in those contests and sit at 9-6 on the year in total, good for first place in the AFC West division.

“I think there had to be a shelf life on that,” Lopresti said of Swift’s appearances leading to more viewership. “You were either going to say, ‘Hey, I kind of like watching football, so I’m going to continue to be a fan,’ or, ‘Alright, I checked in on my girl; [I saw] what she’s up to and now we move on,’ especially on Christmas Day.”

Jeff Thurn Indicted on Federal Wire Fraud Charges

BSM Staff
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Jeff Thurn Indicted on Federal Wire Fraud Charges

Former ESPN Sioux Falls host Jeff Thurn has been indicted on five counts of wire fraud for allegedly stealing millions from investors in a ticket resale business.

Court documents reveal Thurn ran a fictitious ticket-buying business from 2015 to 2022 and told investors he could get certain profits by selling tickets on the secondary market, per KELO TV in Sioux Falls. According to investigators, Thurn defrauded investors of more than $5 million during the seven years.

According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Thurn provided guarantees to investors about how much profit would be distributed and allegedly provided fake receipts to prove he had bought the tickets that were actually counterfeit. Authorities claim Thurn used the money for sports betting, gambling, and cryptocurrency purposes.

After being released on a $100,000 bail, Thurn is scheduled to reappear in court on Wednesday, January 17th. After originally appearing at the federal courthouse in Sioux Falls, the case has been transferred to Florida due to one of the alleged victims living in the Miami area.

If convicted, Thurn is facing up to 20 years in prison and a $10 million fine.

Earlier this year, Jeff Thurn departed ESPN Sioux Falls after more than a decade to focus on his national role with ESPN Radio. He hosted Overtime from 11 AM-1 PM in Sioux Falls. He joined ESPN Radio in a fill-in capacity in February 2022.

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