Sunday, November 16, 2003
SPORTS BROADCAST PERSONALITY MOMENTS OF THE WEEK
Okay, it'll be two bad ones and a good one here.
Early in the week, the FSNNW Northwest Sports Report was doing highlights for a Toronto Raptor game. There was a play in which Milt Palacio dished the ball off to Vince Carter. The part where it gets a little too-hot-for-TV is that Angie (Marzetta to Arlati to) Mentink pronounced it differently from how I'd pronounce it. I'd pronounce Palacio as puh-LOSS-ee-oh, but Angie pronounced it as puh-LAY-shee-oh. Then she said something to the effect of "Palacio rhymes with..." And then Jim Watson was laughing in disbelief at the obvious unsaid dirty joke. With all the employee turnover that's gone on at FSNNW, how come Angie Three Names is still there? I mean, sure, I'm glad Matt Biondi is gone (boy, did that guy suck ass), but the first anchors for the Regional Sports Report were Rod Simons and Tom Glasgow, and if it was really fair, Rod Simons should have never been cut loose.
Moment number 2 was from ESPN SportsCenter. Linda Cohn was doing highlights for a hockey game. Someone punched in a loose puck in front of the net for a goal. Linda Cohn, however, called the loose puck a "loose rubber." That didn't put a good thought into my mind. Especially if anyone's run across an actual loose rubber in public, you know firsthand this didn't put a good thought into your mind.
Moment number three is the good moment. Last Friday morning on KJR, Mitch Levy was out with whatever sickness was going around the office. This left Steve Sandmeyer and Matt "Stretch" Johnson behind to take the reins of the 5:30-10am shift. As I've come to learn over the years, if Steve Sandmeyer is filling in for a regular host, hilarity will probably ensue -- look no further than what happened one day when he filled in for Softy and The Nintendo Incident (RealPlayer needed) happened. On this day, Sandmeyer and Stretch were talking about handicapping football games, and how the guy they bring on every week to help people pick football games was 5-16-3 the week before with his picks and was barely over .500 on the year (and he's getting PAID to do it). They were talking about taking Baylor and the 53 or so points against Oklahoma (a bet which would have raked in cash), stuff like that. Then they got a little into story mode. Sandmeyer told about a place in the building they call the Sports Pit, where basically everyone hangs out, throws stuff at each other, and stares at women walking across the street. Sandmeyer prefaced all of this with "[w]e're not compulsive gamblers at all, by the way." One day they were betting on anything and everything; the fax machine was the pay station, basically where everyone put their money if they had action. Crumpled-up one-dollar bills were everywhere. When guys in suits walked by, they told them "nothing" was going on. The peak of the betting, though, was apparently when one of the production guys came in and said "[t]hat seagull will leave that lamppost in over or under four-and-a-half minutes!" They started wagering, and it got to the point where they were yelling at the seagull when it would make any sort of motion on the lamppost. You really had to hear it.
Early in the week, the FSNNW Northwest Sports Report was doing highlights for a Toronto Raptor game. There was a play in which Milt Palacio dished the ball off to Vince Carter. The part where it gets a little too-hot-for-TV is that Angie (Marzetta to Arlati to) Mentink pronounced it differently from how I'd pronounce it. I'd pronounce Palacio as puh-LOSS-ee-oh, but Angie pronounced it as puh-LAY-shee-oh. Then she said something to the effect of "Palacio rhymes with..." And then Jim Watson was laughing in disbelief at the obvious unsaid dirty joke. With all the employee turnover that's gone on at FSNNW, how come Angie Three Names is still there? I mean, sure, I'm glad Matt Biondi is gone (boy, did that guy suck ass), but the first anchors for the Regional Sports Report were Rod Simons and Tom Glasgow, and if it was really fair, Rod Simons should have never been cut loose.
Moment number 2 was from ESPN SportsCenter. Linda Cohn was doing highlights for a hockey game. Someone punched in a loose puck in front of the net for a goal. Linda Cohn, however, called the loose puck a "loose rubber." That didn't put a good thought into my mind. Especially if anyone's run across an actual loose rubber in public, you know firsthand this didn't put a good thought into your mind.
Moment number three is the good moment. Last Friday morning on KJR, Mitch Levy was out with whatever sickness was going around the office. This left Steve Sandmeyer and Matt "Stretch" Johnson behind to take the reins of the 5:30-10am shift. As I've come to learn over the years, if Steve Sandmeyer is filling in for a regular host, hilarity will probably ensue -- look no further than what happened one day when he filled in for Softy and The Nintendo Incident (RealPlayer needed) happened. On this day, Sandmeyer and Stretch were talking about handicapping football games, and how the guy they bring on every week to help people pick football games was 5-16-3 the week before with his picks and was barely over .500 on the year (and he's getting PAID to do it). They were talking about taking Baylor and the 53 or so points against Oklahoma (a bet which would have raked in cash), stuff like that. Then they got a little into story mode. Sandmeyer told about a place in the building they call the Sports Pit, where basically everyone hangs out, throws stuff at each other, and stares at women walking across the street. Sandmeyer prefaced all of this with "[w]e're not compulsive gamblers at all, by the way." One day they were betting on anything and everything; the fax machine was the pay station, basically where everyone put their money if they had action. Crumpled-up one-dollar bills were everywhere. When guys in suits walked by, they told them "nothing" was going on. The peak of the betting, though, was apparently when one of the production guys came in and said "[t]hat seagull will leave that lamppost in over or under four-and-a-half minutes!" They started wagering, and it got to the point where they were yelling at the seagull when it would make any sort of motion on the lamppost. You really had to hear it.
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