I've gotten caught up just enough to finally get to answering some emails. I sincerely apologize for not getting back quicker, but football season leads to seven day work weeks and next thing you know, the Christmas tree is up and the calendar is ready to turn. This is the lion's share of the emails I received over the past six weeks or so. The one "theme" of emails I didn't answer were the classic "Why are you guys showing Game A instead of Game B". For nine years I've been screaming from the rooftops that Mark Haggard and myself have ZERO input on the programming for ABC regional college football. As a matter of fact our station has ZERO input, we are simply assigned a game. If there's a mistake, it's not our fault - trust me! We find it amusing that people think we would have the ability to change the game on WPDE from Penn State to Florida State if we wanted to. That is not the case!
On to the emails:
Andy writes:
I live in Florence and have for 3 years. I find it amazing that you always start sports with Coastal Carolina when you have the 2 big schools, Div 1, USC and Clemson 2nd and 3rd. I understand that Coastal is in Myrtle Beach but citizens of this state have been following the Tigers and Gamecocks much longer. I bet if a poll was done, more citizens of Myrtle Beach would rather see USC or Clemson highlights first. I lived in Columbia for 8 years and they had another school there too. Benedict College. WIS would give them much attention but would start with the Carolina. I grew up in the upstate, and WSPA would do the same, Wofford would then get their highlights second. I want to continue to watch wpde but will have to switch to the other stations when it comes to sports. Thanks
Andy:
I appreciate you writing in. First of all, I appreciate criticism where it doesn't get nasty and your argument is valid. In a nutshell, we made a commitment to be the TV home of Coastal Carolina athletics with the David Bennett Show and the Cliff Ellis Show. I would say the biggest argument for leading with CCU over the Gamecocks and Clemson is that the majority of CCU games are not televised while nearly every single Gamecocks and Clemson game can be seen on major TV (ESPN, etc). The majority of CCU games are at 7:00pm - we have a 7:00pm newscast and I can tell you without a doubt that we've led with USC or Clemson in the early show. If we were not giving Clemson and USC their proper due in the sportscast, that would be a different subject, but the reality is we are doing extended highlights each and every Saturday of all three schools. We are well aware of the importance of the Gamecocks and Clemson to our local sports coverage and will continue to do everything we can to bring as much information on both programs as possible. Our commitment to CCU through the coaches shows will continue as well.
Cindy Moe writes
I have an End Zone question. Concerning the team that wins but aren't favored to. Watching the End Zone the past few Friday nights (Rushing to get home from away games just to see it)This past Friday I had my husband record it so our son could see how their team is making a great come back. When our teams spotlight came up, there was very little said about how our guys worked hard to make the come back, and one thing that eveyone in the community can see and know how the game went is End Zone. We have been very disappointed in the display of your program- Spot lighting the team that lost (but were favored to win) and the only acalade given to the winning team was the final score. It really looked that our team lost if you were just going by what was being said. I feel maybe you should promote the winning team a bit more not just the one that is being favored to win. Just a suggestion. We'll keep watching.
Cindy:
Glad you brought this up. We are using every resource possible to bring our communities the most extensive coverage of high school football every Friday night. Our general manager, news director and Ed Piotrowski (hands down the best football shooter among meteorologists!) are all grabbing cameras on Friday night in order for us to get as many games as possible. What happens is that we have anywhere between 10 to 12 shooters grabbing 15-18 games every week. Doing that simple math shows that a number of our shooters have to grab two games in a night (we call it the double dip). When someone double dips, they start at one game and shoot the first quarter or half of the second and then go to the next game and grab the third quarter. When you double dip, you are always running the risk of missing out on significant action from one of the games. You need to have a little luck go your way on a double dip. For example, if someone were to be going to Loris followed by North Myrtle Beach - if the Loris game is scoreless at the half, the shooter has to leave the game even though there are no major highlights. Hypothetically, if that shooter leaves with no scores and then goes to North Myrtle Beach where the Chiefs have a 35-0 halftime lead, then they are shooting a third quarter where NMB may be a lot more conservative with the game under control. That's a dilemma we have to deal with on a regular basis. It would be great to be able to stay for all four quarters of 18 games we shoot, but it simply can not happen. We earmark a couple of the big games on the board and try and let shooters stay for the entire game, but inevitably we are going to miss some action some of the time. Sometimes we get very fortunate and it works out great. I can remember Mark Haggard shooting a Saint James/Socastee double dip where he got three TD's in the first 16 minutes of game action at the Shark Tank and then arrived at Socastee where the game had four scores in the 3rd quarter. Sometimes it works out like that, and sometimes it doesn't. That is why sometimes you'll see a team that lost 42-7 get their highlight on simply because they scored when our cameras were there. I hope that explains what is going on. Here's hoping that every double dip has a happy ending in 2009!
JD writes:
I was just wondering if you guys cover the CAROLINA hurricanes or anything else besides USC,clemson,or ccu?
JD:
The Carolina Hurricanes have a niche of fans here on the Grand Strand, but quite frankly it's a small niche. That being said, if there's room for the Canes on a night when they are playing, I have absolutely no problem with putting them in the sportscast, but our focus is to show as much local sports coverage as possible. We will do our best to show 'Canes highlights whenever we can.
Carlin Munnerlyn writes:
Why are the points off so badly on the "Leading Tackles" for the End Zone? Someone is not doing a very good job. Jamie Munnerlyn has been leading the entire season up until last week where he is got behind by only 3...Johnsonville had a by. He has 114 points before playing Hemingway. I want an answer. This is breaking his heart....Channel 15 needs to quit putting up stats. if they can't keep them correct. I expect a phone call.
Carlin:
Glad you brought this up. Each Sunday/Monday during the high school football season, I get stats from the area high schools. Each team's stats presentation is different, but it's easy to break down yards, averages, etc. The one unique stat is the tackle category. Some schools have their tackles broken down by solo, assist and TFL along with sacks. You take those four numbers and that is your total tackle number. Other schools credit .5 tackle for assists. To try and be consistent, I was adding the four categories above and counting them as one tackle. Johnsonville's stats were unique in that they had it broken down by solo, assist, assist #2, TFL and sacks. The secondary assist was something that the majority of the other schools did not have so I was discounting it. Jamie Munnerlyn (who had a great senior season by the way) had tackle numbers far greater than everyone in the ara because of that second column. After reading your email, I decided to count Jamie's tackle total the way Johnsonville high school gave them to me. I do apologize as I didn't mean to take away what Jamie was doing. The tackle number on the leaderboard in our stats section has Jamie's correct tackle total as given to us by the Flashes.
Barry Fowler writes:
I was just wondering if WWMB-21 is going to carry ACC Basketball.
Barry:
To the best of my knowledge, CW 21 will once again have ACC basketball games. That schedule gets started up in January.
Mike Pirozzi writes:
I was really intrigued by your segment tonight with David Bennett. Something was said to the effect of "football is a microcosm of life. You can learn more on the field than you can in a classroom." Hey folks, get with it. There are so many football players who can't read, write or even speak proper English. They are brought up in this fantasy world that football is everything. You need to stop glorifying these individuals and start stressing educating them to assimilate themselves into the reality of everday life where you have to actually have to work for working man's wages and raise a family without resorting to somebody else to bail you out of your poor decision making.
Mike:
I guess you can take the quote from Coach Bennett in a couple of different ways. It seems as if the negative stories seem to stick out more than the positive ones. I can tell you from a CCU football perspective that the high character guys who go to class, volunteer numerous hours to different community projects and are overall great guys outnumber the bad apples 10 to 1. Yet we are not doing stories about them on the news. If you've been around Coach Bennett as long as I am he constantly hammers home the message that the priorities of a CCU football player are: God and family first, academics second and then football. The context that Coach Bennett was using football as a microcosm of life was that not everything is going to go your way on the gridiron and that often applies to life. A kid like Jamie Childers was ready to be the star quarterback, then in an instant gets meningitis and has a long road of recovery to get back to where he was. Dominique Davenport is the definition of a student athlete and heavily involved in CCU's Campus Outreach program. He saw his season get cut short early with a broken elbow. He'll spend the next six months working around the clock to get back on the football field. I certainly don't condone with some of the young men did off the field during the 2008 season. That has been well documented. But the majority of CCU football players will graduate and be valued members of society. Unfortunately, those stories don't get on the front page of the newspaper or are the lead story in a sportscast.
Betsy Rowell writes:
When will your applications be avaliable for the college scholarship (sports zone). Thank You
Betsy:
I'm keeping my fingers crossed that we will be able to give at least one $5,000 scholarship this year. The entire WPDE Scholarship fund is based on our one day charity golf tournament. With the economy as turbulent as it is, Ed Piotrowski and I are hoping that we will be able to secure the major sponsorship to continue the event. We've got some ideas on trying to keep things going, but it's not a guarantee at this point. Our scholarship fund is a small operation that survives thanks to the overwhelming support of our community. We'll do everything we can to keep it going. If we are able to secure sponsorship, we'll have a deadline of sometime in May for applications and all the information will be online at carolinalive.com
Derron Smith writes:
I think my cousin Antonio McAllister ''Bubba'' from ''Timmonsville'' should be on the north and south team.Runningback/cornerback ''Please'' Select him
Derron:
I've got your back on this one, but we have no say in the North/South rosters. We did put Bubba on our WPDE All-Zone team along with his teammate Fredrick Wilhite. I'm glad we were able to do that as they both deserved the honor. It seems to be quite difficult for 1A players to make All-Star teams. I'm still in shock that Kwame Geathers of Carvers Bay and Lake View's Quandon Christian did not make either All-Star game (both 1A players). Glad that Bubba was a part of our banquet - he had a great year and was always giving us highlights on Friday night!
Pam writes:
I just wanted to know the qualifications for the zoneman award.
Pam: I answered this question in a previous blog entry - I went ahead and pasted it below:
There are many questions every year about the Zoneman and the All-Zone team so I will explain the process. First of all, the balloting for the Zoneman is decided by 40 voters. 34 coaches, Hags and myself, and four other media members and other coaches pick the Zoneman on the first week of November. Each ballot is first, second and third place for top player in the WPDE viewing area. Underclassmen are eligible as well as any player in the WPDE viewing area. The reason we choose the first week in November is so we have ample time to gather the ballots, solidify the podium and order the trophy which usually takes 3-4 weeks to get to us.
Many people will be upset that a certain person was not a finalist for the Zoneman Trophy. The fact of the matter is that there are 10 to 12 solid candidates every single season. I can't think of a better process than giving every coach an equal vote. Many of them watch our show and see the highlights of the top players in the area. We have four players on the podium this year because every one of them eclipsed the 20 point mark (3 points for 1st, 2 points for 2nd, 1 point for 3rd). We always have a minimum of three on the podium and I think this year's group is excellent. We have two future Clemson Tigers (Malliciah Goodman and Quandon Christian) to go along with two Myrtle Beach Seahawks (Everett Golson and Jamere Valentine
RICK FOUNTAIN writes:
Do you cover HS basketball games? Do teams need to call in or email their scores? I can not locate Tuesday night scores online.
Rick:
Indeed we do cover high school basketball. The transition from high school football to high school basketball overlaps each other so what we've done as a general rule is to begin our coverage with the four Holiday hoops tournaments in our area (Holiday Inviational Girls, Shootout by the Sea, Florence Pepsi Classic and the Beach Ball) and then begin our Hoop Zone coverage on Tuesday's and Friday's starting in January. Beginning in January we will post scores on carolinalive.com along with an honor roll of the top performances of that night. I have also put in a request to our content manager to get the schedules of both the boys and girls basketball teams posted on each team's page. Hopefully that will get done by the end of the year and we'll be able to get each page updated with scores and records. Have no fear, the hoops brigade is coming!
Todd Crane writes:
Rich, I can't believe that you NEVER even mentioned the Girls HS Holiday Invitational that starts tomorrow in Myrtle Beach, with 16 teams. Even Crescent Banks who is sponsoring the tourney, advertised on your sisterstation at 7:30 last night about the tournament, and they are giving free tickets! Disgruntled!
Todd:
Have no fear, we are providing day by day coverage of the tournament as well as our other three Holiday Hoops events.
Denita Elliott writes:
On the zone cup standings, Myrtle Beach High school did not make it to the semi-finals of Girls High School tennis. They were defeated in the quarterfinals by Hilton Head not the semi finals. Waccamaw and Johnsonville both made it to the semi-finals with one additional win. Myrtle Beach should only have 25 points not 50 points.
Denita:
Indeed you are correct! I've made the appropriate changes in the overall standings. I encourage all fans of a particular high school to double check my math work so we can have the Zone Cup standings correct! I appreciate the heads up.
As always, I enjoy the questions and the interaction. Hope everyone has a great Christmas and Holiday season. We'll be at both bowls and get ready for the Cliff Ellis Show and all the high school hoops you can handle. Also, we've compiled the top 15 local sports stories which will air on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. If you're not going to snuggle by the fireplace with WPDE news, fear not as we will post the entire list and web video on carolinalive.com!
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Friday, December 12, 2008
My 2008 Heisman Ballot
Now that Everett Golson has been crowned the Zoneman, we can find out who will win the Heisman in 2008. I wonder one day if Golson will win the Heisman. He's got a long way to go, but his makeup off the field is the biggest intangible going his way. I've been fortunate enough to have a Heisman vote for the past eight years.
This is the year of the quarterback and like many ballots, I have three signal callers on my list. I feel bad that Graham Harrell didn't get an invite to New York, as the Texas quarterback deserved to make the podium. I was very close to putting Myron Rolle on my ballot as I think the Florida State safety is beyond the definition of a student athlete. Now that my ballot is cast, I have a little bit of regret that I was afraid to pull the trigger on a "symbolic vote". To be a Rhodes Scholar and play at a high level of college football is simply astounding. I wish that the Heisman ballot expanded to the top 5 instead of just three.
We know that the top three will be (in no particular order) - Tim Tebow, Sam Bradford and Colt McCoy. I am guessing that Bradford is the favorite based on the website www.stiffarmtrophy.com (a great site to check out if your into projections). You can go around in circles talking about the merits and nitpick about all three of these guys, but in the end here's what my thought process was. I voted Tim Tebow first last year and I didn't see anything that made me need to change my pick this year. It seemed as if he fell off the favorite radar after a week four loss to Ole Miss which followed a less than glitzy statline against Tennessee (the Gators won that game 30-6). Now that we've arrived at the end of the year, a one point loss to the Rebels isn't as bad as it seemed earlier in the year. If you look at Tebow's stats in the loss (24 of 38, 319 yards, 1 TD pass, 0 INT and 2 TD runs), those are some pretty good numbers in a defeat. He doesn't have the same mind boggling numbers as last year, but 28 TD's and only 2 INT's really sticks out as a major plus. Bradford and McCoy are both excellent and are both deserving of this award. In the end, I couldn't come up with a reason to take my first place vote for Tebow off the table. So here is my official Heisman vote:
1st place - Tim Tebow, Florida
2nd place - Sam Bradford, Oklahoma
3rd place - Colt McCoy, Texas
It should be a close race and there should be a little bit of drama and uncertainty when the next Heisman winner is revealed on Saturday night.
This is the year of the quarterback and like many ballots, I have three signal callers on my list. I feel bad that Graham Harrell didn't get an invite to New York, as the Texas quarterback deserved to make the podium. I was very close to putting Myron Rolle on my ballot as I think the Florida State safety is beyond the definition of a student athlete. Now that my ballot is cast, I have a little bit of regret that I was afraid to pull the trigger on a "symbolic vote". To be a Rhodes Scholar and play at a high level of college football is simply astounding. I wish that the Heisman ballot expanded to the top 5 instead of just three.
We know that the top three will be (in no particular order) - Tim Tebow, Sam Bradford and Colt McCoy. I am guessing that Bradford is the favorite based on the website www.stiffarmtrophy.com (a great site to check out if your into projections). You can go around in circles talking about the merits and nitpick about all three of these guys, but in the end here's what my thought process was. I voted Tim Tebow first last year and I didn't see anything that made me need to change my pick this year. It seemed as if he fell off the favorite radar after a week four loss to Ole Miss which followed a less than glitzy statline against Tennessee (the Gators won that game 30-6). Now that we've arrived at the end of the year, a one point loss to the Rebels isn't as bad as it seemed earlier in the year. If you look at Tebow's stats in the loss (24 of 38, 319 yards, 1 TD pass, 0 INT and 2 TD runs), those are some pretty good numbers in a defeat. He doesn't have the same mind boggling numbers as last year, but 28 TD's and only 2 INT's really sticks out as a major plus. Bradford and McCoy are both excellent and are both deserving of this award. In the end, I couldn't come up with a reason to take my first place vote for Tebow off the table. So here is my official Heisman vote:
1st place - Tim Tebow, Florida
2nd place - Sam Bradford, Oklahoma
3rd place - Colt McCoy, Texas
It should be a close race and there should be a little bit of drama and uncertainty when the next Heisman winner is revealed on Saturday night.
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
A major endorsement for Thig
When Tyler Thigpen was thrown to the wolves in Atlanta for his first career NFL start, I thought the worst. Quarterbacks from Coastal Carolina don't usually get a big window to prove their worth in the National Football League. Three picks and a trip back to the bench was not the cinderella story that CCU fans were hoping for.
But the second chance, changed everything. When Thig went toe to toe with Brett Favre, he proved that he could play with the big boys. What's happened since then is nothing short of remarkable. Yes, Thig is 1-7 as a starter, but he has taken a nightmare situation in Kansas City and has made them somewhat competitive. The Chiefs are an absolute nightmare right now - poor defense, an offensive line that put two quarterbacks on the shelf for a year, and a Pro Bowl running back who has made more headlines off the field than on it.
The Chiefs have three games to go and it will prove to be the ulimate audition on whether Thigpen is named the starter for 2009. The Chiefs will likely have a top 5 pick and have a chance to get one of the top 2 quarterbacks on the board. Thigpen has proven that he belongs in the NFL - if the Chiefs can't figure that out, I'm sure someone else will. Remember, Brett Favre was an Atlanta Falcon before he was a Packer legend and the Saints didn't give Jake Delhomme the starter's endorsement and the Panthers are still thanking them for that.
You can put his numbers up over the last seven weeks against almost any quarterback in the league. But, forget about bloggers and sportscasters analyzing the numbers and being an armchair quarterback - listen to a Hall of Famer (click on link below).
Gonzalez: A disgrace if Thigpen isn't QB in 2009
But the second chance, changed everything. When Thig went toe to toe with Brett Favre, he proved that he could play with the big boys. What's happened since then is nothing short of remarkable. Yes, Thig is 1-7 as a starter, but he has taken a nightmare situation in Kansas City and has made them somewhat competitive. The Chiefs are an absolute nightmare right now - poor defense, an offensive line that put two quarterbacks on the shelf for a year, and a Pro Bowl running back who has made more headlines off the field than on it.
The Chiefs have three games to go and it will prove to be the ulimate audition on whether Thigpen is named the starter for 2009. The Chiefs will likely have a top 5 pick and have a chance to get one of the top 2 quarterbacks on the board. Thigpen has proven that he belongs in the NFL - if the Chiefs can't figure that out, I'm sure someone else will. Remember, Brett Favre was an Atlanta Falcon before he was a Packer legend and the Saints didn't give Jake Delhomme the starter's endorsement and the Panthers are still thanking them for that.
You can put his numbers up over the last seven weeks against almost any quarterback in the league. But, forget about bloggers and sportscasters analyzing the numbers and being an armchair quarterback - listen to a Hall of Famer (click on link below).
Gonzalez: A disgrace if Thigpen isn't QB in 2009
Friday, December 5, 2008
The Banquet Circuit
I have a whole pile of emails that need answering and that will come in the coming days as soon as state champions are crowned and the banquet circuit comes to an end. This Thursday, the 9th annual Chevy End Zone banquet will take place at the Holiday Inn West in Myrtle Beach. The very next day is the Mr. Football and North/South awards ceremony at Myrtle Beach high school.
There are many questions every year about the Zoneman and the All-Zone team so I will explain the process. First of all, the balloting for the Zoneman is decided by 40 voters. 34 coaches, Hags and myself, and four other media members and other coaches pick the Zoneman on the first week of November. Each ballot is first, second and third place for top player in the WPDE viewing area. Underclassmen are eligible as well as any player in the WPDE viewing area. The reason we choose the first week in November is so we have ample time to gather the ballots, solidify the podium and order the trophy which usually takes 3-4 weeks to get to us.
Many people will be upset that a certain person was not a finalist for the Zoneman Trophy. The fact of the matter is that there are 10 to 12 solid candidates every single season. I can't think of a better process than giving every coach an equal vote. Many of them watch our show and see the highlights of the top players in the area. We have four players on the podium this year because every one of them eclipsed the 20 point mark (3 points for 1st, 2 points for 2nd, 1 point for 3rd). We always have a minimum of three on the podium and I think this year's group is excellent. We have two future Clemson Tigers (Malliciah Goodman and Quandon Christian) to go along with two Myrtle Beach Seahawks (Everett Golson and Jamere Valentine). It was a fairly close race and we'll reveal the winner this Thursday night and air our special on Sunday at 2pm on WWMB-TV 21.
This year's Mr. Football presentation and the North South All-Star game is going to bring us a new and exciting project. WPDE Sports will be producing a 30 minute special that features the highlights of the North South All Star game and the presentation of South Carolina's Mr. Football. This will be a great opportunity to showcase all the great festivities of All-Star week and we will air the special on Sunday, December 14th across the state (WPDE in Florence/Myrtle Beach, WACH in Columbia, WCIV in Charleston and WYFF in Greenville). It's a great challnege to turn around a lot of material in a short amount of time and distribute it across the entire state, but we're excited to give the North South week its proper due.
Looking forward to answering a host of emails in the coming days!
There are many questions every year about the Zoneman and the All-Zone team so I will explain the process. First of all, the balloting for the Zoneman is decided by 40 voters. 34 coaches, Hags and myself, and four other media members and other coaches pick the Zoneman on the first week of November. Each ballot is first, second and third place for top player in the WPDE viewing area. Underclassmen are eligible as well as any player in the WPDE viewing area. The reason we choose the first week in November is so we have ample time to gather the ballots, solidify the podium and order the trophy which usually takes 3-4 weeks to get to us.
Many people will be upset that a certain person was not a finalist for the Zoneman Trophy. The fact of the matter is that there are 10 to 12 solid candidates every single season. I can't think of a better process than giving every coach an equal vote. Many of them watch our show and see the highlights of the top players in the area. We have four players on the podium this year because every one of them eclipsed the 20 point mark (3 points for 1st, 2 points for 2nd, 1 point for 3rd). We always have a minimum of three on the podium and I think this year's group is excellent. We have two future Clemson Tigers (Malliciah Goodman and Quandon Christian) to go along with two Myrtle Beach Seahawks (Everett Golson and Jamere Valentine). It was a fairly close race and we'll reveal the winner this Thursday night and air our special on Sunday at 2pm on WWMB-TV 21.
This year's Mr. Football presentation and the North South All-Star game is going to bring us a new and exciting project. WPDE Sports will be producing a 30 minute special that features the highlights of the North South All Star game and the presentation of South Carolina's Mr. Football. This will be a great opportunity to showcase all the great festivities of All-Star week and we will air the special on Sunday, December 14th across the state (WPDE in Florence/Myrtle Beach, WACH in Columbia, WCIV in Charleston and WYFF in Greenville). It's a great challnege to turn around a lot of material in a short amount of time and distribute it across the entire state, but we're excited to give the North South week its proper due.
Looking forward to answering a host of emails in the coming days!
Monday, November 17, 2008
A Zone Insider remembers Coach Skip
This season, we started a new section of wpde.com's sports page with individual pages for all 34 teams we cover in our area. We asked each coach to give us a player who can be our Zone Insider who gives us weekly blog updates on how the team's season is going. I'm optimistic that over time, we'll have every page loaded with information on your favorite school. This season we have had about 10 guys who have done an outstanding job of posting blog entries each week. Steven Cobb is the Myrtle Beach Seahawks starting linebacker and plays tight end as well. This is his latest blog entry talking about the loss of Myrtle Beach assistant coach Greg Skipper, who was killed in a car accident the night before the Seahawks 31-7 playoff victory over Airport.
As you have probably heard Coach Greg Skipper passed away Thursday night in a car accident. If you don’t know Coach Skip he spent the better part of his 51 years coaching football and basketball. I’m not going to give an obituary or anything like that, but I do want to talk about my most lasting memory of Coach Skip.
First off, Skip was my b-team basketball coach my seventh and eighth grade years and when I reached high school he moved up too and coached the JV team. Unfortunately, I tore my ACL the end of eighth grade and missed the entire football season and the beginning of basketball. It takes 6 months for an ACL to heal and when I finally got cleared the season was well under way.
The day I got cleared we happened to be on the road against West Brunswick. Earlier that week Skip had told me I would sit that game out and practice the next week and hopefully then get some playing time. I reluctantly agreed and rode on the bus to West Brunswick in street clothes.
In the locker room before the game Coach Skip pulled me aside. He reached in the bulky equipment bag and pulled out my number 33 jersey and pants. He said he knew I had been waiting a long time to play and he was going to let me. I looked at him and told him I hadn’t brought my basketball shoes. He asked me what size I wear and I told him 12. Without thinking he pulled his New Balances off and handed them to me…
This selfless act may not seem like a huge deal, but it stands out to me. Those people who were close to Coach Skipper probably have hundreds of these “Skip” stories; most of them probably aren’t quite as serious (Skip was a jokester). I know the Seahawk family can come together and pull through this tough time. I just want anyone who reads this to pray for Coach Skip’s family and remember what a great man he was. From lending his shoes to a scrawny ninth grader, to his impact on the lives of thousands of young athletes—Coach Skip will not be forgotten.
A lot of times blogs can be filled with a lot of useless information - rambling thoughts and opinions masked as fact. This is a shining example of what great things can com from a blog. Stephen Cobb has made some great plays on both sides of the ball for the Seahawks this season and I've bragged on him in the End Zone on more than one occasion, but this is his best performance of 2008. Thanks Stephen for giving our viewers and readers some true insight on what a great loss the Seahawk family is feeling.
As you have probably heard Coach Greg Skipper passed away Thursday night in a car accident. If you don’t know Coach Skip he spent the better part of his 51 years coaching football and basketball. I’m not going to give an obituary or anything like that, but I do want to talk about my most lasting memory of Coach Skip.
First off, Skip was my b-team basketball coach my seventh and eighth grade years and when I reached high school he moved up too and coached the JV team. Unfortunately, I tore my ACL the end of eighth grade and missed the entire football season and the beginning of basketball. It takes 6 months for an ACL to heal and when I finally got cleared the season was well under way.
The day I got cleared we happened to be on the road against West Brunswick. Earlier that week Skip had told me I would sit that game out and practice the next week and hopefully then get some playing time. I reluctantly agreed and rode on the bus to West Brunswick in street clothes.
In the locker room before the game Coach Skip pulled me aside. He reached in the bulky equipment bag and pulled out my number 33 jersey and pants. He said he knew I had been waiting a long time to play and he was going to let me. I looked at him and told him I hadn’t brought my basketball shoes. He asked me what size I wear and I told him 12. Without thinking he pulled his New Balances off and handed them to me…
This selfless act may not seem like a huge deal, but it stands out to me. Those people who were close to Coach Skipper probably have hundreds of these “Skip” stories; most of them probably aren’t quite as serious (Skip was a jokester). I know the Seahawk family can come together and pull through this tough time. I just want anyone who reads this to pray for Coach Skip’s family and remember what a great man he was. From lending his shoes to a scrawny ninth grader, to his impact on the lives of thousands of young athletes—Coach Skip will not be forgotten.
A lot of times blogs can be filled with a lot of useless information - rambling thoughts and opinions masked as fact. This is a shining example of what great things can com from a blog. Stephen Cobb has made some great plays on both sides of the ball for the Seahawks this season and I've bragged on him in the End Zone on more than one occasion, but this is his best performance of 2008. Thanks Stephen for giving our viewers and readers some true insight on what a great loss the Seahawk family is feeling.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Bennett and Blogs don't mix
Five years ago, the word "blog" wasn't even a word. Now, it's getting thrown around when it comes to just about anything associated with the internet. I always thought a blog was exactly what I'm doing right here, but it has gone beyond that. So I did a little google work and came up with this definition:
Web LOG is a journal kept on the internet. This journal is often updated daily and contains all information that the person maintaining the BLOG (Blogger) wishes to share with the world. Also applies to websites dedicated to a particular topic and being updated with the latest news, views and trends.
I have to admit that I get a chuckle whenever Coach Bennett talks about bloggers. The first time he made a bold statement about how he doesn't value what bloggers have to say and what people are posting on the internet, my heart actaully sank to my stomach. Coach Bennett writes a weekly column for Palmetto Pigskin Preview. It also gets posted on his website. I tried to come up with a catchy name for it, something with a little bit of alliteration and I came up with Bennett's Blog. Technically, it was a weekly newspaper column, but it really was sort of a personal diary and it was posted on the web so I thought I had a little bit of creative freedom in using the name "Bennett's Blog". As soon as I heard his first "anti-blog" rant, I quickly changed the name. If you pick up the PPP, you will see it is now Coach Bennett's weekly column. Coach and I had a good laugh over this.
At the Stony Brook press conference, Coach Bennett actually got into more detail about his disdain for blogs. When it gets down to it, he doesn't have a problem with the traditional straight forward blog (like this one). It's the message boards where people lurk in anonymity and make random posts with no consequences because no one really knows who they are. This is a part of the new age of journalism where the lines can easily be blurred between credible reporting and a simple spread of rumors. Someone can post on a message board any kind of rumor and it will take on a life of its own. We saw this first hand when Buzz Peterson was rumored to be the College of Charleston's next head coach.
I can promise you this - David Bennett doesn't read blogs (not this one, or any of them). He writes his weekly column on a piece of legal paper and either has me or one of his administrative assistants type it in and email it to me. I've never seen him duck a question or a tough issue in six years. Every single athlete in any sport would be well served to never read a message board as the majority of it is simply stirring the pot in a cauldron of negativity.
"Who's on the blog? Put your real name on the blog!"
That's what Coach Bennett said at the press conference. So I'm here to say this is Rich Chrampanis, on the blog, signing off and taking Coach's advice to find something more productive to do!
Web LOG is a journal kept on the internet. This journal is often updated daily and contains all information that the person maintaining the BLOG (Blogger) wishes to share with the world. Also applies to websites dedicated to a particular topic and being updated with the latest news, views and trends.
I have to admit that I get a chuckle whenever Coach Bennett talks about bloggers. The first time he made a bold statement about how he doesn't value what bloggers have to say and what people are posting on the internet, my heart actaully sank to my stomach. Coach Bennett writes a weekly column for Palmetto Pigskin Preview. It also gets posted on his website. I tried to come up with a catchy name for it, something with a little bit of alliteration and I came up with Bennett's Blog. Technically, it was a weekly newspaper column, but it really was sort of a personal diary and it was posted on the web so I thought I had a little bit of creative freedom in using the name "Bennett's Blog". As soon as I heard his first "anti-blog" rant, I quickly changed the name. If you pick up the PPP, you will see it is now Coach Bennett's weekly column. Coach and I had a good laugh over this.
At the Stony Brook press conference, Coach Bennett actually got into more detail about his disdain for blogs. When it gets down to it, he doesn't have a problem with the traditional straight forward blog (like this one). It's the message boards where people lurk in anonymity and make random posts with no consequences because no one really knows who they are. This is a part of the new age of journalism where the lines can easily be blurred between credible reporting and a simple spread of rumors. Someone can post on a message board any kind of rumor and it will take on a life of its own. We saw this first hand when Buzz Peterson was rumored to be the College of Charleston's next head coach.
I can promise you this - David Bennett doesn't read blogs (not this one, or any of them). He writes his weekly column on a piece of legal paper and either has me or one of his administrative assistants type it in and email it to me. I've never seen him duck a question or a tough issue in six years. Every single athlete in any sport would be well served to never read a message board as the majority of it is simply stirring the pot in a cauldron of negativity.
"Who's on the blog? Put your real name on the blog!"
That's what Coach Bennett said at the press conference. So I'm here to say this is Rich Chrampanis, on the blog, signing off and taking Coach's advice to find something more productive to do!
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Bowden Bailout
The Tommy Bowden era came to a crashing halt on Monday which was shows you how chaotic things must have gotten in TigerTown. I think after the Wake Forest loss, it was a foregone conclusion that it was the beginning of the end, but Tommy saw things so out of control that he walked away.
On the one side of things, you have to look at some numbers.
72 wins in 9 plus seasons (that's almost 8 wins a year)
7-2 against your archrival (Lloyd Carr would still be the Michigan coach if he had this stat alone)
8 bowl trips in 9 seasons
a pretty solid graduation rate
It reminds me a little bit of what happened to Frank Solich at Nebraska and the Cornhuskers haven't gotten back to that level with Bill Callahan and now Bo Pellini, but it's early.
On the flip side, Tommy Bowden had immense talent on the field. No one can deny that. You are looking at as many as a dozen guys that will get drafted in the next couple of years. The pre-season #9 ranking and the pre-season ACC player of the year to go along with the pre-season favorite to win it all in the conference. Everyone in the country was buying the hype that the Tigers were a lock for Jacksonville and a heavy favorite to go to the Orange Bowl. That was the level of expectations in Death Valley and anything below that would be deemed a failure. When people were calling Clemson a fraud after getting waxed by Alabama, I always thought that the ultiamte goal was very much on the table (ACC title game and a shot at the Orange Bowl). The ACC was down and I thought that Clemson could still reach their ulimate goal. I remember leaving for Greensboro and the Chants game at North Carolina A&T. When we got in the car at the station, Clemson was already up 17-6 on Maryland. By the time we arrived at the stadium, the Terps had started the Clemson spiral towards the end of the Bowden era. With Spiller and Davis, Ford and Kelly and Cullen Harper it is mind boggling that seven quarters without a touchdown could happen.
I was a Bowden defender throughout all of his tenure at Clemson. In 2003, he was one loss away from getting canned. He turned around and beat his Dad for the first time, hung up 63 on the Gamecocks and then whipped Tennessee in the Peach Bowl. That was an 8 week course on how to go from nearly fired to getting a big pay raise. Last year, he was an Aaron Kelly dropped pass from getting to the ACC championship game and maybe Miami (Orange Bowl). If Aaron Kelly catches that ball, does Tommy get a mulligan for this year?
I find it interesting how names get thrown into the mix just hours after a coach leaves. Texas defensive coordinator Will Muschamp is a hot name and so is Bobby Johnson, a former Clemson player, who has done wonderful things at Vanderbilt. Dabo Swinney was a wise choice to ride out the season. He is Clemson's top recruiter and has been in the living rooms of many of the current players on the roster. He can also keep the peace with Clemson's long list of verbal commitments for next season. All indications are that our two local players, Quandon Christian of Lake View and West Florence's Malliciah Goodman are still verbal commitments to Clemson.
On a personal level, Bowden was a class act to deal with. Every December, he would come down to the North/South banquet and the Mister Football presentation and would always give me 15 minutes to do a one on one interview to get ready for the bowl game at the end of that month. He recognized that we covered his program extensively even though we were four and a half hours away. He was always very approachable and noticed when we made the long journey to Clemson. To his credit, he played the game well and got himself a couple of nice contracts. When I start to feel bad that the pressure and the negativity got so intense on Tommy, I realize that he gets $3.5 million dollars to deal with all of that.
The next Clemson coach must realize this:
You better get to Tampa (site of this year's ACC title game), and you better get to the Orange Bowl. Going to bowl games, graduating your kids and winning more than you lose isn't going to cut it at Clemson. With the money poured into the facilities and the talent base that is on the field, these things are possible. Welcome to the 21st century of college football.
On the one side of things, you have to look at some numbers.
72 wins in 9 plus seasons (that's almost 8 wins a year)
7-2 against your archrival (Lloyd Carr would still be the Michigan coach if he had this stat alone)
8 bowl trips in 9 seasons
a pretty solid graduation rate
It reminds me a little bit of what happened to Frank Solich at Nebraska and the Cornhuskers haven't gotten back to that level with Bill Callahan and now Bo Pellini, but it's early.
On the flip side, Tommy Bowden had immense talent on the field. No one can deny that. You are looking at as many as a dozen guys that will get drafted in the next couple of years. The pre-season #9 ranking and the pre-season ACC player of the year to go along with the pre-season favorite to win it all in the conference. Everyone in the country was buying the hype that the Tigers were a lock for Jacksonville and a heavy favorite to go to the Orange Bowl. That was the level of expectations in Death Valley and anything below that would be deemed a failure. When people were calling Clemson a fraud after getting waxed by Alabama, I always thought that the ultiamte goal was very much on the table (ACC title game and a shot at the Orange Bowl). The ACC was down and I thought that Clemson could still reach their ulimate goal. I remember leaving for Greensboro and the Chants game at North Carolina A&T. When we got in the car at the station, Clemson was already up 17-6 on Maryland. By the time we arrived at the stadium, the Terps had started the Clemson spiral towards the end of the Bowden era. With Spiller and Davis, Ford and Kelly and Cullen Harper it is mind boggling that seven quarters without a touchdown could happen.
I was a Bowden defender throughout all of his tenure at Clemson. In 2003, he was one loss away from getting canned. He turned around and beat his Dad for the first time, hung up 63 on the Gamecocks and then whipped Tennessee in the Peach Bowl. That was an 8 week course on how to go from nearly fired to getting a big pay raise. Last year, he was an Aaron Kelly dropped pass from getting to the ACC championship game and maybe Miami (Orange Bowl). If Aaron Kelly catches that ball, does Tommy get a mulligan for this year?
I find it interesting how names get thrown into the mix just hours after a coach leaves. Texas defensive coordinator Will Muschamp is a hot name and so is Bobby Johnson, a former Clemson player, who has done wonderful things at Vanderbilt. Dabo Swinney was a wise choice to ride out the season. He is Clemson's top recruiter and has been in the living rooms of many of the current players on the roster. He can also keep the peace with Clemson's long list of verbal commitments for next season. All indications are that our two local players, Quandon Christian of Lake View and West Florence's Malliciah Goodman are still verbal commitments to Clemson.
On a personal level, Bowden was a class act to deal with. Every December, he would come down to the North/South banquet and the Mister Football presentation and would always give me 15 minutes to do a one on one interview to get ready for the bowl game at the end of that month. He recognized that we covered his program extensively even though we were four and a half hours away. He was always very approachable and noticed when we made the long journey to Clemson. To his credit, he played the game well and got himself a couple of nice contracts. When I start to feel bad that the pressure and the negativity got so intense on Tommy, I realize that he gets $3.5 million dollars to deal with all of that.
The next Clemson coach must realize this:
You better get to Tampa (site of this year's ACC title game), and you better get to the Orange Bowl. Going to bowl games, graduating your kids and winning more than you lose isn't going to cut it at Clemson. With the money poured into the facilities and the talent base that is on the field, these things are possible. Welcome to the 21st century of college football.
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Big Mike: A lesson about believing in yourself
I really need to get the NFL Sunday Ticket. A few years back it would have been great for fantasy football reasons, but now there are so many former All-Zoners and former CCU football players playing on Sunday that I crave the Ticket so I can check in all of our former guys.
The most pleasant surprise of all our of alumni right now is Mike Tolbert. When Tolbert was a nightmare for defenses in the Big South, you tend to not let it translate to the NFL. But now Tyler Thigpen, Quinton Teal, Jerome Simpson and Big Mike have taught us that it is possible to be a I-AA star at CCU and then move on to the NFL.
I will always remember the second day of the NFL Draft in 2008 when Hags and I went to Mike Tolbert's house. There was no big celebration - Tolbert was not drafted. But he was all smiles when we pulled up to his house. He was getting his shot with the San Diego Chargers - a signing bonus of a whopping $5,000 (did the Chargers get a bargain or what!??!!) All Mike Tolbert wanted was a shot. He was determined to make the most of it and he sure did.
We gave so much attention to Jerome Simpson and the hype that came with his dazzling workouts. Jerome has not gotten his opportunity yet as the Bengals struggle. There's no doubt that as soon as he gets his chance Jerome will do some great things in the NFL. Back in April, we thought we'd have a highlight reel full of Jerome catches in Bengal stripes, but instead we have Mike Tolbert with a TD catch, a 67 yard catch against the Broncos and bulldozing holes for LaDandian Tomlinson. Tolbert not only made the roster as an undrafted free agent, he's starting as a rookie at fullback for one of the NFL's elite teams.
I remember being at CCU's Pro Day where about a dozen NFL scouts were on hand to eyeball Jerome. I had put together a DVD of highlights of both Simpson and Tolbert. The scouts were all grabbing the DVD's of Jerome and watching every move he made. Tolbert was second fiddle, but the Chargers were at that Pro Day workout and my guess is they grabbed the Tolbert DVD. If it wasn't for Jerome attracting a big crowd, maybe the Chargers wouldn't have discovered their new starting fullback.
David Bennett was bending every scout's ear who was on Simpson watch. "We've got another one that can play on Sundays", he'd always say. It would have been so easy for Big Mike to get caught up in the hype and resign himself to the fact that Jerome was going to be the guy who made it, but quietly Big Mike made the absolute most out of a minimal opportunity.
The NFL is finding out what already knew - Big Mike can play the game. Tolbert believed in himself and now there's a legion of Lightning Bolt fans and one of the best running backs on the planet who are believing in him.
The most pleasant surprise of all our of alumni right now is Mike Tolbert. When Tolbert was a nightmare for defenses in the Big South, you tend to not let it translate to the NFL. But now Tyler Thigpen, Quinton Teal, Jerome Simpson and Big Mike have taught us that it is possible to be a I-AA star at CCU and then move on to the NFL.
I will always remember the second day of the NFL Draft in 2008 when Hags and I went to Mike Tolbert's house. There was no big celebration - Tolbert was not drafted. But he was all smiles when we pulled up to his house. He was getting his shot with the San Diego Chargers - a signing bonus of a whopping $5,000 (did the Chargers get a bargain or what!??!!) All Mike Tolbert wanted was a shot. He was determined to make the most of it and he sure did.
We gave so much attention to Jerome Simpson and the hype that came with his dazzling workouts. Jerome has not gotten his opportunity yet as the Bengals struggle. There's no doubt that as soon as he gets his chance Jerome will do some great things in the NFL. Back in April, we thought we'd have a highlight reel full of Jerome catches in Bengal stripes, but instead we have Mike Tolbert with a TD catch, a 67 yard catch against the Broncos and bulldozing holes for LaDandian Tomlinson. Tolbert not only made the roster as an undrafted free agent, he's starting as a rookie at fullback for one of the NFL's elite teams.
I remember being at CCU's Pro Day where about a dozen NFL scouts were on hand to eyeball Jerome. I had put together a DVD of highlights of both Simpson and Tolbert. The scouts were all grabbing the DVD's of Jerome and watching every move he made. Tolbert was second fiddle, but the Chargers were at that Pro Day workout and my guess is they grabbed the Tolbert DVD. If it wasn't for Jerome attracting a big crowd, maybe the Chargers wouldn't have discovered their new starting fullback.
David Bennett was bending every scout's ear who was on Simpson watch. "We've got another one that can play on Sundays", he'd always say. It would have been so easy for Big Mike to get caught up in the hype and resign himself to the fact that Jerome was going to be the guy who made it, but quietly Big Mike made the absolute most out of a minimal opportunity.
The NFL is finding out what already knew - Big Mike can play the game. Tolbert believed in himself and now there's a legion of Lightning Bolt fans and one of the best running backs on the planet who are believing in him.
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
Mailbag - September Edition
I really had a goal of posting a blog entry at least once a month and August zipped by before I knew what hit me. 34 high school football previews and getting ready for football will do that to you. I apologize for not answering these emails sooner, but here it goes:
Clara Curry asks: How do you pick the End Zone teams for each week?
A great question Clara. Logistics is the single biggest factor in determining which teams join us in the Chevy End Zone studio. We make it a goal to try and get the best teams in our area the opportunity to come in and be a part of the Friday night Zone. For some teams, it's very difficult to get to our Conway studio by 11:00pm. Teams like Lamar and Timmonsville never get a chance to play close enough to get into the studio. Usually on Sunday, Hags and I look at the schedule and run through the options. We are almost always on the same page and get the invite out ASAP.
Chris Martin asks: I wanted to know if you guys were going to do the Palmetto Pigskin competition like you did last year?
Chris - you probably know by now that the Picks competition is up and running. You can access the picks by clicking on "Palmetto Picks" on the left side of the main sports page at wpde.com or you can always go to www.palmettopigskin.com
If you haven't done the picks, you are missing out. It's totally free and takes just a couple of minutes. Jim, Ed, Ally and I enjoy the friendly competition and I think the contest will grow over the next couple of years.
Marty Parker asks: I was wondering if there is anyway to get some to the video highlights that you have from Cheraw. I want to add them to our school website library.
Marty: Many apologies for not getting back with you sooner. Our new web video player which was launched in April is fantastic and easy to use. I love the fact that you can email a story directly to someone's email. Unfortunately, there was a price to pay with that. We had to lose all the web video we previously had over the years as it was in a different format. If you haven't seen it yet, check out the Cheraw page on wpde.com - it is a new addition to our web lineup and I enjoy having each team getting its own page
Kevin Forsee writes:
Just a thought.... I originally grew up in Ohio and most news programs have a rolling graphic of up-to-date sports scores at the end of the sports segment for all pro team games played that day. Not a single news program in the area uses that type of graphic. There are many locals and tourists that have no way of keeping up with their favorite teams without switching to ESPN or the web. I think it would be beneficial and convenient for the Channel 15 viewers to be the first in the area to have a graphic or "ticker" with their favorite sports teams, not just the Braves or Falcons during the sports segment.
Thank you for your time!
Kevin:
Appreciate you writing in. I just have to laugh off the start, because I see you wrote about the Falcons. There is a stigma among some folks that we show all Atlanta pro sports when that is in fact, not the case. The only time we may show a Falcons highlight is if Lamar native John Abraham does something, but we do not give a steady diet of Falcons highlights. The Braves are the Pelicans single "A" affiliate and the closest MLB team to us and that's why we show them a lot.
Now on to your idea, which is a great one. I am all for it - back in the day we used to do scores heading to break before sports, but that was taken away from us. The ticker would solve that problem - right now I don't think we have that technology at our station. If we did, I think it's a great idea and something that I would be in favor of. Hopefully, that can happen down the road.
Danielle writes: I've been checking the website for over an hour trying to find some high school football scores. Could you please make it easier to find and also please let me know where I'm supposed to look. I've tried just about everything and this is exhausting!!!!
Danielle: I believe I may have shot you a short email right after the show when you sent this a couple of weeks back. When I work on the website, accessibility is the single most important thing for what we're trying to accomplish. I know we have lots of content when it pertains to high school football, but we need to get it to you folks! Our 50 minute show forces me to not post the final scores on wpde.com until 12:10 am at the earliest. I have now made it a point to make that the lead sports story on wpde.com on Friday nights and we will have it updated ASAP. The red banner on top of the main sports page is the portal to our 34 team pages. Hopefully, fans are going to their team's page and being able to see all the web video and insider blog from their school. Getting the content from the Friday night show onto the web is a long process, but our goal is to have it up as quickly as possible and we'll continue to work on doing that.
Angie Smith writes: I live in Ruby South Carolina, and our high school is Chesterfield High. I just wanted to know why all the tv stations can come or cover the Cheraw High School's football team, but never come or even say anything about Chesterfield, which is only a 10-15 minute ride from Cheraw. Yes, Cheraw is state champion for 2A, but Chesterfield is state champion for 1A, and last week in Chesterfield's opening game, Chesterfield won 42 - 0 over a 4A Fort Mill High School. I would just like to have some coverage of Chesterfield. This team has really turned around in the past several years from winning no games to winning a state championship, and I think the team players and coaches deserve to have a least one game covered on tv. Could you tell me if there is a reason why Chesterfield is never on tv?
Angie: I have answered this question many times and you can apply the same answer to other schools like Central of Pageland, Manning and Sumter area schools. About six years ago, we decided to make an exact definition of what schools would be part of the Chevy End Zone family. For the last six years, we have had the same 34 high schools defined as the area that we cover. Chesterfield County is not considered part of the Myrtle Beach/Florence market. That means if every single TV in Chesterfield County were to watch WPDE for 24 hours a day, it wouldn't count in the ratings. I realize that Cheraw is in Chesterfield County, but it is on the border of Marlboro County and Cheraw plays many teams from our area, unlike Chesterfield, who is in a region with many out of area teams. We made the decision 6 years ago to keep Cheraw due to the Braves fans strong following of our station. Another factor is having WPDE on your local cable system. Some of our fringe areas don't have us on there, perhaps that has changed over the years. It is nothing personal against the Rams as they have an outstanding team and passionate football fans.
Cathy writes: Hey Rich, Let's give Socastee their due and update passing and rushing etc... to include them also!!!
Hello Cathy: I am glad you checked in on this. The stats are a big part of what I do on Monday's as I know fans across the area enjoy checking on the area leaders. We have the same routine for the past nine years where coaching staffs have to email or fax us their stats over the weekend or on Monday and we compile the list. At this point, I have not received stats from a number of schools, Socastee included. Hopefully, in the next week or so, we'll get everyone to come on board and get stats from all 34 schools. If I can get ahead of schedule this week, I'll attempt to send an email to all 34 coaches to remind them to email me stats every week.
Marilyn P. writes: Why does Rich ignore Panthers games when we are more interested in them than High Sch.& College, which he seems to prefer? There are many retirees in this area who prefer NFL to local. No mention of the great game the Panthers had Sunday. Shame.
Marilyn: Ironic that you wrote this email on the night that I did show John Fox talking about the Panthers big win over San Diego. I understand your criticism, but I'll explain my philosophy. The Panthers play on Sunday's and Mark Haggard does an excellent job of giving thorough highlights and I would say at least half of the time post-game sound. It's not like Hags is doing just one highlight - he goes in depth. On Monday, I will run John Fox if there's something relevant (injury update, etc). It sounds like you want me to run the highlights that Hags ran on Sunday on Monday - if there's nothing new to add, there's no point. Of course, I think that was an awesome win for Carolina and it was great to see Jake Delhomme back under center, but if there's nothing new to add, it would be lazy of me to re-rack highlights. That being said, I do try and make it a point to run Panthers interviews at least once a week. The NFL will not allow us to shoot video on the sidelines, so unfortunately, it's not worth our time to go to Charlotte and cover a game when we can't shoot highlights. I would love to go up and do a long feature on Quinton Teal for example. I will continue to show the Panthers whenever it's warranted.
Thanks to everyone for writing in! Ed and I are leaving 6am for NJ and the CCU/Monmouth game - that's usually an adventure - I'll recap our journey next week!
Clara Curry asks: How do you pick the End Zone teams for each week?
A great question Clara. Logistics is the single biggest factor in determining which teams join us in the Chevy End Zone studio. We make it a goal to try and get the best teams in our area the opportunity to come in and be a part of the Friday night Zone. For some teams, it's very difficult to get to our Conway studio by 11:00pm. Teams like Lamar and Timmonsville never get a chance to play close enough to get into the studio. Usually on Sunday, Hags and I look at the schedule and run through the options. We are almost always on the same page and get the invite out ASAP.
Chris Martin asks: I wanted to know if you guys were going to do the Palmetto Pigskin competition like you did last year?
Chris - you probably know by now that the Picks competition is up and running. You can access the picks by clicking on "Palmetto Picks" on the left side of the main sports page at wpde.com or you can always go to www.palmettopigskin.com
If you haven't done the picks, you are missing out. It's totally free and takes just a couple of minutes. Jim, Ed, Ally and I enjoy the friendly competition and I think the contest will grow over the next couple of years.
Marty Parker asks: I was wondering if there is anyway to get some to the video highlights that you have from Cheraw. I want to add them to our school website library.
Marty: Many apologies for not getting back with you sooner. Our new web video player which was launched in April is fantastic and easy to use. I love the fact that you can email a story directly to someone's email. Unfortunately, there was a price to pay with that. We had to lose all the web video we previously had over the years as it was in a different format. If you haven't seen it yet, check out the Cheraw page on wpde.com - it is a new addition to our web lineup and I enjoy having each team getting its own page
Kevin Forsee writes:
Just a thought.... I originally grew up in Ohio and most news programs have a rolling graphic of up-to-date sports scores at the end of the sports segment for all pro team games played that day. Not a single news program in the area uses that type of graphic. There are many locals and tourists that have no way of keeping up with their favorite teams without switching to ESPN or the web. I think it would be beneficial and convenient for the Channel 15 viewers to be the first in the area to have a graphic or "ticker" with their favorite sports teams, not just the Braves or Falcons during the sports segment.
Thank you for your time!
Kevin:
Appreciate you writing in. I just have to laugh off the start, because I see you wrote about the Falcons. There is a stigma among some folks that we show all Atlanta pro sports when that is in fact, not the case. The only time we may show a Falcons highlight is if Lamar native John Abraham does something, but we do not give a steady diet of Falcons highlights. The Braves are the Pelicans single "A" affiliate and the closest MLB team to us and that's why we show them a lot.
Now on to your idea, which is a great one. I am all for it - back in the day we used to do scores heading to break before sports, but that was taken away from us. The ticker would solve that problem - right now I don't think we have that technology at our station. If we did, I think it's a great idea and something that I would be in favor of. Hopefully, that can happen down the road.
Danielle writes: I've been checking the website for over an hour trying to find some high school football scores. Could you please make it easier to find and also please let me know where I'm supposed to look. I've tried just about everything and this is exhausting!!!!
Danielle: I believe I may have shot you a short email right after the show when you sent this a couple of weeks back. When I work on the website, accessibility is the single most important thing for what we're trying to accomplish. I know we have lots of content when it pertains to high school football, but we need to get it to you folks! Our 50 minute show forces me to not post the final scores on wpde.com until 12:10 am at the earliest. I have now made it a point to make that the lead sports story on wpde.com on Friday nights and we will have it updated ASAP. The red banner on top of the main sports page is the portal to our 34 team pages. Hopefully, fans are going to their team's page and being able to see all the web video and insider blog from their school. Getting the content from the Friday night show onto the web is a long process, but our goal is to have it up as quickly as possible and we'll continue to work on doing that.
Angie Smith writes: I live in Ruby South Carolina, and our high school is Chesterfield High. I just wanted to know why all the tv stations can come or cover the Cheraw High School's football team, but never come or even say anything about Chesterfield, which is only a 10-15 minute ride from Cheraw. Yes, Cheraw is state champion for 2A, but Chesterfield is state champion for 1A, and last week in Chesterfield's opening game, Chesterfield won 42 - 0 over a 4A Fort Mill High School. I would just like to have some coverage of Chesterfield. This team has really turned around in the past several years from winning no games to winning a state championship, and I think the team players and coaches deserve to have a least one game covered on tv. Could you tell me if there is a reason why Chesterfield is never on tv?
Angie: I have answered this question many times and you can apply the same answer to other schools like Central of Pageland, Manning and Sumter area schools. About six years ago, we decided to make an exact definition of what schools would be part of the Chevy End Zone family. For the last six years, we have had the same 34 high schools defined as the area that we cover. Chesterfield County is not considered part of the Myrtle Beach/Florence market. That means if every single TV in Chesterfield County were to watch WPDE for 24 hours a day, it wouldn't count in the ratings. I realize that Cheraw is in Chesterfield County, but it is on the border of Marlboro County and Cheraw plays many teams from our area, unlike Chesterfield, who is in a region with many out of area teams. We made the decision 6 years ago to keep Cheraw due to the Braves fans strong following of our station. Another factor is having WPDE on your local cable system. Some of our fringe areas don't have us on there, perhaps that has changed over the years. It is nothing personal against the Rams as they have an outstanding team and passionate football fans.
Cathy writes: Hey Rich, Let's give Socastee their due and update passing and rushing etc... to include them also!!!
Hello Cathy: I am glad you checked in on this. The stats are a big part of what I do on Monday's as I know fans across the area enjoy checking on the area leaders. We have the same routine for the past nine years where coaching staffs have to email or fax us their stats over the weekend or on Monday and we compile the list. At this point, I have not received stats from a number of schools, Socastee included. Hopefully, in the next week or so, we'll get everyone to come on board and get stats from all 34 schools. If I can get ahead of schedule this week, I'll attempt to send an email to all 34 coaches to remind them to email me stats every week.
Marilyn P. writes: Why does Rich ignore Panthers games when we are more interested in them than High Sch.& College, which he seems to prefer? There are many retirees in this area who prefer NFL to local. No mention of the great game the Panthers had Sunday. Shame.
Marilyn: Ironic that you wrote this email on the night that I did show John Fox talking about the Panthers big win over San Diego. I understand your criticism, but I'll explain my philosophy. The Panthers play on Sunday's and Mark Haggard does an excellent job of giving thorough highlights and I would say at least half of the time post-game sound. It's not like Hags is doing just one highlight - he goes in depth. On Monday, I will run John Fox if there's something relevant (injury update, etc). It sounds like you want me to run the highlights that Hags ran on Sunday on Monday - if there's nothing new to add, there's no point. Of course, I think that was an awesome win for Carolina and it was great to see Jake Delhomme back under center, but if there's nothing new to add, it would be lazy of me to re-rack highlights. That being said, I do try and make it a point to run Panthers interviews at least once a week. The NFL will not allow us to shoot video on the sidelines, so unfortunately, it's not worth our time to go to Charlotte and cover a game when we can't shoot highlights. I would love to go up and do a long feature on Quinton Teal for example. I will continue to show the Panthers whenever it's warranted.
Thanks to everyone for writing in! Ed and I are leaving 6am for NJ and the CCU/Monmouth game - that's usually an adventure - I'll recap our journey next week!
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
There's a guy with one arm pitching a no-hitter at Yankee Stadium
As a lifelong New York Yankee fan, the All-Star festivities have been special for me and Josh Hamilton's performance in the Home Run Derby may be the last great moment in the House that Ruth Built unless the Yankees rally into the post-season or we see a perfect game.
I've been fortunate enough to see a handful of great moments in the Bronx. The first one came on July 24th, 1983. The Middletown, NJ Swim Club had a bus trip to see the Royals and the Yankees and my Mom (a non-sports fan in every sense of the word), took me to set up shop in the upper deck. With 2 outs inn the 9th inning, Goose Gossage made a mistake to George Brett and a 2 run homer gave the Royals a 5-4 lead. Gossage will be inducted together into Cooperstown and the Baseball Hall of Fame later this month. Yankees manager Billy Martin came out and there was a lot of people in the stands asking what was going on as Brett's bat came out of the dugout and was laid across home plate. As a 13 year old, I remember saying to the fans sitting around me that they were measuring the amount of pine tar on his bat. I was engulfed in Yankee baseball, never missing a broadcast and I remember hearing discussion about Brett using a lot of pine tar on his bat. Umpire Tim McClelland called Brett out and one of the most famous scenes in baseball lore happened. An enraged Brett stormed out of the dugout and it took about half of the Royals to hold him back. (YouTube this if you haven't seen it!) Just by pure luck, I was in attendance in what will forver be known as the Pine Tar Game.
I've been to two World Series games at Yankee Stadium. In 1998, my wife and I on a whim decided to drive from Bangor, Maine down to the Bronx to try and scalp tickets to game one of the World Series. It was a fun adventure, and I was able to get two tickets in the bleachers for $125 each (a pretty good bargain) 10 minutes before the first pitch. Paranoid that I was getting counterfeit tickets, I made the scalper walk with us up to the gate to make sure we got in. We saw a 9-6 Yankees win as Tino Martinez sparked a 7 run 7th inning.
While working in 1999 in Bangor, we covered the Boston Red Sox and were able to secure credentials for the ALCS. My weekend sports anchor was able to go to Fenway and cover the Yankees 4 games to 1 series win. When you apply for post-season credentials, the normal procedure for a local TV affiliate is to get passes until your local team is eliminated. We were surprised to get a phone call in our sports office from Major League Baseball asking if we were going to use our World Series credentials. Calmly, I answered yes. We couldn't turn down a chance to cover a World Series game. Game four against the Atlanta Braves at Yankee Stadium had our chief meteorologist, Rob Nucatola, and I hit the road. I don't know what it is, but weather guys are the best road trip sidekicks (see Ed Piotrowski and about 25 CCU road trips!). I don't know how we did it, but I was actually live on the field at Yankee Stadium at 6:20 pm prior to the World Series. The Yankees won the game, Roger Clemens got his first world series ring and we got a boat load of sound bites on the field. The locker room was so overloaded with media and VIP's, that we were able to get interviews with Scott Brosius, Jim Leyritz, Tino Martinez, Jorge Posada and a host of others virtually one on one. On the outside, you have to stay professional, but on the inside you have goose bumps knowing you are standing on the field that you grew up watching as a kid - that I was standing on the same field as Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle and countless others.
This brings me to my favorite Yankee Stadium moment. My television career began behind the scenes at WCBS-TV in New York. I was lucky enough to get an opportunity and worked my way to associate sports producer. I was producing the weekend sportscasts for Steve Levy, now at ESPN. Steve began his career at WFAN, the all sports radio station in New York City. He actually worked on the radio early Saturday afternoon before he came into work at the TV station. It was my job to set the table - come in early and get the rundown started and begin recording the games that we were going to show highlights of. It was a Saturday afternoon in early September, 1993 and the Yankees were hosting the Cleveland Indians. Jim Abbott was the starting pitcher. For those who don't know, Abbott is an amazing story. He was born without a right hand and was able to pitch with his glove tucked under his right arm and in a seemless motion, could get the glove onto his left hand by the time the ball reached home plate. He was a very good fielding pitcher. You can get mesmerized just watching him do this alone. On this day, Abbott was dialed in. You never take a no-hitter seriously until about the 6th inning and when Abbott hadn't allowed a hit, I realized that maybe something special was going to happen.
I was a kid. 23 years old and working in New York City. There were so many people working at Channel 2 and I was so low on the totem pole that less than half the people on staff knew my name. There was always a higher level sports producer around or an anchor except on Saturday's. It was about a 20 minute drive from WCBS to Yankee Stadium. If Abbott got through the 6th with a no-hitter intact, I had to go to the assignment desk and get a camera crew and get to the Bronx in case history was made. Sure enough, at the end of 6, the Indians still had a zero in the hit column. I walked from the sports office to the newsroom and went to the woman sitting behind the central nervous system of WCBS. She definitely didn't know my name. I told her I needed to get a cameraman to go with me to Yankees Stadium ASAP. She said to me "I'll see what I can do and get back to you". At this point, for the first time and honestly the only time in my New York career, I got a little courage. "There's a guy with one arm pitching a no-hitter at Yankee Stadium. Trust me, we need to be there right now." Fortunately, I was on my way downstairs and on the West Side Highway to the Bronx. I got to the Stadium in bottom of the 8th which is pretty good time. I sat in the bowels of the stadium and just listened to the roar of the crowd. Even though I didn't see that 9th inning, the crowd dictated to me that history was made. I was in place and was able to get post-game interviews with Abbott, Wade Boggs (who made a great defensive play to keep the no-hitter intact) and everyone else involved. I remember Levy calling in to the sports office and saying to me "Please tell me you just got back from the Stadium" - to which I replied "Yes". If I didn't say yes, I'd probably be teaching tennis in New Jersey and out of the business before I ever really got into it. The fact that Steve trusted me to get the job done was one of the most significant moments in my career. If it was any other day, I would have been holed up in the sports office answering phones and logging highlights. That no-hitter story gave me the confidence that I can work a big story and I went from "Who's that kid" in the newroom to "Hey that's one of the sports producers" (most of them still didn't know my name!). I'm glad that moment happened at such a special place. I'm sure the new Yankee Stadium will be a palace, but I'm sure it won't be the same.
I've been fortunate enough to see a handful of great moments in the Bronx. The first one came on July 24th, 1983. The Middletown, NJ Swim Club had a bus trip to see the Royals and the Yankees and my Mom (a non-sports fan in every sense of the word), took me to set up shop in the upper deck. With 2 outs inn the 9th inning, Goose Gossage made a mistake to George Brett and a 2 run homer gave the Royals a 5-4 lead. Gossage will be inducted together into Cooperstown and the Baseball Hall of Fame later this month. Yankees manager Billy Martin came out and there was a lot of people in the stands asking what was going on as Brett's bat came out of the dugout and was laid across home plate. As a 13 year old, I remember saying to the fans sitting around me that they were measuring the amount of pine tar on his bat. I was engulfed in Yankee baseball, never missing a broadcast and I remember hearing discussion about Brett using a lot of pine tar on his bat. Umpire Tim McClelland called Brett out and one of the most famous scenes in baseball lore happened. An enraged Brett stormed out of the dugout and it took about half of the Royals to hold him back. (YouTube this if you haven't seen it!) Just by pure luck, I was in attendance in what will forver be known as the Pine Tar Game.
I've been to two World Series games at Yankee Stadium. In 1998, my wife and I on a whim decided to drive from Bangor, Maine down to the Bronx to try and scalp tickets to game one of the World Series. It was a fun adventure, and I was able to get two tickets in the bleachers for $125 each (a pretty good bargain) 10 minutes before the first pitch. Paranoid that I was getting counterfeit tickets, I made the scalper walk with us up to the gate to make sure we got in. We saw a 9-6 Yankees win as Tino Martinez sparked a 7 run 7th inning.
While working in 1999 in Bangor, we covered the Boston Red Sox and were able to secure credentials for the ALCS. My weekend sports anchor was able to go to Fenway and cover the Yankees 4 games to 1 series win. When you apply for post-season credentials, the normal procedure for a local TV affiliate is to get passes until your local team is eliminated. We were surprised to get a phone call in our sports office from Major League Baseball asking if we were going to use our World Series credentials. Calmly, I answered yes. We couldn't turn down a chance to cover a World Series game. Game four against the Atlanta Braves at Yankee Stadium had our chief meteorologist, Rob Nucatola, and I hit the road. I don't know what it is, but weather guys are the best road trip sidekicks (see Ed Piotrowski and about 25 CCU road trips!). I don't know how we did it, but I was actually live on the field at Yankee Stadium at 6:20 pm prior to the World Series. The Yankees won the game, Roger Clemens got his first world series ring and we got a boat load of sound bites on the field. The locker room was so overloaded with media and VIP's, that we were able to get interviews with Scott Brosius, Jim Leyritz, Tino Martinez, Jorge Posada and a host of others virtually one on one. On the outside, you have to stay professional, but on the inside you have goose bumps knowing you are standing on the field that you grew up watching as a kid - that I was standing on the same field as Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle and countless others.
This brings me to my favorite Yankee Stadium moment. My television career began behind the scenes at WCBS-TV in New York. I was lucky enough to get an opportunity and worked my way to associate sports producer. I was producing the weekend sportscasts for Steve Levy, now at ESPN. Steve began his career at WFAN, the all sports radio station in New York City. He actually worked on the radio early Saturday afternoon before he came into work at the TV station. It was my job to set the table - come in early and get the rundown started and begin recording the games that we were going to show highlights of. It was a Saturday afternoon in early September, 1993 and the Yankees were hosting the Cleveland Indians. Jim Abbott was the starting pitcher. For those who don't know, Abbott is an amazing story. He was born without a right hand and was able to pitch with his glove tucked under his right arm and in a seemless motion, could get the glove onto his left hand by the time the ball reached home plate. He was a very good fielding pitcher. You can get mesmerized just watching him do this alone. On this day, Abbott was dialed in. You never take a no-hitter seriously until about the 6th inning and when Abbott hadn't allowed a hit, I realized that maybe something special was going to happen.
I was a kid. 23 years old and working in New York City. There were so many people working at Channel 2 and I was so low on the totem pole that less than half the people on staff knew my name. There was always a higher level sports producer around or an anchor except on Saturday's. It was about a 20 minute drive from WCBS to Yankee Stadium. If Abbott got through the 6th with a no-hitter intact, I had to go to the assignment desk and get a camera crew and get to the Bronx in case history was made. Sure enough, at the end of 6, the Indians still had a zero in the hit column. I walked from the sports office to the newsroom and went to the woman sitting behind the central nervous system of WCBS. She definitely didn't know my name. I told her I needed to get a cameraman to go with me to Yankees Stadium ASAP. She said to me "I'll see what I can do and get back to you". At this point, for the first time and honestly the only time in my New York career, I got a little courage. "There's a guy with one arm pitching a no-hitter at Yankee Stadium. Trust me, we need to be there right now." Fortunately, I was on my way downstairs and on the West Side Highway to the Bronx. I got to the Stadium in bottom of the 8th which is pretty good time. I sat in the bowels of the stadium and just listened to the roar of the crowd. Even though I didn't see that 9th inning, the crowd dictated to me that history was made. I was in place and was able to get post-game interviews with Abbott, Wade Boggs (who made a great defensive play to keep the no-hitter intact) and everyone else involved. I remember Levy calling in to the sports office and saying to me "Please tell me you just got back from the Stadium" - to which I replied "Yes". If I didn't say yes, I'd probably be teaching tennis in New Jersey and out of the business before I ever really got into it. The fact that Steve trusted me to get the job done was one of the most significant moments in my career. If it was any other day, I would have been holed up in the sports office answering phones and logging highlights. That no-hitter story gave me the confidence that I can work a big story and I went from "Who's that kid" in the newroom to "Hey that's one of the sports producers" (most of them still didn't know my name!). I'm glad that moment happened at such a special place. I'm sure the new Yankee Stadium will be a palace, but I'm sure it won't be the same.
Thursday, July 3, 2008
My link with Pete Sampras
Tonight on my sportscast I showed highlights of Serena Williams advancing to the Wimbledon final with a 6-2, 7-6 win over Zheng Jie. In those highlights, I showed a ballboy who collided into Serena at almost full speed. It brought back memories of my days as a ballboy. That's right, I had the Reebok red and blue outfit in the back row of the 1987 US Open. I went to a tryout at Flushing Meadow and the USTA National Tennis Center and made the cut to work the back row. Basically, I was throwing balls on one perfect bounce to a player and during changeovers, throwing balls across the court to my comrades in the back row. There is a pecking order in the ballboy world. A newbie like myself was not going to get thrown on the stadium court or the grandstand. I never did get on to the main two courts - my highlight of my ballboy career was working a match on court 16 (at the time, one of the larger outer courts in Flushing Meadow) with Carling Bassett-Seguso, who was the Anna Kournikova of 1987. As for the low point of my ballboy career, that would come in a women's doubles match. Raffaella Reggi, who was an Italian ranked in the top 20 in women's singles, was playing in a doubles match. During changeovers, we would have to throw tennis balls across court and I was in my routine of throwing line drives when miss Reggi walked right into one of my throws. It hit her sqaure on the head. Fortunately, there were only about 50 people watching the match, but they all managed to gasp. I thought it was going to be my last match. It probably would have been if it was on the stadium or grandstand, but Reggi laughed, I apologized profusely and she and her partner won the match easily in straight sets.
The highlight of the ballboy experience was getting the chance to actually play at the USTA National Tennis Center. My high school teammate, Chris Gambino, was a highly ranked national player who was on standby to get into the US Open boys singles draw. He didn't get to play in the event, but he was working as a court attendant during the Open and was allowed to practice on the courts because he was on standby. We would get there early and hit balls before the matches got started at 11am. The court attendant gig was way better than ballboy - all you had to worry about was getting towels, and relaying scores.
I can thank Chris Gambino for my one and only significant match as a varsity tennis player in high school. I started playing tennis at around the age of 12 and got hooked. There was a tremendous public courts program that became my summer job and was responsible for my passion for tennis. My high school, Christian Brothers Academy, had the reputation as one of the best tennis programs in New Jersey. For five years, I practiced and took many lessons with the hopes of maybe, just maybe I could start for the CBA tennis team in my senior season. Alas, I got to my senior year and was the 8th player on the depth chart. Unfortunately, seven players play (3 singles and two doubles teams). All of the hard work did not pay off. The beauty of tennis is there is no one to blame about the starting lineup. You beat a player head to head and you move up the ladder. No excuses, I was the 8th best player. Granted, I probably would have started for any other team in the state of New Jersey. That's what many people told me, and I didn't believe them until mid-season.
Newark Academy held a mid-season tournament where the top 8 teams in the state were invited to play head to head and have an idea of who was the favorite heading into the later part of the year. We were ranked #2 in the state and drew the #7 team in the first round. I was ready to ride the bench as usual. Gambino was playing in a pro qualifer tournament the same day as our match. He was playing a world ranked player and he thought he'd be able to come to our match in plenty of time. We were getting ready to leave for our match when our coach got the call - Chris beat this world ranked player and would not be playing in our match. For the first time ever, I got the call to play in a varsity tennis match. I played second doubles with Brian Bocker and won the match in straight sets. While I was playing my first varsity match, Chris Gambino was playing a 16 year old phenom named Pete Sampras (he lost to Pistol Pete 7-5,7-5 if I recall). Our tennis team went on to a perfect season and a state championship and I played in a handful of matches against weaker teams on our schedule.
The confidence of that one match kept me going. I won a doubles invitational with our #2 player Joe Clemente after the season and got a chance to play tennis at Saint Bonaventure. I played three years of NCAA Division I tennis despite playing a grand total of 8 matches in my high school career.
Sure, it's sixteen degrees of separation, but I always feel I'll be forever linked to one of the greatest tennis players in history and if it wasn't for him, I may have never felt what it was like to truly win on a tennis court.
The highlight of the ballboy experience was getting the chance to actually play at the USTA National Tennis Center. My high school teammate, Chris Gambino, was a highly ranked national player who was on standby to get into the US Open boys singles draw. He didn't get to play in the event, but he was working as a court attendant during the Open and was allowed to practice on the courts because he was on standby. We would get there early and hit balls before the matches got started at 11am. The court attendant gig was way better than ballboy - all you had to worry about was getting towels, and relaying scores.
I can thank Chris Gambino for my one and only significant match as a varsity tennis player in high school. I started playing tennis at around the age of 12 and got hooked. There was a tremendous public courts program that became my summer job and was responsible for my passion for tennis. My high school, Christian Brothers Academy, had the reputation as one of the best tennis programs in New Jersey. For five years, I practiced and took many lessons with the hopes of maybe, just maybe I could start for the CBA tennis team in my senior season. Alas, I got to my senior year and was the 8th player on the depth chart. Unfortunately, seven players play (3 singles and two doubles teams). All of the hard work did not pay off. The beauty of tennis is there is no one to blame about the starting lineup. You beat a player head to head and you move up the ladder. No excuses, I was the 8th best player. Granted, I probably would have started for any other team in the state of New Jersey. That's what many people told me, and I didn't believe them until mid-season.
Newark Academy held a mid-season tournament where the top 8 teams in the state were invited to play head to head and have an idea of who was the favorite heading into the later part of the year. We were ranked #2 in the state and drew the #7 team in the first round. I was ready to ride the bench as usual. Gambino was playing in a pro qualifer tournament the same day as our match. He was playing a world ranked player and he thought he'd be able to come to our match in plenty of time. We were getting ready to leave for our match when our coach got the call - Chris beat this world ranked player and would not be playing in our match. For the first time ever, I got the call to play in a varsity tennis match. I played second doubles with Brian Bocker and won the match in straight sets. While I was playing my first varsity match, Chris Gambino was playing a 16 year old phenom named Pete Sampras (he lost to Pistol Pete 7-5,7-5 if I recall). Our tennis team went on to a perfect season and a state championship and I played in a handful of matches against weaker teams on our schedule.
The confidence of that one match kept me going. I won a doubles invitational with our #2 player Joe Clemente after the season and got a chance to play tennis at Saint Bonaventure. I played three years of NCAA Division I tennis despite playing a grand total of 8 matches in my high school career.
Sure, it's sixteen degrees of separation, but I always feel I'll be forever linked to one of the greatest tennis players in history and if it wasn't for him, I may have never felt what it was like to truly win on a tennis court.
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Cashing In
It has been a busier June than normal, thanks to Coastal Carolina's fantastic run on the diamond. Kudos to the University for making an aggressive play to keep Gary Gilmore in Conway. While Gilly is getting some much deserved coin in his bank account, some of his players are also cashing in.
Signing Bonuses
==================
Jordan Lyles #38 pick of Houston Astros in supplemental first round: $930,000
Pete Andrelzyck, 5th round pick of the Florida Marlins: $185,000
Dock Doyle, 5th round pick of the NY Mets: $167,000
David Sappelt, 9th round pick of the Cincinnati Reds: $75,000
You can see why Jordan said no thanks to the Gamecocks and quickly signed on the dotted line with the Astros organization. These four players would be wise to stock away this windfall of cash. Their salary in the minors starts at $850 a month and $20 meal money on the road. Eventually, the big bucks of the big leagues is on the horizon, but it's a long and tough journey to make it in the show.
Signing Bonuses
==================
Jordan Lyles #38 pick of Houston Astros in supplemental first round: $930,000
Pete Andrelzyck, 5th round pick of the Florida Marlins: $185,000
Dock Doyle, 5th round pick of the NY Mets: $167,000
David Sappelt, 9th round pick of the Cincinnati Reds: $75,000
You can see why Jordan said no thanks to the Gamecocks and quickly signed on the dotted line with the Astros organization. These four players would be wise to stock away this windfall of cash. Their salary in the minors starts at $850 a month and $20 meal money on the road. Eventually, the big bucks of the big leagues is on the horizon, but it's a long and tough journey to make it in the show.
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
The Mad Dash
First and foremost, a tip of the cap to Gary Gilmore for finally slaying the dragon. For so many years, reaching the NCAA Regional was not good enough for the CCU baseball program. This past weekend at Charles Watson Stadium was a declaration that the Chanticleers are a legitimate college baseball power.
My first year here was the heartbreaking Athens Regional where the Chants were one strike away from a Super Regional before current Cincinnati Red Jeff Keppinger hit a home run to put Georgia into the Super Regionals. Finally, after seven more trips to the Regionals, the Chants slugged their way into college baseball's sweet 16.
This is the second straight year I've covered the regionals and you learn in a hurry that it's a marathon weekend. There is such a premium on staying in the winner's bracket and both Alabama and Coastal Carolina knew it on Saturday night. The game started at 7:30 due to a 30 minute lightning delay. The Crimson Tide took a 10-6 lead on a bases loaded triple and it looked like "Here we go again". Hags came over to the ballpark and picked up the tape of highlights to that point as we both thought it was shaping up to be a Crimson Tide win. But by the time Hags reached the driveway across the street, CCU exploded for 7 runs in the 8th inning highlighted by a Tommy Baldridge 3 run HR to give the Chants a 13-10 lead. Hags got back in the car and came to pick up the outburst. At this point it was about 10:40 pm and we were racing against the clock. Would the game end on time? Would we be able to get post-game reaction? This was the most significant moment in CCU baseball history and we wanted to have it for the 11pm news.
At 11:06 pm, David Sappelt squeezed the leather on the third out and gave CCU the breakthrough win. Normally, we'd have a cooling off period and go to a press conference at Brooks Stadium, but because the game was so late, the NCAA graciously allowed us to do interviews on the field. The clearance to go on the field came at 11:09 pm as the handshakes were completed. Hags is hitting the air in about 14 minutes. Can I get the interviews, run across campus to my car, get back to the station, edit the interviews and send it on our computer server? Vegas probably had it as a 15-1 shot. I got Gilly and Tommy Baldridge and the CCU support staff came to the rescue. I asked if they could golf cart me to my car -- Kelly Moore and I sped towards the athletic offices and realized that the gate was locked up. We sprinted through the offices and into the parking lot on the other side of the fence. It's 11:16 - seven minutes to go. I turn the key and make a sharp left turn and meander around campus towards the traffic light at 501. I call Hags and he realizes that we have a shot at it. A little game traffic, but I'm sprinting into the edit bay at about 11:20 pm. I have to download about 90 seconds of tape into our computer and begin editing. Hags is going to do highlights first so we have a little time. As he goes out on the set, I'm chopping up the sound and sending it to our control room. With about 75 seconds to spare, it's in our system. Hags wraps up the highlights and tosses on blind faith to the post-game reaction hoping it's there. It was. It's stories like this that make the business fun. If I was a minute later, it would have been a very different feeling. The baseball gods were looking out for us.
When I was running to the parking lot, there were some great CCU baseball fans who asked me as I was sprinting that I couldn't possibly get this on for the 11pm news. The next day, they heard that I did make it on the air and we laughed about it on Sunday before the East Carolina game. Surely, with a 7pm first pitch we wouldn't be cutting it close in the title game right? 35 runs, 37 hits, 7 errors, 8 pitching changes and 3 hours and 54 minutes later I was wrong. This time it was 10:54, but there was a championship celebration to deal with. As I was making the same mad dash to the parking lot at 11:06, the same people who saw me the night before looked at their watches and said "You've got plenty of time! If you made it last night, tonight will be easy!" I should mention that my on-camera intro to the celebration was shot by none other than Coach David Bennett who camped out on the third base fence for most of the weekend.
We were lucky enough to go 2 for 2 when it came to getting a big sports story on the air. Hags and I have spent the better part of 10 years shooting games at Watson Stadium in front of intimate gatherings, so we were satisfied that we were able to bring the excitement of the biggest weekend in CCU baseball history back to the viewers at home.
Now it's off to the Super Regional. Hopefully, with some help from our TV friends in NC, we won't be making any sprints through the parking lot in Cary, NC!
My first year here was the heartbreaking Athens Regional where the Chants were one strike away from a Super Regional before current Cincinnati Red Jeff Keppinger hit a home run to put Georgia into the Super Regionals. Finally, after seven more trips to the Regionals, the Chants slugged their way into college baseball's sweet 16.
This is the second straight year I've covered the regionals and you learn in a hurry that it's a marathon weekend. There is such a premium on staying in the winner's bracket and both Alabama and Coastal Carolina knew it on Saturday night. The game started at 7:30 due to a 30 minute lightning delay. The Crimson Tide took a 10-6 lead on a bases loaded triple and it looked like "Here we go again". Hags came over to the ballpark and picked up the tape of highlights to that point as we both thought it was shaping up to be a Crimson Tide win. But by the time Hags reached the driveway across the street, CCU exploded for 7 runs in the 8th inning highlighted by a Tommy Baldridge 3 run HR to give the Chants a 13-10 lead. Hags got back in the car and came to pick up the outburst. At this point it was about 10:40 pm and we were racing against the clock. Would the game end on time? Would we be able to get post-game reaction? This was the most significant moment in CCU baseball history and we wanted to have it for the 11pm news.
At 11:06 pm, David Sappelt squeezed the leather on the third out and gave CCU the breakthrough win. Normally, we'd have a cooling off period and go to a press conference at Brooks Stadium, but because the game was so late, the NCAA graciously allowed us to do interviews on the field. The clearance to go on the field came at 11:09 pm as the handshakes were completed. Hags is hitting the air in about 14 minutes. Can I get the interviews, run across campus to my car, get back to the station, edit the interviews and send it on our computer server? Vegas probably had it as a 15-1 shot. I got Gilly and Tommy Baldridge and the CCU support staff came to the rescue. I asked if they could golf cart me to my car -- Kelly Moore and I sped towards the athletic offices and realized that the gate was locked up. We sprinted through the offices and into the parking lot on the other side of the fence. It's 11:16 - seven minutes to go. I turn the key and make a sharp left turn and meander around campus towards the traffic light at 501. I call Hags and he realizes that we have a shot at it. A little game traffic, but I'm sprinting into the edit bay at about 11:20 pm. I have to download about 90 seconds of tape into our computer and begin editing. Hags is going to do highlights first so we have a little time. As he goes out on the set, I'm chopping up the sound and sending it to our control room. With about 75 seconds to spare, it's in our system. Hags wraps up the highlights and tosses on blind faith to the post-game reaction hoping it's there. It was. It's stories like this that make the business fun. If I was a minute later, it would have been a very different feeling. The baseball gods were looking out for us.
When I was running to the parking lot, there were some great CCU baseball fans who asked me as I was sprinting that I couldn't possibly get this on for the 11pm news. The next day, they heard that I did make it on the air and we laughed about it on Sunday before the East Carolina game. Surely, with a 7pm first pitch we wouldn't be cutting it close in the title game right? 35 runs, 37 hits, 7 errors, 8 pitching changes and 3 hours and 54 minutes later I was wrong. This time it was 10:54, but there was a championship celebration to deal with. As I was making the same mad dash to the parking lot at 11:06, the same people who saw me the night before looked at their watches and said "You've got plenty of time! If you made it last night, tonight will be easy!" I should mention that my on-camera intro to the celebration was shot by none other than Coach David Bennett who camped out on the third base fence for most of the weekend.
We were lucky enough to go 2 for 2 when it came to getting a big sports story on the air. Hags and I have spent the better part of 10 years shooting games at Watson Stadium in front of intimate gatherings, so we were satisfied that we were able to bring the excitement of the biggest weekend in CCU baseball history back to the viewers at home.
Now it's off to the Super Regional. Hopefully, with some help from our TV friends in NC, we won't be making any sprints through the parking lot in Cary, NC!
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Mailbag - May edition
I got three different responses on the same subject including an old school letter with a stamp on it and everything so I thought I'd dive into one of the biggest single complaints I have received in the past nine years. The emails and letter below are pretty cut and dry in their criticism.
Jim writes:
There are many of us who watch your program every night and we would like to see more national sports highlights/coverage from other area's and less about the Braves and Falcons. Please remember the high percentage of viewers that have relocated to Myrtle Beach from the northeast, (Boston, NYC, Phil and Washington area we would like to see more Pro and college teams from these area's.)
Dan Ward writes:
Rich:
I realize that you only have a very limited time (3 min +/-) for the sports segment of the 11PM news. As a result, the majority of the time available is and should be dedicated to local sports. However, when it comes to professional sports scores the only teams even mentioned are from Atlanta and Charlotte. In other words, 95% of the professional sports team scores are never mentioned.
Due to the nature of the people moving to this area over the past number of years, I believe that a great majority of your viewers are interested the teams other than the Braves, Falcons, Panthers, Thrashers, Hurricanes, Hawks and Bobcats.
With the very limited time available to you may I suggest that you run a banner containing all the available scores during your sports broadcast. This is done very successfully in a number of other cities I have lived in.
Thanks for your kind consideration.
These are valid criticisms, but I do want to point out one thing: the teams I highlighted in bold above are teams that we rarely, if EVER show highlights of. The only time we have showed Falcons highlights is to spotlight Lamar native John Abraham. The Falcons, Thrashers and Hawks are not part of our blood stream. To explain our steady diet of Braves highlights is quite simple: the Myrtle Beach Pelicans are the single "A" affiliate of the Atlanta Braves and we have seen the direct pipeline of Pelicans that are a key part of the Braves foundation at the major league level. We are an official affiliate of the Carolina Panthers, thus our dedication to giving them a steady diet on the show.
Dan's suggestion of a scoreboard is a good one. It used to be that we ran a scoreboard in the tease before sports at 11pm, but it was dropped. The overwhelming theory in this modern day and age is that there are numerous places you can get the national sports scores at your fingertips through the internet, your cell phone or places like Fox Sports or ESPN. The ironic part is that if we were to do the scoreboard idea that Dan suggested, we would most likely put local scores and SEC/ACC fare over the national sports that people crave.
I saved the best for last. I received this typed letter in my mailbox with the words "Consumer Complaint" written in the lower left hand corner:
Dear Sports Editor (I guess that's me)
Through the agony in the months since the World Series, baseball fans catching your offerings as part of nightly newscasts have suffered through golf (a game played in designer clothes) and auto racing (as much mechanics as sport).
So now we are back to the summer and baseball!
But what do we get? Golf and racing!!!
It is as if EVERY weekend race (and all the preliminaries leading up to it) are Super Bowls. And every piddling tournament (especially if we get one more shot of Tiger Woods) is The Masters!
So even on a Sunday evening when old guys out here without a cable are hurting, we get more golf, more racing and maybe two minutes of the Atlanta Braves. What about the American League (and certified Yankee haters?) What about the slump of Ortiz that was over before we heard about it? What managers are on the block?
If you operation intends to serve the public, and not just two special elite groups who have had their way all year long, then it is incumbent on you to put some things on the back burner and recognize what season it is!
Regards, Roy Haymond.
This is such a well written letter. I really enjoyed reading it even if it's a slam on me and Hags to a certain extent. Here are the facts: I'll start with baseball and then address golf and NASCAR. Coming off a show where I just had five different baseball elements, I can say that we are showing plenty of baseball not just the kind of baseball that Roy and some of our transplant fans don't want. A steady diet of Pelicans and Braves to go along with USC, Clemson and CCU baseball are our bread and butter during this time of year.
In regards to golf and NASCAR. Golf is a $1 billion dollar industry to the Grand Strand. That's not an inflated number. While there is no PGA Tour event here, golf is what defines the Grand Strand. I always feel that we can do more coverage of the local golf scene and we do our best to try and get a pulse on what's going on locally on the golf scene. In addition, that industry and the people who play have a high interest on what happens on the PGA Tour. NASCAR was born and bred in the South and I have seen enough passionate fans in our viewing area to know that we will always have a big chunk of audience interested in the week to week grind of Sprint Cup racing. The fact that Darlington Raceway is in our backyard and hosts the elite of motorsports is proof that we have to make a commitment to NASCAR coverage. 7.8 million people watched the Dodge Challenger 500 earlier this month at Darlington. It is the single biggest sporting event on our soil when it comes to the Myrtle Beach/Florence market bar none.
So that leads me to the mission statement so to speak. We don't have a sports handbook, but we really follow a gameplan when it comes to covering sports:
LAYER ONE: The Foundation
High School Sports, Coastal Carolina, South Carolina, Clemson, the Myrtle Beach Pelicans
You can probably count on your hand the number of times in a year that we don't have one of these elements in a sportscast on a given day. These are things that you can not get on ESPN, Fox Sports, CNN, etc.
LAYER TWO: NASCAR, Braves, Panthers, Bobcats, locals in the pros, golf scene
I wish that some of our local stars moved on to places that our transplants want to see. If Jerome Simpson was a Patriots wide receiver, you'd see a lot more Pats highlights on our news. If Tyler Thigpen was traded to the New York Jets, the Gang Green on the Strand would be ecstatic. We're always looking out to see if one of our local products does something at the pro level.
LAYER THREE: Local features, national sports
This week I was able to show a couple of national stories. Jon Lester's no-hitter with the Red Sox and the Manchester United/Chelsea Champions League Final in Moscow. Reality is that we did about 25 seconds on each of these stories, but that's the landscape in 2008. I get 2:45 Monday through Friday and we try to span the local landscape and everything else to get to as many communities and keep as many fans happy as we can.
I've given up a long time ago in trying to keep everyone happy. In the sports office, Hags and I are like a sports talk show talking about all the national things that this one particular niche craves, but we know that local sports is our #1 priority. Hags does a great job on the weekend of finding the balance to show the big national sports games that people are talking about (the Cavs/Celtics game 7 for example). Hags has the luxury of a little more time on the weekends and can craft that into his show.
I had a brainstorm of doing the "Transplant highlight of the night" where people would log on to our website and pick the game they want to see that night on the 11pm news. If I thought we'd get a few hundred votes every night, I would do that and it would probably be real fun.
I do appreciate the input as always and will continue to answer emails as they come my way.
Jim writes:
There are many of us who watch your program every night and we would like to see more national sports highlights/coverage from other area's and less about the Braves and Falcons. Please remember the high percentage of viewers that have relocated to Myrtle Beach from the northeast, (Boston, NYC, Phil and Washington area we would like to see more Pro and college teams from these area's.)
Dan Ward writes:
Rich:
I realize that you only have a very limited time (3 min +/-) for the sports segment of the 11PM news. As a result, the majority of the time available is and should be dedicated to local sports. However, when it comes to professional sports scores the only teams even mentioned are from Atlanta and Charlotte. In other words, 95% of the professional sports team scores are never mentioned.
Due to the nature of the people moving to this area over the past number of years, I believe that a great majority of your viewers are interested the teams other than the Braves, Falcons, Panthers, Thrashers, Hurricanes, Hawks and Bobcats.
With the very limited time available to you may I suggest that you run a banner containing all the available scores during your sports broadcast. This is done very successfully in a number of other cities I have lived in.
Thanks for your kind consideration.
These are valid criticisms, but I do want to point out one thing: the teams I highlighted in bold above are teams that we rarely, if EVER show highlights of. The only time we have showed Falcons highlights is to spotlight Lamar native John Abraham. The Falcons, Thrashers and Hawks are not part of our blood stream. To explain our steady diet of Braves highlights is quite simple: the Myrtle Beach Pelicans are the single "A" affiliate of the Atlanta Braves and we have seen the direct pipeline of Pelicans that are a key part of the Braves foundation at the major league level. We are an official affiliate of the Carolina Panthers, thus our dedication to giving them a steady diet on the show.
Dan's suggestion of a scoreboard is a good one. It used to be that we ran a scoreboard in the tease before sports at 11pm, but it was dropped. The overwhelming theory in this modern day and age is that there are numerous places you can get the national sports scores at your fingertips through the internet, your cell phone or places like Fox Sports or ESPN. The ironic part is that if we were to do the scoreboard idea that Dan suggested, we would most likely put local scores and SEC/ACC fare over the national sports that people crave.
I saved the best for last. I received this typed letter in my mailbox with the words "Consumer Complaint" written in the lower left hand corner:
Dear Sports Editor (I guess that's me)
Through the agony in the months since the World Series, baseball fans catching your offerings as part of nightly newscasts have suffered through golf (a game played in designer clothes) and auto racing (as much mechanics as sport).
So now we are back to the summer and baseball!
But what do we get? Golf and racing!!!
It is as if EVERY weekend race (and all the preliminaries leading up to it) are Super Bowls. And every piddling tournament (especially if we get one more shot of Tiger Woods) is The Masters!
So even on a Sunday evening when old guys out here without a cable are hurting, we get more golf, more racing and maybe two minutes of the Atlanta Braves. What about the American League (and certified Yankee haters?) What about the slump of Ortiz that was over before we heard about it? What managers are on the block?
If you operation intends to serve the public, and not just two special elite groups who have had their way all year long, then it is incumbent on you to put some things on the back burner and recognize what season it is!
Regards, Roy Haymond.
This is such a well written letter. I really enjoyed reading it even if it's a slam on me and Hags to a certain extent. Here are the facts: I'll start with baseball and then address golf and NASCAR. Coming off a show where I just had five different baseball elements, I can say that we are showing plenty of baseball not just the kind of baseball that Roy and some of our transplant fans don't want. A steady diet of Pelicans and Braves to go along with USC, Clemson and CCU baseball are our bread and butter during this time of year.
In regards to golf and NASCAR. Golf is a $1 billion dollar industry to the Grand Strand. That's not an inflated number. While there is no PGA Tour event here, golf is what defines the Grand Strand. I always feel that we can do more coverage of the local golf scene and we do our best to try and get a pulse on what's going on locally on the golf scene. In addition, that industry and the people who play have a high interest on what happens on the PGA Tour. NASCAR was born and bred in the South and I have seen enough passionate fans in our viewing area to know that we will always have a big chunk of audience interested in the week to week grind of Sprint Cup racing. The fact that Darlington Raceway is in our backyard and hosts the elite of motorsports is proof that we have to make a commitment to NASCAR coverage. 7.8 million people watched the Dodge Challenger 500 earlier this month at Darlington. It is the single biggest sporting event on our soil when it comes to the Myrtle Beach/Florence market bar none.
So that leads me to the mission statement so to speak. We don't have a sports handbook, but we really follow a gameplan when it comes to covering sports:
LAYER ONE: The Foundation
High School Sports, Coastal Carolina, South Carolina, Clemson, the Myrtle Beach Pelicans
You can probably count on your hand the number of times in a year that we don't have one of these elements in a sportscast on a given day. These are things that you can not get on ESPN, Fox Sports, CNN, etc.
LAYER TWO: NASCAR, Braves, Panthers, Bobcats, locals in the pros, golf scene
I wish that some of our local stars moved on to places that our transplants want to see. If Jerome Simpson was a Patriots wide receiver, you'd see a lot more Pats highlights on our news. If Tyler Thigpen was traded to the New York Jets, the Gang Green on the Strand would be ecstatic. We're always looking out to see if one of our local products does something at the pro level.
LAYER THREE: Local features, national sports
This week I was able to show a couple of national stories. Jon Lester's no-hitter with the Red Sox and the Manchester United/Chelsea Champions League Final in Moscow. Reality is that we did about 25 seconds on each of these stories, but that's the landscape in 2008. I get 2:45 Monday through Friday and we try to span the local landscape and everything else to get to as many communities and keep as many fans happy as we can.
I've given up a long time ago in trying to keep everyone happy. In the sports office, Hags and I are like a sports talk show talking about all the national things that this one particular niche craves, but we know that local sports is our #1 priority. Hags does a great job on the weekend of finding the balance to show the big national sports games that people are talking about (the Cavs/Celtics game 7 for example). Hags has the luxury of a little more time on the weekends and can craft that into his show.
I had a brainstorm of doing the "Transplant highlight of the night" where people would log on to our website and pick the game they want to see that night on the 11pm news. If I thought we'd get a few hundred votes every night, I would do that and it would probably be real fun.
I do appreciate the input as always and will continue to answer emails as they come my way.
Saturday, April 26, 2008
Simpson's Redemption
When I was in the edit bay listening to Mel Kiper, Jr's comments on Jerome Simpson getting drafted by the Cincinnati Bengals in the second round, I thought back to all the times that I may have had a skewed view of football talent. After all, I cover more Coastal Carolina games and hence, more FCS games than the higher level BCS and perhaps I was caught up in that level. Could Chanticleers really make an NFL roster? Tyler Thigpen and Quinton Teal disproved that theory last season. I always thought Jerome Simpson was a special talent who could actually play on Sundays. I truly thought that he would be the first CCU player to play in the NFL (although I'm more than happy to be wrong thanks to Thig and Quinton). It really is mind boggling that CCU has produced three NFL players (and hopefully a fourth with Mike Tolbert). Kiper more or less said that when talking about all the big school receivers on the draft board and a guy from Coastal Carolina is the Bengals answer to helping a receiving corps that may have an AWOL Pro Bowler in Chad Johnson.
As Cincinnati and the NFL learns more about Jerome Simpson, I will always remember seeing him at Coastal Grand Mall folding T-shirts at Champs Sports like any other college student working a part time job. How satisfying will it be for Jerome to have his jersey in that same Champs store a few years down the road?! More than that, Simpson provides a valuable lesson in bouncing back from adversity.
It's a long lost memory now, but CCU fans will always remember the dreaded Super Safety. Back in 2005, I wrote a column in Palmetto Pigskin Preview about one of the lowest points in CCU football history.
From Palmetto Pigskin Preview
November 23rd, 2005
With ten seconds to go, Coastal Carolina was a mere strategic snap away from everything they were looking for: a second Big South title, a second ten win season, and a reason to watch the Division I-AA football playoff pairings show with a close eye. When I saw Jerome Simpson back in punt formation, it was easy to see what the play call was. You’ve got the guy with the best hands, and one of the fastest on the roster. Take the snap, melt down that ten seconds on your way to the back of the End Zone, and take a safety. All that was left to do was celebrate. But then it happened. Think Chris Webber calling timeout when Michigan didn’t have any left in the NCAA Tournament, or Bill Buckner watching the ball in between his legs, or Joe Pisarcik fumbling for the NY Giants in victory formation, as Herman Edwards gave the Philadelphia Eagles an improbable win.
Jerome Simpson was supposed to run into the end zone, but instead went out of bounds at the 4 yard line, giving Charleston Southern 1.5 seconds to ruin Coastal’s 2005 season. And that’s what exactly happened two overtimes later.
Simpson made a mental error, and there’s no defense for it. The look of devastation on his face five seconds after it happened was all the proof you needed.
In September, Jerome Simpson had the #1 play on ESPN SportsCenter. His highlight in the last game of the season was the antithesis of a top play.
University of Memphis basketball player Darius Washington, Jr. had three free throws in the Conference USA Championship to get his team to the NCAA Tournament last year. After making the first free throw to get within one against Louisville, he proceeded to miss both free throws to lose in a heartbreaking fashion. Washington dropped to the ground and pulled his jersey over his head. As the whole nation watched this, something funny happened. Rather than rip the athlete, people across the country embraced him from emails to letters and phone calls. They were able to give him the confidence to get back on the court and put the miscue behind him. The whole country doesn’t know about Simpson’s miscue, but everyone who is associated with Coastal Carolina football does. The challenge on the entire Chants football family (fans, coaches and players) is to be there for Jerome through a long off-season and keep him on track to get back on the gridiron and excel.
Imagine if your son or best friend was the person making that mistake. We live in a world that has negativity. At some point, Simpson will have to deal with an angry email or unruly fans shouting at him on the field. Hopefully, the support of fans, family and friends will dwarf the bad apples he’s bound to come across.
Football is a “what have you done for me lately” kind of sport. People will forget Simpson’s amazing performance that was a huge reason for the Chants upset of James Madison. They’ll forget him attracting double teams to give other receivers the chance to shine.
Jerome Simpson was supposed to run into the End Zone. He has two more years of football at Coastal Carolina, and will never forget that play. It’s my hope that he does run into the end zone many times in the future, and he bounces back from this adversity.
Fast forward three years. Yes, Simpson did bounce back from that adversity. It's a tired cliche, but the term "Everything happens for a reason" fits in this situation. Jerome could have went the other way and never been the same player he was before that fateful play. If Jerome didn't face that bump in the road, perhaps he would not have trained as hard or stayed humble when success came his way. Instead the opposite happened - Jerome matured and used the pain of that disappointment to become an NFL wide receiver. Jerome and his family were driving home from a flea market when Cincinnati head coach Marvin Lewis called to tell him that he was about to be a Bengal. Simpson pulled over on the highway and began jumping up and down crying tears of joy and celebrating with his family. A whole legion of CCU fans were jumping up and down as well.
As Cincinnati and the NFL learns more about Jerome Simpson, I will always remember seeing him at Coastal Grand Mall folding T-shirts at Champs Sports like any other college student working a part time job. How satisfying will it be for Jerome to have his jersey in that same Champs store a few years down the road?! More than that, Simpson provides a valuable lesson in bouncing back from adversity.
It's a long lost memory now, but CCU fans will always remember the dreaded Super Safety. Back in 2005, I wrote a column in Palmetto Pigskin Preview about one of the lowest points in CCU football history.
From Palmetto Pigskin Preview
November 23rd, 2005
With ten seconds to go, Coastal Carolina was a mere strategic snap away from everything they were looking for: a second Big South title, a second ten win season, and a reason to watch the Division I-AA football playoff pairings show with a close eye. When I saw Jerome Simpson back in punt formation, it was easy to see what the play call was. You’ve got the guy with the best hands, and one of the fastest on the roster. Take the snap, melt down that ten seconds on your way to the back of the End Zone, and take a safety. All that was left to do was celebrate. But then it happened. Think Chris Webber calling timeout when Michigan didn’t have any left in the NCAA Tournament, or Bill Buckner watching the ball in between his legs, or Joe Pisarcik fumbling for the NY Giants in victory formation, as Herman Edwards gave the Philadelphia Eagles an improbable win.
Jerome Simpson was supposed to run into the end zone, but instead went out of bounds at the 4 yard line, giving Charleston Southern 1.5 seconds to ruin Coastal’s 2005 season. And that’s what exactly happened two overtimes later.
Simpson made a mental error, and there’s no defense for it. The look of devastation on his face five seconds after it happened was all the proof you needed.
In September, Jerome Simpson had the #1 play on ESPN SportsCenter. His highlight in the last game of the season was the antithesis of a top play.
University of Memphis basketball player Darius Washington, Jr. had three free throws in the Conference USA Championship to get his team to the NCAA Tournament last year. After making the first free throw to get within one against Louisville, he proceeded to miss both free throws to lose in a heartbreaking fashion. Washington dropped to the ground and pulled his jersey over his head. As the whole nation watched this, something funny happened. Rather than rip the athlete, people across the country embraced him from emails to letters and phone calls. They were able to give him the confidence to get back on the court and put the miscue behind him. The whole country doesn’t know about Simpson’s miscue, but everyone who is associated with Coastal Carolina football does. The challenge on the entire Chants football family (fans, coaches and players) is to be there for Jerome through a long off-season and keep him on track to get back on the gridiron and excel.
Imagine if your son or best friend was the person making that mistake. We live in a world that has negativity. At some point, Simpson will have to deal with an angry email or unruly fans shouting at him on the field. Hopefully, the support of fans, family and friends will dwarf the bad apples he’s bound to come across.
Football is a “what have you done for me lately” kind of sport. People will forget Simpson’s amazing performance that was a huge reason for the Chants upset of James Madison. They’ll forget him attracting double teams to give other receivers the chance to shine.
Jerome Simpson was supposed to run into the End Zone. He has two more years of football at Coastal Carolina, and will never forget that play. It’s my hope that he does run into the end zone many times in the future, and he bounces back from this adversity.
Fast forward three years. Yes, Simpson did bounce back from that adversity. It's a tired cliche, but the term "Everything happens for a reason" fits in this situation. Jerome could have went the other way and never been the same player he was before that fateful play. If Jerome didn't face that bump in the road, perhaps he would not have trained as hard or stayed humble when success came his way. Instead the opposite happened - Jerome matured and used the pain of that disappointment to become an NFL wide receiver. Jerome and his family were driving home from a flea market when Cincinnati head coach Marvin Lewis called to tell him that he was about to be a Bengal. Simpson pulled over on the highway and began jumping up and down crying tears of joy and celebrating with his family. A whole legion of CCU fans were jumping up and down as well.
Thursday, April 3, 2008
Mailbag
I want to thank the folks who have told me that they enjoy the blog. I now realize that people are actually reading this and I'm not just talking to myself so as a result I'm going to start cranking out some entries. Here are a few of the working titles I'll be writing about in the coming weeks.
"Camraderie on the Diamond"
"My link with Pete Sampras"
"There's a guy with one arm pitching a no-hitter at Yankee Stadium"
For now, I wanted to take the time to answer some questions I have gotten in the past few weeks. We used to have a forum section on the old website where I rattled off responses on a regular basis. I will try and wrangle questions up every month or so and post the answers here. Feel free to email me at 15sports@wpde.com and I'll do my best to try and answer your question. Now on to the mailbag:
Hello,Rick I watch 15 news and I thank you do a great job telling the sports,but would like to ask you why you don't cover Florence Darlington technical College Baseball team,I never hear you say nothing about them.My reason is, my son LA Owens is there he is one of there pitchers. I thank you might remember him from Dillon High School he was one of the wide receivers #3 just wanted to know why you didn't cover FDTC baseball team. - Lucille Owens
Lucille:
I appreicate you getting in touch with us. This is the perfect example of how we put something on the radar and try and cover. We get spread thin during baseball with having to cover the Pelicans, USC, Clemson and CCU. We already did a feature on the FMU baseball team as they are a nationally ranked Division II power and we need to get cracking on high school baseball as the playoffs are right around the corner. I remember LA well on the gridiron playing for Jackie Hayes and I hope that he can use FDTC as a springboard to another opportunity in college baseball. Please keep in touch and while I can't guarantee we'll go out there, I can promise you we'll do a story if he signs to play college baseball at another school.
Has WPDE dropped the Zone Cup incentive they have done for the past three years for high school teams? It's no longer posted, and hasn't been for a 2-3 months.
Has WPDE dropped the Zone Cup incentive they have done for the past three years for high school teams? It's no longer posted, and hasn't been for a 2-3 months.
Has WPDE dropped the Zone Cup incentive they have done for the past three years for high school teams? It's no longer posted, and hasn't been for a 2-3 months. From: Keith
Keith:
The Zone Cup is alive and well. Our website is set up in such a way that stories have a shelf life of about 3-4 days. We updated the Zone Cup standings after each round of state championships. The last update was right after the high school basketball state championships. I think we need to make the Zone Cup a permanent link on the left side of the sports page and will get cracking on that. I have to navigate through the corporate ladder on our new website so things take a little bit more time, but I will get this to be a permanent fixture on wpde.com so folks can keep tabs all year long.
Just wondering why on your web pages under sports, you have USC, Clemson... but not Coastal Carolina University. You cover them well on TV, have the David Bennett show etc..
Give us our own little notch.. Thanks.. Jeff Linder
Jeff:
This is another great suggestion. You guys have got me in the mode to keep our web guys busy. I've come up with a small laundry list of things that I will try and get added to wpde.com in the coming weeks:
1. WPDE Sports Shootout Golf Tournament page
2. Zone Cup Standings
3. CCU News
4. David Bennett Show page
5. Cliff Ellis Show page
Keep an eye out for these things in the next few weeks!
When will the 2008 WPDE Scholarship form be available on-line. Currently the 2007 is loaded. From: Kelly Bridgers
Kelly:
Thanks so much for bringing this to my attention. This is one thing on the list I was able to get crossed off. The scholarship application is updated and is on the link is on the left hand side of the main page. A reminder that any high school senior in the WPDE viewing area is eligible for our $5,000 scholarship. The money we raise from our annual golf tournament goes to the scholarship fund. Our tournament is set for Friday, May 30th at Wachesaw East in Murrells Inlet. We hope that we can continue to raise $15,000 as we have for the past three years. The deadline to get your application in is Friday, May 2nd. We will look through all of the applications and get it narrowed to a top 5-10 right before the golf tournament. Once we figure out how much money we have raised, we will announce the winners in early June.
Why are you guys not giving any coverage to the Southeastern Baseball Classic From: Faile
The Southeastern Baseball Classic is an outstanding annual high school baseball tournament hosted by Hartsville high school. The Red Foxes lost in the finals of this prestigious event. Part of the battle is information. We have many things going on in many sports all year long. If we had a heads up and reminder of the tournament, that would have helped. The other factor was getting scores called in. If either of those two things happened, we would have had a chance to put it on our radar and try and cover it. A lot of times we get information after the fact, and that doesn't help the cause. We are looking forward to covering Hartsville baseball as they make what should be a deep run in the Class 4A playoffs along with Conway.
For Rich Chrampanis: I know that South Carolina touts its 3 sports as football, basketball, and spring football and that WPDE supports this with its End Zone and Hoop Zone awards. But, how about the other "sports" played in local high schools and at CCU? Consider the following:
baseball/softball - diamond zone
wrestling - mat zone
tennis - court zone
track and field - track zone
golf - green zone (not to be confused with an area in
Iraq with the same name)
Well, you get the idea. Let's have some more "zones"! From: Fred Carpenter
Fred:
Appreciate you checking in. We like to think that we have these sports covered with our Zone Cup program. Like the Sears Cup in NCAA sports, we award points to each high school based on their post-season performance in varsity sports, both boys and girls. Especially in the spring, we try and get to as many spring playoff events as possible as it has a direct impact on the final standings in the Zone Cup race. As I mentioned above, we'll be getting the Zone Cup as a permanent link on the site. Every year, we get the Diamond Zone pitched to us. It's flattering to think that people think enough of our local sports coverage to want even more! It comes down to clock and resources. It's just Hags and me and we have a finite amount of time in each sportscast. Our station goes above and beyond the call of duty to devote an amazing amount of resources to our football and basketball products. That being said, I'm hoping that as the years go by, the Zone Cup catches on and it becomes an award that every high school covets. The Zoneman and Mister and Miss Hoop Zone have prestige in our area thanks to our former winners being in the NFL, NBA and WNBA. The Zone Cup should be on the same level as it is the reflection of an entire school's athletic department. We'll keep putting the spotlight on as many different sports as we can during the school year.
For Rich Chrampanis,
UNC's basketball player is Tyler Hansbrough, not Hansborough. His last name is pronounced Hans-bro. From: Shirley Kirby
Shirley:
I went back and checked the tape, and indeed I turned the ball over with my pronunciation. Roy Williams would have me running the Dean Dome steps for that. I have a ton of admiration for Psycho-T. I do appreciate folks keeping me straight and keeping tabs on me.
Our family relocated to Pawleys Island from the Northeastern part of Ohio (Akron) about three years ago. We are avid sports fans (Cleveland Browns & Cleveland Indians)and I have noticed that when you guys have the sports segment of the daily news you never include any of the northern teams. There are alot of people that live here that are from the north and would like to get game results for their teams (Indians, White Soxes, etc.) and also the football teams. The only ones that you guys ever talk about are the Braves, NY etc. It's bad enough that we can't physically see our teams play regularly but we don't hear about what they are doing. Can you accommodate this? From Kathy Eagan
Kathy:
I'm glad you brought this up as I have had to make this response to many different transplants. First and foremost, I am a transplant as well (like Bruce Springsteen says, I come from somewhere in the swamps of Jersey). I grew up on Warner Wolf (he's the reason I became a sportscaster) and my usual fix of Giants, Jets, Yankees, Mets, Rangers, Islanders and Devils. If there's one thing I've learned is that we have packs of transplants who are passionate about many things. If I had to rank them, here they are and what they want:
1. New York Metro area (Yankees/Mets/Giants/Jets)
2. North Carolina (Tar Heels)
3. West Virginia (Mountaineers)
4. Ohio (Ohio State/Indians/Browns)
5. Philadelphia (Eagles/Phillies)
6. Boston (Red Sox/Patriots)
7. Virginia Tech (Hokies)
The days of covering national sports in a local sportscast are all but gone. I've spoken about this many times, but in this new age of information now, you have to bring a product that is exclusive to the area you live in. In regards to the professional sports, you can get all of those things through ESPN.
The foundation of what we cover is high school sports and three colleges (Coastal Carolina, South Carolina and Clemson). Add to that the Myrtle Beach Pelicans. We have both coaches shows at CCU and we do extensive high school sports coverage because 99 percent of the time, you can't get it anywhere else outside of Myrtle Beach. The same goes for the Gamecocks and Tigers - the fan base of both is very large in our area and quite passionate.
The reason we cover the Atlanta Braves like we do is simple: the Pelicans are the Single "A" affiliate of the Braves and we are at the point as we enter season 10 of the Birds at the Beach that the majority of the Braves lineup has spent some time in Myrtle Beach. Jeff Francouer, Brian McCann and Martin Prado just to name a few. In addition, we are the official local affiliate of the Carolina Panthers.
The next layer of our coverage (and this is where a lot of our national coverage comes in) is following our local products in the pros:
Why did we show Milwaukee Bucks/Washington Wizards highlights last night? Simply because Myrtle Beach's own Ramon Sessions hit the buzzer beater to win the game. The same applies to Raymond Felton (Latta) with the Charlotte Bobcats, Albert Haynseworth (Hartsville) with the Tennessee Titans and the list goes on and on.
Times have changed - we used to show major league baseball scores at 11pm in the break before the sports segment, but that has gone away. Again, the mantra that you can get that kind of information on ESPN or by simply logging on to the internet or getting scores from your favorite team texted to your mobile phone.
The other factor is time. We get 2:45 for each show we do Monday-Friday. That time can go by quickly. Five years ago, I could get anywhere between 3:30 and 4:00 - that gave me more time to do the occasional national sports story. I still try and pick the major national sports stories and give them some time, but local sports is first and foremost every day.
I would love to have the transplants come on to the blog and email me questions/comments or thoughts about their favorite teams. Here I have all the space in the world to talk Tar Heels, Indians, or anything.
Since you're an Ohio fan, I will share this - the best pitching performance I ever saw in Myrtle Beach was when a young CC Sabathia pitched a complete game shutout against the Pelicans. I like the makeup of the Tribe - Travis Hafner is an underrated superstar and Victor Martinez is a top 5 catcher that no one talks about. If Carmona can be anywhere near what he was last year and Joe Borowski can get his ERA under 5.00 (that's a selfish request, since he's on my roti team), the Tribe should be able to challenge Detroit and Minnesota in the AL Central.
duckman said...
You are my favorite station to watch for basketball & football scores & highlights. But it seems that when those two sports are over you take a vacation from high school sports. I would like to see more coverage on high school softball & baseball. You not only have some of the best teams in the state right here in the Pee Dee but also in the country.
Duckman:
I appreciate the kind words. It's funny that you say that, because Hags actually did take a vacation after the high school basketball state championships. We have a small window of opportunities to take time off as we generally work 6 or 7 day weeks during football and basketball season. We spend March and April giving attention to college baseball, spring football and the Pelicans. We will go full out for the high school baseball and softball playoffs and get to as many different games as we can over a four week span. We will spend the next couple of weeks trying to pinpoint which teams we need to keep an eye on. Rest assured, things are going to get cranked up with high school baseball and softball!
Great questions from all -- looking forward to doing this again on a regular basis!
"Camraderie on the Diamond"
"My link with Pete Sampras"
"There's a guy with one arm pitching a no-hitter at Yankee Stadium"
For now, I wanted to take the time to answer some questions I have gotten in the past few weeks. We used to have a forum section on the old website where I rattled off responses on a regular basis. I will try and wrangle questions up every month or so and post the answers here. Feel free to email me at 15sports@wpde.com and I'll do my best to try and answer your question. Now on to the mailbag:
Hello,Rick I watch 15 news and I thank you do a great job telling the sports,but would like to ask you why you don't cover Florence Darlington technical College Baseball team,I never hear you say nothing about them.My reason is, my son LA Owens is there he is one of there pitchers. I thank you might remember him from Dillon High School he was one of the wide receivers #3 just wanted to know why you didn't cover FDTC baseball team. - Lucille Owens
Lucille:
I appreicate you getting in touch with us. This is the perfect example of how we put something on the radar and try and cover. We get spread thin during baseball with having to cover the Pelicans, USC, Clemson and CCU. We already did a feature on the FMU baseball team as they are a nationally ranked Division II power and we need to get cracking on high school baseball as the playoffs are right around the corner. I remember LA well on the gridiron playing for Jackie Hayes and I hope that he can use FDTC as a springboard to another opportunity in college baseball. Please keep in touch and while I can't guarantee we'll go out there, I can promise you we'll do a story if he signs to play college baseball at another school.
Has WPDE dropped the Zone Cup incentive they have done for the past three years for high school teams? It's no longer posted, and hasn't been for a 2-3 months.
Has WPDE dropped the Zone Cup incentive they have done for the past three years for high school teams? It's no longer posted, and hasn't been for a 2-3 months.
Has WPDE dropped the Zone Cup incentive they have done for the past three years for high school teams? It's no longer posted, and hasn't been for a 2-3 months. From: Keith
Keith:
The Zone Cup is alive and well. Our website is set up in such a way that stories have a shelf life of about 3-4 days. We updated the Zone Cup standings after each round of state championships. The last update was right after the high school basketball state championships. I think we need to make the Zone Cup a permanent link on the left side of the sports page and will get cracking on that. I have to navigate through the corporate ladder on our new website so things take a little bit more time, but I will get this to be a permanent fixture on wpde.com so folks can keep tabs all year long.
Just wondering why on your web pages under sports, you have USC, Clemson... but not Coastal Carolina University. You cover them well on TV, have the David Bennett show etc..
Give us our own little notch.. Thanks.. Jeff Linder
Jeff:
This is another great suggestion. You guys have got me in the mode to keep our web guys busy. I've come up with a small laundry list of things that I will try and get added to wpde.com in the coming weeks:
1. WPDE Sports Shootout Golf Tournament page
2. Zone Cup Standings
3. CCU News
4. David Bennett Show page
5. Cliff Ellis Show page
Keep an eye out for these things in the next few weeks!
When will the 2008 WPDE Scholarship form be available on-line. Currently the 2007 is loaded. From: Kelly Bridgers
Kelly:
Thanks so much for bringing this to my attention. This is one thing on the list I was able to get crossed off. The scholarship application is updated and is on the link is on the left hand side of the main page. A reminder that any high school senior in the WPDE viewing area is eligible for our $5,000 scholarship. The money we raise from our annual golf tournament goes to the scholarship fund. Our tournament is set for Friday, May 30th at Wachesaw East in Murrells Inlet. We hope that we can continue to raise $15,000 as we have for the past three years. The deadline to get your application in is Friday, May 2nd. We will look through all of the applications and get it narrowed to a top 5-10 right before the golf tournament. Once we figure out how much money we have raised, we will announce the winners in early June.
Why are you guys not giving any coverage to the Southeastern Baseball Classic From: Faile
The Southeastern Baseball Classic is an outstanding annual high school baseball tournament hosted by Hartsville high school. The Red Foxes lost in the finals of this prestigious event. Part of the battle is information. We have many things going on in many sports all year long. If we had a heads up and reminder of the tournament, that would have helped. The other factor was getting scores called in. If either of those two things happened, we would have had a chance to put it on our radar and try and cover it. A lot of times we get information after the fact, and that doesn't help the cause. We are looking forward to covering Hartsville baseball as they make what should be a deep run in the Class 4A playoffs along with Conway.
For Rich Chrampanis: I know that South Carolina touts its 3 sports as football, basketball, and spring football and that WPDE supports this with its End Zone and Hoop Zone awards. But, how about the other "sports" played in local high schools and at CCU? Consider the following:
baseball/softball - diamond zone
wrestling - mat zone
tennis - court zone
track and field - track zone
golf - green zone (not to be confused with an area in
Iraq with the same name)
Well, you get the idea. Let's have some more "zones"! From: Fred Carpenter
Fred:
Appreciate you checking in. We like to think that we have these sports covered with our Zone Cup program. Like the Sears Cup in NCAA sports, we award points to each high school based on their post-season performance in varsity sports, both boys and girls. Especially in the spring, we try and get to as many spring playoff events as possible as it has a direct impact on the final standings in the Zone Cup race. As I mentioned above, we'll be getting the Zone Cup as a permanent link on the site. Every year, we get the Diamond Zone pitched to us. It's flattering to think that people think enough of our local sports coverage to want even more! It comes down to clock and resources. It's just Hags and me and we have a finite amount of time in each sportscast. Our station goes above and beyond the call of duty to devote an amazing amount of resources to our football and basketball products. That being said, I'm hoping that as the years go by, the Zone Cup catches on and it becomes an award that every high school covets. The Zoneman and Mister and Miss Hoop Zone have prestige in our area thanks to our former winners being in the NFL, NBA and WNBA. The Zone Cup should be on the same level as it is the reflection of an entire school's athletic department. We'll keep putting the spotlight on as many different sports as we can during the school year.
For Rich Chrampanis,
UNC's basketball player is Tyler Hansbrough, not Hansborough. His last name is pronounced Hans-bro. From: Shirley Kirby
Shirley:
I went back and checked the tape, and indeed I turned the ball over with my pronunciation. Roy Williams would have me running the Dean Dome steps for that. I have a ton of admiration for Psycho-T. I do appreciate folks keeping me straight and keeping tabs on me.
Our family relocated to Pawleys Island from the Northeastern part of Ohio (Akron) about three years ago. We are avid sports fans (Cleveland Browns & Cleveland Indians)and I have noticed that when you guys have the sports segment of the daily news you never include any of the northern teams. There are alot of people that live here that are from the north and would like to get game results for their teams (Indians, White Soxes, etc.) and also the football teams. The only ones that you guys ever talk about are the Braves, NY etc. It's bad enough that we can't physically see our teams play regularly but we don't hear about what they are doing. Can you accommodate this? From Kathy Eagan
Kathy:
I'm glad you brought this up as I have had to make this response to many different transplants. First and foremost, I am a transplant as well (like Bruce Springsteen says, I come from somewhere in the swamps of Jersey). I grew up on Warner Wolf (he's the reason I became a sportscaster) and my usual fix of Giants, Jets, Yankees, Mets, Rangers, Islanders and Devils. If there's one thing I've learned is that we have packs of transplants who are passionate about many things. If I had to rank them, here they are and what they want:
1. New York Metro area (Yankees/Mets/Giants/Jets)
2. North Carolina (Tar Heels)
3. West Virginia (Mountaineers)
4. Ohio (Ohio State/Indians/Browns)
5. Philadelphia (Eagles/Phillies)
6. Boston (Red Sox/Patriots)
7. Virginia Tech (Hokies)
The days of covering national sports in a local sportscast are all but gone. I've spoken about this many times, but in this new age of information now, you have to bring a product that is exclusive to the area you live in. In regards to the professional sports, you can get all of those things through ESPN.
The foundation of what we cover is high school sports and three colleges (Coastal Carolina, South Carolina and Clemson). Add to that the Myrtle Beach Pelicans. We have both coaches shows at CCU and we do extensive high school sports coverage because 99 percent of the time, you can't get it anywhere else outside of Myrtle Beach. The same goes for the Gamecocks and Tigers - the fan base of both is very large in our area and quite passionate.
The reason we cover the Atlanta Braves like we do is simple: the Pelicans are the Single "A" affiliate of the Braves and we are at the point as we enter season 10 of the Birds at the Beach that the majority of the Braves lineup has spent some time in Myrtle Beach. Jeff Francouer, Brian McCann and Martin Prado just to name a few. In addition, we are the official local affiliate of the Carolina Panthers.
The next layer of our coverage (and this is where a lot of our national coverage comes in) is following our local products in the pros:
Why did we show Milwaukee Bucks/Washington Wizards highlights last night? Simply because Myrtle Beach's own Ramon Sessions hit the buzzer beater to win the game. The same applies to Raymond Felton (Latta) with the Charlotte Bobcats, Albert Haynseworth (Hartsville) with the Tennessee Titans and the list goes on and on.
Times have changed - we used to show major league baseball scores at 11pm in the break before the sports segment, but that has gone away. Again, the mantra that you can get that kind of information on ESPN or by simply logging on to the internet or getting scores from your favorite team texted to your mobile phone.
The other factor is time. We get 2:45 for each show we do Monday-Friday. That time can go by quickly. Five years ago, I could get anywhere between 3:30 and 4:00 - that gave me more time to do the occasional national sports story. I still try and pick the major national sports stories and give them some time, but local sports is first and foremost every day.
I would love to have the transplants come on to the blog and email me questions/comments or thoughts about their favorite teams. Here I have all the space in the world to talk Tar Heels, Indians, or anything.
Since you're an Ohio fan, I will share this - the best pitching performance I ever saw in Myrtle Beach was when a young CC Sabathia pitched a complete game shutout against the Pelicans. I like the makeup of the Tribe - Travis Hafner is an underrated superstar and Victor Martinez is a top 5 catcher that no one talks about. If Carmona can be anywhere near what he was last year and Joe Borowski can get his ERA under 5.00 (that's a selfish request, since he's on my roti team), the Tribe should be able to challenge Detroit and Minnesota in the AL Central.
duckman said...
You are my favorite station to watch for basketball & football scores & highlights. But it seems that when those two sports are over you take a vacation from high school sports. I would like to see more coverage on high school softball & baseball. You not only have some of the best teams in the state right here in the Pee Dee but also in the country.
Duckman:
I appreciate the kind words. It's funny that you say that, because Hags actually did take a vacation after the high school basketball state championships. We have a small window of opportunities to take time off as we generally work 6 or 7 day weeks during football and basketball season. We spend March and April giving attention to college baseball, spring football and the Pelicans. We will go full out for the high school baseball and softball playoffs and get to as many different games as we can over a four week span. We will spend the next couple of weeks trying to pinpoint which teams we need to keep an eye on. Rest assured, things are going to get cranked up with high school baseball and softball!
Great questions from all -- looking forward to doing this again on a regular basis!
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Hoop Zone Banquet
Another banquet is in the books and I have to say that the 8th annual Hoop Zone banquet was one of the smoothest we ever had. It was a great season that culminated in an amazingly busy two weekends as our local teams invaded Charleston and Columbia. I've posted in the past about the process of selecting our All-Zone teams and the voting process for the Zoneman and Mister and Miss Hoop Zone, but I feel it's important to reiterate as we inevitably seem to have a lot of questions.
In early January, Hags and I put our mental focus on the high school basketball season. The first thing I do is take out last year's All-Hoop Zone team and see who's returning. Barring a player suspension, major injury or other discipline types of problems, the players who were on last year's team usually returns to the All-Hoop Zone team. After that, we draw a line and develop a watch list. It starts by combing through box scores and getting calls from coaches on Tuesday and Friday night. We did a Hoop Zone honor roll on wpde.com on those nights and it was pretty easy to see who was on that list every time. We would move those on to the watch list and then go out and eyeball as many games as we can. I'm proud to say we had highlights of 74 games on our newscasts this basketball season which I think is a very impressive number for a two man sports department. Hags and I will try and think of how we can be even more efficient and try and get that number closer to 100 next season.
When it comes to playoff time, we look at #1 seeds (region champs) and make sure they are getting serious consideration for an All-Hoop Zone spot. After that, we go through the rest of the brackets and really study who we haven't seen and who deserves consideration. It is very difficult for a player to make the All-Hoop Zone team if their team doesn't make the playoffs. Of our 40 players on this year's team, only one did not make the post-season - Darryl Edge of North Myrtle Beach. Considering he is a 1,000 point career scorer, a 2007 WPDE All-Hoop Zone selection and received Mister Hoop Zone votes, he's an exception to the rule. I know we have a lot of talented players who don't make the team, but this process is the most fair that we know of.
In the past, our process for Mister and Miss Hoop Zone was to collect 15 boys coaches and 15 girls coaches to decide on Mr. and Miss HZ. This year was so unique that we got to that number (17 total ballots when you include mine and Hags) that I didn't feel right about it. With the 17 ballots, Kinard Gadsden-Gilliard had a 1 point lead on Lashay Page and Ashley Clarke had a 2 point lead on Rubylee Wright. Hags and I usually have very similar ballots, but our three picks were all over the place. It's then we realized that you could make a very strong argument for as many as five boys. The most fair thing to do would be to get every coach in the area (34 boys and 34 girls). That's 68 calls! I knew I'd have the piece of mind knowing that it couldn't be more impartial than to do that. So we got on the horn in a big way and collected each and every ballot. What we saw was the same results when we had 17 ballots (Gadsden-Gilliard was up by 2 on Page, Clarke a 6 point margin over Rubylee). However, I felt relieved that we expanded the process to include everyone. Especially on the boys side, a vote or two different could have completely turned things around. The fact that first and fifth place were seperated by only 8 points was amazing. It was a lot more work, but it was good to get input from everyone in our Hoop Zone family.
My mind is always racing a million miles an hour during the banquet and I never get to talk to everyone I want to. Our goal is to make this night special for each and every player that is being honored. I hope we accomplish that goal, because it means a lot not only to Hags and I, but our entire station. I hope our basketball friends appreciate the support shown by WPDE management to spend thousands of dollars in awards, food, etc. so we can make it a special night.
Eight years of Hoop Zone banquets and there's already an awesome legacy. We've got two NBA players, one more on the way soon (Carlos Powell - we're rooting for ya!) and a WNBA player to boot. From there, a long list of Division I and other college basketball players. One of my favorite parts of our website is the Zone history section that lets you drag down a high school and see all of their All-Zone picks over the years. I would like to get that more prominently displayed on wpde.com so folks can take the time to look over who has represented their communities over the years.
I put the section below on our Hoop Zone page, but wanted to put it here as well so our high school and local sports fans can get a full dose of Hoop Zone factoids and trivia:
Here are some fun facts and notes about the Hoop Zone banquet:
Just how far has the Hoop Zone banquet come?
The first WPDE All-Hoop Zone team did not have a banquet. The top 12 boys and girls had pizza in the break room at the old WPDE studios in Florence. Raymond Felton sat in a folding chair when he was announced the first Mister Hoop Zone in 2001. Based on the success of the first season, the Hoop Zone banquet has expanded to a full dinner and 30 minute special held after the week after state champions are crowned. Raymond's second Mister Hoop Zone featured the first true banquet and the airing of "The Truth", WPDE's 30 minute documentary on the current Charlotte Bobcats point guard which won an Edward R. Murrow Regional Award for outstanding documentary.
Two firsts in 2008
Latisha Harris became the first Aynor Blue Jacket to make an All-Hoop Zone team. The junior should be a contender for Miss Hoop Zone 2009. Also, a first - Khadijah Sessions became the first 8th grader to make the squad. The Myrtle Beach guard will try and carry on the Lady Seahawks dominance on the hardwood.
Waiting to Eat
Of the 34 SCHSL teams in the WPDE viewing area, there are now only four schools that have not had a boy or girl make the All-Hoop Zone team in our eight year history:
East Clarendon
Lake View
Lamar
Waccamaw
The Two Timers
Ashley Clarke joins an exclusive list of two time Mister and Miss Hoop Zone winners:
Raymond Felton (2001,02)
Ramon Sessions (2003,04)
Christina Dewitt (2005,06)
Ashley Clarke (2007,08)
Third time's the charm:
Only 11 players in our eight year history have made the All-Hoop Zone team three times. Mr. Hoop Zone Finalist Lashay Page of Dillon became just the second boys player while Ashley Clarke, Michelle McGee and Rubylee Wright bring the girls "3-timers" to 9:
North Myrtle Beach's Christina Dewitt is the one and only four time All-Hoop Zone selection.
Three time WPDE All-Hoop Zone selections:
Boys
Lashay Page (Latta 05,06 Dillon 08)
RaSean Dickey (Marlboro County 2002-04)
Girls
Ashley Clarke (Myrtle Beach 05,07,08)
Michelle McGee (Andrews 2006-08)
Rubylee Wright (Latta 2006-08)
Tomay Johnson (Andrews 2004-06)
Latasha Hayward (Hemingway 2003-05)
Zaporia Carr (North Myrtle Beach 2003-05)
Andrea Robinson (Wilson 2003-05)
Christina Dewitt (North Myrtle Beach 2002-05) * 4 time selection *
Tyesha Ervin (Darlington 2002-04)
Sasha Reaves (Mullins 2001-03)
Banquet Fixtures
Here's the breakdown of the most banquet appearances in eight years (boys, girls and combined)
Most All Hoop Zone boys selections
1. Marlboro County 12
2. Wilson 11
3. Myrtle Beach 10
3. Hemingway 10
5. Mullins 7
Most All Hoop Zone girls selections
1. Myrtle Beach 12
2. Wilson 11
3. Darlington 7
3. Mullins 7
3. North Myrtle Beach 7
Combined boys and girls All Hoop Zone selections
1. Myrtle Beach 22
2. Wilson 22
3. Marlboro County 15
4. Mullins 14
4. Hemingway 14
In early January, Hags and I put our mental focus on the high school basketball season. The first thing I do is take out last year's All-Hoop Zone team and see who's returning. Barring a player suspension, major injury or other discipline types of problems, the players who were on last year's team usually returns to the All-Hoop Zone team. After that, we draw a line and develop a watch list. It starts by combing through box scores and getting calls from coaches on Tuesday and Friday night. We did a Hoop Zone honor roll on wpde.com on those nights and it was pretty easy to see who was on that list every time. We would move those on to the watch list and then go out and eyeball as many games as we can. I'm proud to say we had highlights of 74 games on our newscasts this basketball season which I think is a very impressive number for a two man sports department. Hags and I will try and think of how we can be even more efficient and try and get that number closer to 100 next season.
When it comes to playoff time, we look at #1 seeds (region champs) and make sure they are getting serious consideration for an All-Hoop Zone spot. After that, we go through the rest of the brackets and really study who we haven't seen and who deserves consideration. It is very difficult for a player to make the All-Hoop Zone team if their team doesn't make the playoffs. Of our 40 players on this year's team, only one did not make the post-season - Darryl Edge of North Myrtle Beach. Considering he is a 1,000 point career scorer, a 2007 WPDE All-Hoop Zone selection and received Mister Hoop Zone votes, he's an exception to the rule. I know we have a lot of talented players who don't make the team, but this process is the most fair that we know of.
In the past, our process for Mister and Miss Hoop Zone was to collect 15 boys coaches and 15 girls coaches to decide on Mr. and Miss HZ. This year was so unique that we got to that number (17 total ballots when you include mine and Hags) that I didn't feel right about it. With the 17 ballots, Kinard Gadsden-Gilliard had a 1 point lead on Lashay Page and Ashley Clarke had a 2 point lead on Rubylee Wright. Hags and I usually have very similar ballots, but our three picks were all over the place. It's then we realized that you could make a very strong argument for as many as five boys. The most fair thing to do would be to get every coach in the area (34 boys and 34 girls). That's 68 calls! I knew I'd have the piece of mind knowing that it couldn't be more impartial than to do that. So we got on the horn in a big way and collected each and every ballot. What we saw was the same results when we had 17 ballots (Gadsden-Gilliard was up by 2 on Page, Clarke a 6 point margin over Rubylee). However, I felt relieved that we expanded the process to include everyone. Especially on the boys side, a vote or two different could have completely turned things around. The fact that first and fifth place were seperated by only 8 points was amazing. It was a lot more work, but it was good to get input from everyone in our Hoop Zone family.
My mind is always racing a million miles an hour during the banquet and I never get to talk to everyone I want to. Our goal is to make this night special for each and every player that is being honored. I hope we accomplish that goal, because it means a lot not only to Hags and I, but our entire station. I hope our basketball friends appreciate the support shown by WPDE management to spend thousands of dollars in awards, food, etc. so we can make it a special night.
Eight years of Hoop Zone banquets and there's already an awesome legacy. We've got two NBA players, one more on the way soon (Carlos Powell - we're rooting for ya!) and a WNBA player to boot. From there, a long list of Division I and other college basketball players. One of my favorite parts of our website is the Zone history section that lets you drag down a high school and see all of their All-Zone picks over the years. I would like to get that more prominently displayed on wpde.com so folks can take the time to look over who has represented their communities over the years.
I put the section below on our Hoop Zone page, but wanted to put it here as well so our high school and local sports fans can get a full dose of Hoop Zone factoids and trivia:
Here are some fun facts and notes about the Hoop Zone banquet:
Just how far has the Hoop Zone banquet come?
The first WPDE All-Hoop Zone team did not have a banquet. The top 12 boys and girls had pizza in the break room at the old WPDE studios in Florence. Raymond Felton sat in a folding chair when he was announced the first Mister Hoop Zone in 2001. Based on the success of the first season, the Hoop Zone banquet has expanded to a full dinner and 30 minute special held after the week after state champions are crowned. Raymond's second Mister Hoop Zone featured the first true banquet and the airing of "The Truth", WPDE's 30 minute documentary on the current Charlotte Bobcats point guard which won an Edward R. Murrow Regional Award for outstanding documentary.
Two firsts in 2008
Latisha Harris became the first Aynor Blue Jacket to make an All-Hoop Zone team. The junior should be a contender for Miss Hoop Zone 2009. Also, a first - Khadijah Sessions became the first 8th grader to make the squad. The Myrtle Beach guard will try and carry on the Lady Seahawks dominance on the hardwood.
Waiting to Eat
Of the 34 SCHSL teams in the WPDE viewing area, there are now only four schools that have not had a boy or girl make the All-Hoop Zone team in our eight year history:
East Clarendon
Lake View
Lamar
Waccamaw
The Two Timers
Ashley Clarke joins an exclusive list of two time Mister and Miss Hoop Zone winners:
Raymond Felton (2001,02)
Ramon Sessions (2003,04)
Christina Dewitt (2005,06)
Ashley Clarke (2007,08)
Third time's the charm:
Only 11 players in our eight year history have made the All-Hoop Zone team three times. Mr. Hoop Zone Finalist Lashay Page of Dillon became just the second boys player while Ashley Clarke, Michelle McGee and Rubylee Wright bring the girls "3-timers" to 9:
North Myrtle Beach's Christina Dewitt is the one and only four time All-Hoop Zone selection.
Three time WPDE All-Hoop Zone selections:
Boys
Lashay Page (Latta 05,06 Dillon 08)
RaSean Dickey (Marlboro County 2002-04)
Girls
Ashley Clarke (Myrtle Beach 05,07,08)
Michelle McGee (Andrews 2006-08)
Rubylee Wright (Latta 2006-08)
Tomay Johnson (Andrews 2004-06)
Latasha Hayward (Hemingway 2003-05)
Zaporia Carr (North Myrtle Beach 2003-05)
Andrea Robinson (Wilson 2003-05)
Christina Dewitt (North Myrtle Beach 2002-05) * 4 time selection *
Tyesha Ervin (Darlington 2002-04)
Sasha Reaves (Mullins 2001-03)
Banquet Fixtures
Here's the breakdown of the most banquet appearances in eight years (boys, girls and combined)
Most All Hoop Zone boys selections
1. Marlboro County 12
2. Wilson 11
3. Myrtle Beach 10
3. Hemingway 10
5. Mullins 7
Most All Hoop Zone girls selections
1. Myrtle Beach 12
2. Wilson 11
3. Darlington 7
3. Mullins 7
3. North Myrtle Beach 7
Combined boys and girls All Hoop Zone selections
1. Myrtle Beach 22
2. Wilson 22
3. Marlboro County 15
4. Mullins 14
4. Hemingway 14
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