The ESPN Jinx

Is there an ESPN Jinx?

We’re all familiar with the Sports Illustrated Jinx: athletes have uncannily started losing, become injured, or even died within a short time of appearing on the cover of the magazine. I woke up on June 7th to hear one of the ESPN Radio blowhards going on and on about how Big Brown, this year’s winner of the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness, was a shoo-in to win the Belmont Stakes. After all, the horse’s main competition was injured and likely to withdraw and the rest of the field was a bunch of nags. “Ugh," I thought. "Another ESPN commentator guaranteeing that someone (or some animal) is going to win." That was pretty much a guarantee that Big Brown would not win. Didn’t the ESPN hyperbole machine learn anything from their “The Patriots Are the Best Team Ever” nonsense earlier this year? In January and February, all those radio knot heads could talk about was that there was no way that the Patriots could lose; Tom Brady was an A-list celebrity; Tom Brady was the best quarterback ever, blah, blah, blah! Only, there was a way the Patriots could lose—The New York Giants beat them. Imagine that. Last summer, ESPN downplayed the suspicions that Barry Bonds had used performance-enhancing drugs as he marched toward Hank Aaron’s home run record. For weeks on end, I endured several of their sports “journalists “opine that the suspicions about Bonds didn’t matter—breaking the home run record would still be a great achievement, nothing had ever been proven about Bonds, everybody does it, someone who is clean (such as Alex Rodriguez) would break the record in a few years anyway, and on and on. The contortions The ESPN on-air talent went through were mindboggling. A few months after Bonds broke the record, he found himself facing a federal indictment on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice. He is for all intents and purposes out of the game of baseball.

Just today, their Saturday morning blatherers kept saying that they weren't diggin' the primetime showings of the U.S. Open golf tournament. While it was hardly a jinx, since the ESPN personalities didn't guarantee that anyone would win, Tiger Woods made them out to be fools. He had an incredible round that included two eagles, one of them allowing him to seize the lead at the 18th hole. I doubt that NBC is regretting the decision to show the tournament in prime time.

Would that ESPN’s current crop of sportscasters would learn something from Jim McKay, who died on the day of the Belmont at the age of 86. He made sports broadcasting touching, human, poignant, and grand without any of the bombast that most current sportscasters fall into. McKay loved horse races, and certainly would have conveyed the excitement of Big Brown’s potential to be the first Triple Crown winner in 30 years. But he would not have bought into the inevitability theme and cheap hype that pervades ESPN. Had he been in New York, he would have talked not only of Big Brown, but of the other horses, their trainers, their jockeys, their stories. He would have made us realize that yes, Big Brown was the favorite, but it was too early for a coronation. After Big Brown’s stumble from third place to dead last, McKay would have said something eloquent on the fly to convey the heartbreak of Big Brown and his jockey while also lauding the victor. Today’s combined ESPN/ABC coverage immediately focused on Big Brown’s “stunning” loss as soon as Da’Tara crossed the finish line. A horse at 38-1 odds led the Belmont wire to wire, and ESPN/ABC decided to immediately rerun the race, with visual effects focused not on how Da’Tara won, but on how Big Brown lost. McKay knew when to speak and what to say, and more importantly, what not to say. Would that his former colleagues at ESPN/ABC followed his example.