Some More Links to Chew on

Scouring the internet so you don’t have to. Some more links on this Friday.

George K. Thomas of the Akron Beacon Journal talks about local sports radio station, WKNR, doing better in the ratings.

John Maffei of the North County Times is critical of Fox’s and MLB’s joint decision to move the World Series into a possible November conclusion.

Tom Hoffarth of the LA Daily News has more on the Fox/MLB decision on the World Series. And Hoffarth has a traditional news & notes column which includes notes on NBC’s coverage of the Preakness

Ray Buck of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram is unhappy seeing the World Series pushed back.

Bob Wolfey of the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel piles on Fox and MLB.

Dave Darling of the Orlando Sentinel says people may not like seeing Red Sox-Yankees outside the Northeast, but he says it’s the best rivalry in sports. I’d agree with that.

Joe Davidson of the Sacramento Bee has no mention of the World Series, thankfully. He writes about the NFL thinking about shortening the draft by cutting the time in-between picks in the 1st round from 15 to possibly 7 – 10 minutes. Having been at the draft last month, I say it’s a good thing. 15 minutes is too long in this day and age.

Here’s a story on former Denver Bronco and current ESPN NFL Analyst, Mark “Stinky” Schlereth getting a part on CBS’ Guiding Light daytime drama (or soap opera as it’s really known).

I like this idea of finding NFL stories after all those silly World Series in November sob stories by the media writers. Judd Zulgad of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune says Vikings programming is going to be on three different TV outlets this coming season.

Jim Carlisle of the Ventura County Star echoes some of the comments made by ESPN’s Ombudsman Lee Anne Schreiber last week.

Tim Lemke of the Washington Times (a Unification Church newspaper) has a two-tiered blog entry, one on the NFL Network’s loss in court and the other on the MLB blackout rules.

With all this bitching about the World Series possibly ending in November, one overlooked story is the fact that when MLB launches its own channel in 2009, it’ll televise 26 games nationwide, no blackouts whatsoever. Here’s the story directly from MLB.com. You may remember when MLB Extra Innings appeared to be headed to DirecTV exclusively earlier this year, the launch of MLB Network was part of the deal. Now with cable’s In-Demand part of the Extra Innings package, MLB Network will also launch on an expanded basic tier, something which the NFL Network has tried to do unsuccessfully since launching.

Chris Zelkovich of the Toronto Star looks at the change in direction for CBC Sports. Five years ago, it dropped the Blue Jays and focused on other sports. Now after CBC has signed up rights for Soccer’s World Cup, the NHL and Toronto’s FC in MLS, Canada’s public-funded TV network announces a new deal for the Blue Jays that could lead to more games next summer as the CFL leaves for CTV/TSN. Two years ago, Canadians were sounding the death knell after CBC lost the bidding for the Olympic Games in Vancouver in 2010, the CFL, but it’s now made a big turnaround.

Randy Sportak attacks the NHL for kowtowing to NBC instead of CBC in regards to the NHL playoff scheduling.

Speaking about the Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver, Damian Inwood of the Vancouver Province says even though the games are 3 years away, the Vancouver Olympic Organizing Committee (Vancouver 2010) still has to plan the starting times now of all of the events to appease the three major TV rightsholders (NBC, CTV and the European Broadcast Union) and the 7 international sports federations.

And those are your links for now. I’ll be back with an analysis of the Network Upfronts later.