Saturday Link Action

I went to work this morning, went to lunch and now I’m back at the home office. Time for some linkage before the Final Four tips off.

I’m still in shock over the news that the New York Times Company is threatening to close the Boston Globe. I knew things were bad at the Globe, but for it to get to the point where the paper could be in its last month of operation, it’s really mind-boggling. The paper is where Peter Gammons, Will McDonough, Bob Ryan and others have received notoriety for their reporting. At one time, the sports section was considered the best in the country, and it’s where the news and notes column became famous. Now, we could be seeing the paper in its final days and it’s very sad. As a person who grew up in New England and would buy the Sunday Globe just to read Gammons and McDonough along with one of the first sports media columns written by Jack Craig, it’s quite sad to see this happen. I hope somehow the situation gets resolved before we see one of the nation’s great newspapers fall by the wayside. Thus far, we’ve seen two major papers shut down this year, the Rocky Mountain News and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. I’m afraid to say they won’t be the last.

To your links.

It’s rare that I start with Newsday’s Neil Best on a Saturday, but he has a story today on his experience at the new Yankee Stadium on Friday. Neil says he shucked the chance to take media tours of Yankee Stadium and Citi Field and wanted to experience his first time in both as any fan would. That was a long introduction, wasn’t it? But Neil did take an opportunity to go into the spacious Yankee Stadium clubhouse. Neil mentions the TV camera shot from high above home plate is cause for concern for fans. And Neil says Mets fans may miss the first hour of the game against Florida on April 11th due to silly MLB on Fox blackout rules.

Ken Schott of the Schenectady Gazette says it’s time for the Yankees to replace their radio broadcast team and I could not agree more.

Dave Hughes of the Baltimore-centric Press Box looks into the Orioles broadcast cut off from earlier this week.

Rich Polikoff of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette says the Kansas City Royals are trying to get their broadcasts into Northwest Arkansas.

But maybe the Royals should work on Topeka, Kansas first as Rick Dean of the Topeka Capital-Journal writes, Fox Sports Kansas City does not have a deal with Cox Cable for all 140 broadcasts this season.

Bob Holliday of the Bloomington (IN) Pentagraph says Cardinals fans will have to scramble see 20 games that won’t be picked up by Comcast which are on Fox Sports Midwest’s schedule.

The Sports Media Watch says the 2009 NCAA Tournament Elite Eight ended up being tied for the lowest rated ever. SMW looks at the ratings for this year’s NCAA Tournament to date. And Paulsen looks at the ratings for the Final Four going back to 1999.

Mike Reynolds of Multichannel News says UConn could pull off its second double basketball championship like it did in 2004.

The Detroit News’ Joanne C. Gerstner caught up with former University of Detroit coach Dick Vitale who’s in town for his current job. You know that one.

Joe Lapointe of the New York Times writes about how Dick Vitale turned from just being an ex-basketball coach into basketball analyst extraordinaire.

Jim Williams from the Washington Examiner tells you all you need to know on CBS’ coverage of today’s NCAA Men’s Final Four. And Jim says the NCAA Women’s Final Four is also worth watching on Sunday.

Tom Jones of the St. Petersburg Times says this is a great weekend to watch sports on TV.

Barry Horn of the Dallas Morning News talks with a bunch of network TV personalities on the events they’re covering this weekend. Barry has an anecdote about Texas Rangers owner and former radio station butcher Tom Hicks (disclosure: I worked at a Clear Channel radio station owned by Hicks so I’m not really a fan of his …. just so you know).

Keith Thibeault of Sports Media Journal wonders why ESPN even bothers sometimes. Case in point, ESPN.com’s latest cross promotion for ESPN Radio.

Howard Herman of the Berkshire (MA) Eagle says Comcast SportsNet New England has hashed out a deal with Time Warner Cable that keeps Celtics games on TV in Western Massachusetts.

And things have been worked out in Maine as well.

David Tanklefsky of Broadcasting & Cable writes about DirecTV’s interactive coverage of The Masters.

Kelly Jasper of the Augusta (GA) Chronicle writes that former CBS and Fox sportscaster Pat Summerall will in town next week for a speaking engagement in advance of The Masters.

David Barron of the Houston Chronicle says a local TV sports anchor has huge shoes to fill.

Jay Posner of the San Diego Union-Tribune says a local TV station is adding a sports segment and hiring a new reporter which bucks a trend.

Branson Wright of the Cleveland Plain Dealer has his sports theme tune Hall of Fame.

Over at Puck The Media, your girl Saturday, Wrap Around Curl has another edition of Bad NHL Merchandise.

Lots of g

ood links today. Enjoy your Saturday.