Now that I’m back at the office, it’s time to give you some linkage. I went over to Justin.tv to see what sites are streaming the Olympics and there were a lot. With NBC, the International Olympic Committee and other parties hunting for illegal streaming, several channels are being shut down, but I have managed to watch the CBC’s coverage this morning. The Opening Ceremonies have been quite fun to watch as China’s large contingent entered the Bird’s Nest. I’m not giving a link to the channel because I don’t want to see it shut down.
Let’s go over the Weekend Viewing Picks.
With the Olympics now underway, they are the main viewing pick for this weekend. I’m not going to list everything. You can go to NBC’s site to see what’s on its channels this weekend. It starts tonight with the Opening Ceremonies (tape delayed) on NBC at 7:30 p.m. Just wait until you see how the Olympic flame was lit. It was quite amazing to see. I won’t spoil it for you.
The PGA Championship is also in session. TNT will have early third and final round coverage this weekend starting at 11 a.m. CBS comes in with full 18 hole coverage of the season’s last major championship at 2 p.m. on both Saturday and Sunday. PGA.com also has full online coverage as well.
Over to baseball, Fox has two games on Saturday. Most of the country will see the Cardinals-Cubs while others will watch the Yankees at Anaheim. The split and announcing assignments can be seen here. WGN has the Red Sox and White Sox squaring off at 7 on Saturday night. On Sunday, TBS will have Red Sox-White Sox at 2 p.m. and ESPN will have Cards-Cubs live from Wrigley on Sunday Night Baseball at 8 p.m.
Exhibition football is in full swing. The NFL Network will have two games tonight, one live. The Philadelphia Eagles face the Steelers in Pittsburgh at 7:30, then at 11:30, it will air the Seattle Seahawks traveling to the Metrodome to face the Minnesota Vikings on tape delay. Then on Saturday, NFL Network has a live doubleheader with the Bills at Redskins at 7, followed by Dallas at San Diego at 10.
NASCAR’s Nationwide Series will be shown Saturday at 3 p.m. on ABC as the Zippo 200 takes place. Then on Sunday, ESPN will air the Sprint Cup Series Centurion Boat at the Glen at 2 p.m.
Indy Car heads to Kentucky for the Meijer Indy 300 which ESPN2 carries at 6:30 Saturday night.
ESPN2 has the Countrywide Classic finals, Sunday at 5 p.m. as the U.S. Open Series continues.
A full listing of sports on TV can be seen at USA Today.
Let’s do your links.
National
USA Today’s Michael Hiestand has some suggestions for NBC on how to make the Olympics more palatable for viewers.
Richard Deitsch of Sports Illustrated says NBC’s networks will be all-Olympics, all the time.
CNBC’s Darren Rovell in Beijing looks at the best selling NBA jerseys in Communist China.
James Hibbard of the Hollywood Reporter has some reviews of the Olympics Opening Ceremonies.
Marisa Guthrie of Broadcasting & Cable says NBC will be hyping its primetime lineup during the Olympic Games.
Larry Barrett of Multichannel News writes that Spike TV will have a special celebrating the 20th anniversary of the Madden NFL video game.
Mike Flaherty of Variety says Brett Favre’s playing for the New York Jets could lead to higher ratings for CBS which carries the AFC package.
East and Mid-Atlantic
David Scott of the Boston Sports Media Watch has some ramblings from Foxboro.
Nancy Marrapese-Burrell in today’s Boston Globe says despite not having Tiger Woods, there are still several reasons to watch the PGA Championship.
Richard Sandomir of the New York Times looks at how Brett Favre has boosted the Jets in more ways than one.
Newsday’s Neil Best has three stories on Favre signing with the Jets. The first story looks at the business impact on the Jets. Then, Neil talks with Fox Sports’ NFL insider Jay Glazer who broke the story while spending 24 hours in the Orlando airport. Neil writes that ESPN is an early winner with a Jets game on Monday Night Football in Week 3.
The New York Post’s Phil Mushnick says MLB Commish Bud Selig should have punished Ken Griffey, Jr. for his throat slash directed at Reds analyst Jeff Brantley just before last week’s trade deadline.
Also from the Post, Justin Terranova talks with ESPN’s MLB analyst Steve Phillips about the NL East race. And Justin has five questions for CBS golf analyst Nick Faldo regarding the PGA Championship.
Laura Nachman says CBS’ Charley Casserly joins Gus Johnson to call Eagles exhibition games.
The Baltimore Sun’s Ray Frager looks at NBC’s enormous amount of Olympics coverage.
Two things from the DC/Baltimore Examiner’s Jim Williams. First, Jim says WUSA and Comcast SportsNet Mid-Atlantic begin their annual battle of Redskins coverage. Finally, Jim says this weekend’s PGA Championship has been lost in all of the Olympics hype.
Tim Lemke of the Washington Times says Versus has signed a 10 year deal with the Indy Racing League.
South
Doug Nye of The State says this year, NBC is offering the most hours of Olympic coverage ever.
Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald calls the amount of coverage NBC will provide from Communist China, “staggering.”
Dave Darling of the Orlando Sentinel says NBC has made this year’s Olympics easier to watch, although he erred in saying the Opening Ceremonies will be seen live tonight.
Jerry Greene, also from the Sentinel writes that with or without Tiger Woods, watching golf on TV is a true struggle.
David Barron from the Houston Chronicle says NBC is showing the Olympics on multiple platforms.
Ray Buck of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram says SportsCenter won’t look the same in the mornings starting on Monday.
Mel Bracht of the Daily Oklahoman looks at the 3,600 hours of the Olympics that NBC will provide. Mel has an Olympic channel guide. Mel says Cox Communications is ramping up its high school football coverage. And Mel has his weekend viewing picks.
Midwest
George M. Thomas of the Akron Beacon Journal says NBC is going to be showing the Olympics on all of its cable channels.
Bob Wolfey of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel tells his readers to get ready to see a lot of the Jets with Brett Favre on CBS.
Michael Zuidema of the Grand Rapids (MI) Press says it will be tough to avoid the Olympics on your TV.
Teddy Greenstein of the Chicago Tribune says long-time Chicagoland sports personality Lou Canellis is happy to be back in the sports scene.
Neal Justin of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune says NBC’s coverage of the Olympics will be the most intense ever. Neal has his five don’t miss moments for the Games.
Paul Christian of the Rochester Post-Bulletin tells us that NBC will flood our TV’s with the Games.
The Kansas City Star’s Jeffrey Flanagan has some quotes from last night’s KCTV broadcast of the Chiefs-Bears game.
Fang’s Bites welcomes the St. Louis Post-Dispatch’s Dan Caesar to the Friday megalinks. He had been writing on Saturdays, but now moves his media column to Friday. Today, Dan writes about Charter Communications refusing to pick up some of NBC’s HD Olympic coverage.
West
Over to the San Diego Union-Tribune where Jay Posner talks with Padres voice Matt Vasgerian who is working the Olympics for NBC out of the Saturday Night Live studios in New York. Here are the ratings from San Diego last week.
John Maffei of the North County Times also talks with Matt Vasgerian.
Jim Carlisle of the Ventura County Star says Olympic viewers will go from having too little to watch to possibly having too much.
Randy Harvey of the Los Angeles Times has a day-by-day highlight guide of what to watch at the Olympics.
Tom Hoffarth of the Los Angeles Daily News says the amount of Olympics coverage on NBC is overwhelming. Tom has his extensive media notes in his Farther Off the Wall blog. And Tom writes that NBC did the Olympic time warp during the Today show this morning carefully avoiding the Opening Ceremonies which were taking place at the time.
Ron Judd of the Seattle Times live blogged CBC’s coverage of the Olympics Opening Ceremonies.
Canada
William Houston of the Toronto Globe and Mail says while this may be CBC’s last Olympics for at least six years, it’s not going out quietly.
Chris Zelkovich of the Toronto Star writes that Olympics coverage on CBC/TSN and NBC is reaching new heights.
That’s going to do it for now.
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