As we head into a three day weekend, it’s time to give you your Friday megalinks.
As always, we go into the Weekend Viewing Picks first.
College football has already begun with some games played on Thursday. Among the highlights for Saturday, USC takes on Virginia, Michigan hosts Utah, Appalachian State visits LSU and Alabama plays Clemson in the Georgia Dome. You can see the slate of nationally televised games for Saturday in my College Football Viewing Picks. On Sunday, ESPN has Kentucky-Louisville at 3:30 p.m. and FSN will air Colorado State-Colorado at Invesco Field at 7:30 p.m. Then on Monday, ESPN has a doubleheader starting Rutgers hosting Fresno State at 4 p.m. and Tennessee playing in the Rose Bowl against UCLA at 8.
The U.S. Open, tennis’ last Grand Slam Tournament of the year finishes its first week of play in Flushing Meadow, NY. CBS has extensive weekend coverage starting at 11 a.m. on Saturday, Sunday and Monday. USA has primetime coverage throughout the weekend at 7.
Major League Baseball heads into September with two games on Fox on Saturday at 3:55 p.m., Philadelphia at Wrigley Field to take on the Cubs and the Tampa Bay Rays host Baltimore. The regional splits and announcing assignments are here. WGN has White Sox-Red Sox, Saturday night at 7. On Sunday, TBS has the White Sox-Red Sox at 1:30 p.m., WGN has the Phillies-Cubs at 2 and ESPN’s Sunday night game airs on ESPN2 as the Dodgers play Arizona at 8.
The PGA Tour’s FedEx Cup continues with the Deutsche Bank Championship at the TPC Boston. Golf Channel has 2nd round coverage on Saturday starting at 3 p.m. NBC takes over with 3rd round coverage Sunday at 3. Then NBC picks up the final round at 2 p.m. on Labor Day.
NASCAR’s Sprint Cup series has the Pepsi 500 Sunday at 8 p.m.
Let’s head to your links.
National
USA Today’s Michael Hiestand talks about the next step in instant replay.
Christopher Byrne of Eye on Sports Media looks at TBS’s blog which doles out its production assignments for its Sunday afternoon MLB games through a blog.
Glenn Dickson of Broadcasting & Cable reports that ABC’s College Football Countdown will finally be aired in HD. It’s about time.
Larry Barrett in Multichannel News tells us the NFL Network will have a slew of special programming leading up to Thursday’s Redskins-Giants season opener.
CNBC’s Darren Rovell says Olympians are picking up speaking engagements. Darren wonders if Nastia Liukin can make you eat your Wheaties. And Darren gets readers’ reaction to the LPGA’s English-only policy.
Joe Favorito likes how the US Open is going green.
The Sports Media Watch has some idle notes.
Maury Brown of the Biz of Baseball talks about the new MLB postseason ad campaign being put forth by Fox and TBS. Thank goodness it will not involve Dane Cook.
East and Mid-Atlantic
David Scott of the Boston Sports Media Watch breaks news that the Boston Herald is losing yet another reporter.
Nancy Marrapese-Burrell of the Boston Globe talks about Inside the NFL moving to Showtime.
Phil Mushnick in today’s New York Post remembers late Post columnist Dick Young.
The Post’s Justin Terranova talks with ESPN’s Tim Hasselbeck and NBC/NFL Network’s Cris Collinsworth about the Giants. And Justin has five questions for ESPN college football analyst Kirk Herbstreit.
Pete Dougherty of the Albany Times Union has the composite college football schedule for the entire 2008-09 season.
Over to the Baltimore Sun where Ray Frager is impressed with Versus’ versatility. In his blog, Ray has the announcing lineup for ESPN’s family of networks’ college football games.
The Washington Times’ Tim Lemke writes that some Olympic sponsors are not re-upping for Vancouver and London.
South
Doug Nye of The State says the new SEC TV deals have made the conference #1 on TV. Doug talks about the South Carolina and South Carolina State football coaches shows switching TV channels.
Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald writes that ESPN is promising a new documentary on the University of Miami will be fair and not a hatchet job.
Dave Darling of the Orlando Sentinel says there’s going to be a lot of college football on TV this season.
Mel Bracht from the Daily Oklahoman says CBS’ Spencer Tillman is looking forward to calling his first Oklahoma football game. Mel has Spencer’s top five college football teams. Mel has some news and notes. And Mel give us his Weekend Viewing Picks.
Midwest
George M. Thomas of the Akron Beacon Journal has women angry over fantasy sports leagues.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s Bob Wolfley talks about Ron Jaworski getting a bigger role on Monday Night Football this season.
Teddy Greenstein in today’s Chicago Tribune says ESPN helped to broker Saturday’s matchup between Utah and Michigan.
Paul Christian of the Rochester Post Bulletin has a primer on the Big Ten Network.
Dan Ca
esar of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch talks about the Rams not being on national TV this season. And Dan talks about Dan Patrick and Keith Olbermann being reunited on Football Night in America.
Jeffrey Flanagan from the Kansas City Star has Fox NFL analyst Jayice “JC” Pearson lobbying for new sideline reporter Nishelle Turner.
West
Jay Posner of the San Diego Union-Tribune says focus groups turned ESPN back to the basics on Monday Night Football. Jay has the ratings from last week.
John Maffei in the North County Times writes about the new analyst for San Diego State University football games.
The Ventura County Star’s Jim Carlisle says the game will be the star on ESPN’s Monday Night Football. Imagine that.
Steve Springer of the Los Angeles Times compares this year’s Olympics overall viewing record to other programs.
The Los Angeles Daily News’ Tom Hoffarth is on vacation, but he does give us a shrunken version of his media notes.
That’s going to do it for the megalinks. Back later with Viewing Picks galore later.
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