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| Photo: NBC Sports Philadelphia |
Much like the station's home building is changing names, and has many times since it opened up, I can point to when that channel changed names as the time it started going downhill. When Comcast bought NBC, they rebranded the channel...from Comcast SportsNet to NBC Sports Philadelphia. I remember vividly the first day of Comcast SportsNet, with Michael Barkann wearing a goofy sports tie kicking things off. By the way, I say "goofy" affectionately, because I have worn my share of goofy sports ties on TV over the years. Barkann welcomed everyone to a brand new channel, and then smoothly went into the debut of Daily News Live.
Ah, Daily News Live. How great was that show? That was appointment viewing for me everyday at 5PM. I remember it was 90 minutes long when it began, and at some point they shortened it to 60 minutes. I was so disappointed that my favorite show was cut by a half hour. Barkann, who thankfully is still there today, is a supremely talented broadcaster. I'm a huge fan. He was the perfect host for that show. How fantastic was it to actually see the guys you read in the paper everyday? Guys like the late legendary Stan Hochman, Rich Hofman, the late great Phil Jasner, Marcus Hayes, and so many others. Who can forget when Barkann and Hayes got into a heated argument on the air, all while Eagles backup quarterback Jeff Blake, who was a guest on the show, just kind of sat there watching.
They also had Sportscenter-type studio shows throughout the day and night. Ron Burke anchored "SportsRise" weekday mornings. He is a news anchor in Albuquerque, New Mexico now. I loved his style on the air, and his writing was outstanding. During NBA highlights, "nothing but net" became "nothing but Sports-net". His show was 30 minutes, and was repeated throughout the morning. They also had "Sports Night" at 6:30 and 10:00 pm, with Neil Hartman and Leslie Gudel anchoring. What a great team they were. Neil had worked at channel 3 and channel 17 before landing at CSN. Leslie had worked in TV on the west coast. Neil now runs Rowan University's Center for Sports Communications. Leslie was working in real estate and in PR. She actually helped me get Brian Dawkins on my old PHL17 show when he was promoting his book. She just moved to Nashville.
Do you remember some of the other names from the early days of CSN? The great Derrick Gunn, besides being an anchor, was amazing with locker room interviews on Eagles Post Game Live. The fantastic Dei Lynam was on the roster too, along with a really talented guy named Pat Boyle, who now works for NBC Sports Chicago.
They even had a late night sports talk show back in the day called "Spotlight" that Barkann hosted. Once a week...I think it was Thursdays...they called it "Loose Cannons"...where they brought on a panel of guests from local media to discuss the big sports issues of the day. I was actually on the show once. It was 1998. I was the overnight guy on B101, and I thought, "what do I have to lose"...so I sent them an email pitching myself. To my astonishment, they called me and invited me on. It figures, the episode I was on, Barkann wasn't there. Steve Coates was the guest host. I was always a Coatsey fan and it was great meeting him and being on the show with him, but I really wanted to be on set with Barkann. Anyway, I was on the panel with Rhea Hughes from WIP, Jack Scheur, the legendary baseball writer from the Associated Press, and longtime Philly TV and radio sportscaster Joe Pellegrino. I had barely done any TV at that point and I was a nervous wreck, so I didn't say very much. That could be why I was never invited back. Or maybe they realized the guy who played Michael Bolton and Celine Dion in the middle of the night on the radio, may not be what they're looking for in a sports guest. Who knows?
The point is, they had local programming at all hours of the day. And I haven't even mentioned the games. Like they still do today, they did Phillies, Flyers and Sixers games, along with pre-game, halftime and post-game coverage. And of course they did a lot around the Eagles, which thankfully they still do.
But the channel these days is basically just the games, and their Eagles show "Birds Huddle". To eat up 4 hours of programming during the day, they air 97.5 The Fanatic's afternoon show. And if there is no game on a particular night, they just re-rack that show and run it again at night. Their morning sports news show, "SportsNet Central", is just 15 minutes long, with that same 15 minutes constantly repeated.
Please understand, this is NOT a knock on their on-air talent. They still have a good roster of talent. John Clark, Amy Fadool, Danny Pommels, Taryn Hatcher and Ashlyn Sullivan...all very good at what they do. And of course, the aforementioned Michael Barkann, whom I think is one of the all-time greats in this town. I just wish that talented team had more real estate to work with. A great sports channel went from "nothing but SportsNet"...to just...nothing.