ESPN’s piece on Phil Rizzuto’s career. The Yankees still suck, but Scooter was a class act by all accounts. Sad to see a baseball legend pass away.

Rights issues in sports are a major concern for companies like ESPN and also the leagues like the NFL and NCAA. You only have to look at the rights fees companies pay to cover sports live or at the money leagues like the NFL make signing away something as simple as mobile data rights. The latest example, and an interesting one at that, involves a Louisville newspaper that tried to have a “live blog” of the NCAA Baseball tournament.

From the article:

A reporter was ejected from an NCAA baseball tournament game for submitting live Internet updates during play.

Brian Bennett, a writer for The (Louisville, Ky.) Courier-Journal, was approached Sunday by an NCAA representative in the bottom of the fifth inning and told that blogging from an NCAA championship event is against NCAA policies.

…

The newspaper said the university circulated a memo on the issue from Jeramy Michiaels, the NCAA’s manager of broadcasting, before the first super regional game Friday. It said blogs are considered a “live representation of the game” and blogs containing action photos or game reports are prohibited until the game is over.

If you think this is a relatively esoteric issue, consider the fact that mobile phones and even regular cameras are getting the capability to transmit digital images directly to sites like Flickr or Photobucket. Fans will be in a position to taunt their friends (“Wish ya were here!”) or instantly share accounts of the game as they happen.

This ought to be a fair use of admission. Fans are simply sharing their experiences, after all, and this doesn’t diminish the value of consistent, live data feeds like those provided by ESPN or the NCAA. This isn’t the case, however, as big money is involved.

Let me give you another example. The NFL is by far the worst offender when it comes to rights enforcement bordering on the stupid. They restrict any site, including partners like ESPN, from offering live play-by-play that offers any detail. They want to have a monopoly on that data on the Internet, and they want to control their partners on other digital platforms (Hello, Nextel).

So, every fall, we used to sit on our hands just waiting for the latest ridiculous demand from the NFL. Two NFL seasons ago, we literally had to rewrite parts of the site to pull any play description beyond “Rush, 12 yards” from the site because the NFL didn’t want us showing as much data as NFL.com. We also couldn’t show a drive chart that showed the results of each play (too much information!) and instead had to focus on a continuous line for each drive. It was stupid, and it wasn’t like it really increased the value of the NFL.com pages with the same data. We also had to pull the play-by-play summary for each quarter until it was completely over. It was ridiculous.

Ultimately, though, since online data rights are measured in the thousands and TV rights are measured in the millions per year, the online rights suffer to maintain the more lucrative TV rights. So, leagues like the NFL and the NCAA feel OK to beat up on small papers and web sites, even when they’re owned by places like ESPN.

I strongly recommend that fans punish such behavior by avoiding the league sites directly. They’re just trying to bilk you for even more money. I do have to point out that ESPN was probably indirectly the reason that this newspaper got shoved out of the NCAA baseball tourney, though. We had a big push to secure online rights to that tournament before I left, and I know ESPN is the TV partner for that event. So… boycott that if you must, but then again… it’s college baseball. I’m sure most of you are boycotting it without even knowing.

Seriously, though, these sorts of policies will leave only the leagues and big, big companies like ESPN or Fox Sports as your source for coverage of your favorite teams. Those of you that deal with MSG, YES, and NESN already have a taste of what this will be like, and an idea of why your cable bill is so ridiculous.

At $18M per, he’s way overpriced. I like Barry Zito, but here are his stats for 2003-2006:

YEAR    G    IP     W   L   ERA   K/9
2003    35  231.2   14  12  3.30  5.67
2004    34  213.0   11  11  4.48  6.89
2005    35  228.1   14  13  3.86  6.74
2006    34  221.0   16  10  3.83  6.15

Yes, he has good numbers, but those numbers make him about 20th or so for K/9 and 10th for ERA. He’s a decent top tier pitcher, but this contract makes him the owner of the largest contract for a pitcher, ever. If he’s worth this, and he basically has had some awful postseason games, I don’t know what this does for Johan Santana and the hot youngsters when they come up to their free agent years. Alex Rodriguez may get a big weight taken off his shoulders soon, I think…

I’m always wondering why more companies don’t help bloggers do their thing. It’s in their best interests, after all, because more people talking about your content or products and more people using your services ends up being good business. Of course, I work at such a company and I can actually address this issue directly, if only for one vertical.

So, today marks the first release of a prototype tool for bloggers who blog about sports. This isn’t a finished product yet, and I’m hesitant to get it out because it’s not polished, but you know what? I want the feedback. So, if you’re a blogger, here’s what I have. Give it a try and let me know what you think. If there’s interest, we’ll get a finished product built and

Basically, I have a small app which will pump out scoring alerts for different sports. So far, I have NBA and NFL ready to go. For each app, there are programmed notifications for key events. In the NBA version, I’m just using clock time. Alerts will be queued for games that cross 12 minute, 8 minutes, 4 minute, and end of quarter boundaries. I’ll be improving the logic as I refine the application. The NFL version will queue alerts every time a quarter starts or ends, plus on any scoring event.

Here’s a demo for what they will look like:

The video is fuzzy because of the encoding (it actually looked worse on YouTube). It also is quite small compared to the web page. It looks huge on the video because I had to make the window small to fit it in the Google Video size limits. Here’s a screenshot of what it looks like on my monitor:

If you are interested in trying it out, all you need to do is add this script tag to your blog, anywhere on the page:

This is a prototype tool and as such may stop working, may break your layout, or may just generally be problematic. I hope not, though. Let me know if you find any bugs. Oh, and even the ID attribute above is important. Please leave the entire tag intact when you add it to your blog or site.

I haven’t tested the NFL one, but will be tomorrow during games. Feel free to change NBA above to NFL tomorrow to see it work. It won’t do anything tonight, since there are no games and also because I’m not running the process to generate the updates.

Currently, you can only have one or the other on your page at a time. This is just a limitation for the prototype. You will be able to choose more configurable alerts in the final product, assuming there’s enough interest to build one. Of course, let me know what features you’d like to see and I’ll see what I can do.

If you aren’t interested in this product, that’s OK. Let me know what tools you’d like to see. I have several I’ve built for use here on FatMixx that I’m cleaning up for release. These include plugins for WordPress to make the task of writing about sports easier. They’re basically versions of the tools we offer our own editors and writers, and there’s no reason you shouldn’t have them, too.

(P.S. I feel like I should say that this isn’t the finest app ever built and unlike many things that ESPN does, it doesn’t quite have that flair and polish. It will, but I want to get this conversation started. As they say, release early, release often. I want to make sure we can get feedback before we build something perfect for us, but useless for you.)

From King Kaufman’s Week 6 picks (winners in caps):

N.Y. GIANTS (2-2) at Atlanta (3-1): The Giants’ strong defensive front and weak secondary is perfect for a quarterback who makes good decisions, gets rid of the ball quickly and has an accurate arm. Oh.

Of course, I’m still picking the Falcons, but hey. By the way, he’s still my favorite sports writer. If you’re not reading Kaufman, you’re missing out.

This has to be the worst own goal ever. Watch:

The ball just hit a divet/bump in the pitch and then bounced right over his foot. That has got to suck. What’s even worse… the commentator says that goalies make the bump to help their goal kicks. That’s why you should square up on the ball, kids.

Another bleg, if you won’t mind. Kareem reminded me about a post I wanted to do about Fan Nation, a small startup here in CT founded by a few former colleagues. I’m curious what the non-ESPN’ers think of Fan Nation. Leave comments below, and thanks!

One thing I try to do whenever I travel is visit a baseball game in town if the city has an MLB team. I don’t have time on all of my trips, but if I do I try to make it over. While in Seattle, I did make a Mariners game, my first at Safeco field. While there, I tried to come up with the list of all the parks I’ve been to. Here it is:

Retired stadiums:

• Veterans Stadium – Philadelphia
• Fulton County Stadium – Atlanta

Been in, but didn’t see a game:

• Skydome – Toronto (may have seen a game, can’t remember)
• Olympic Stadium – Montreal

Current Stadiums:

• Camden Yards – Baltimore
• Fenway Park – Boston
• SBC Park – San Francisco
• Edison Field – Anaheim
• Yankee Stadium – New York
• Safeco Field – Seattle

That’s my list. I hope to add the new Phillies stadium very soon.

Feel free to post your list in the comments or leave a trackback if you blog it.

I have to root for the underdog today, so GO SEAHAWKS!

Can’t really root for Pittsburgh anyway, Philly haters that they are.

Update (1:55 2nd): That was NOT a TD. Crap call from the refs…

Update (5:38 4th): Well, the refs just suck in general. Lots of ticky-tack calls. Regardless, looks like Pittsburgh is as good as everyone was saying. Think this one is pretty much over unless Seattle pulls out a miracle.

It’s a little known fact that companies like ESPN.com, Yahoo.com, and Sportsline.com have to pay royalties to the various players association and/or the leagues in order to run their fantasy games for the public. The cost is often significant, amounting to significant portions of a game’s gross revenue. You can tell games that pay the fee because they’ll have the players association logos plus the league logos on some or all of the pages for the game.At ESPN.com, for example, you’ll find the NFLPA logo at the bottom of our fantasy football pages (example).

Anyway, apparently a company out there is taking one of the leagues to court to argue against the fees as they’re set up now. The company is taking MLB, which bought the exclusive rights to distribute player statistics from the MLBPA, to court to argue that the statistics, once the game is over, are historical fact and therefore shouldn’t require a license. It’s going to be an interesting case that will have some interesting repercussions regardless of who wins.

The leagues exercise pretty significant control over anything they can to make money. The trend over the last few years has been to partner exclusively with a partner to get the big check from one source. You can see it with the deals the NFL made with EA and MLB made with Take2. It hasn’t happened in the fantasy sports world yet, but I wouldn’t be surprised if someone hasn’t thought of that idea.

David Pinto at Baseball Musings has it right, I think when he argues that MLB and the leagues are making a mistake if they limit the number of licenses. Fantasy sports are a feeder into other merchandising and ticket sales. I own one more jersey than I would’ve and I watch WAY more football and baseball than I otherwise would’ve if I didn’t play fantasy sports. We’ll see how it pans out, I guess.

(Usual disclaimer: I speak for myself here and not for ESPN.com or ESPN or Disney.)

Writing about the Patriots today, Michael Smith says:

So you go right on ahead and write them off if you want. I’ll admit it certainly is tempting right about now. But even with injuries to such key performers Kevin Faulk, Rodney Harrison and Matt Light, along with the players the champs lost during the offseason, I’m not ready to do so. You have to be strong up the middle, and after the tackles, New England’s defense isn’t. But I’ve seen this team recover too many times. They’re like the Yankees.

I’ve been ribbing a coworker who is a huge Pats fan about this same thing. While the salary cap does make comparing any NFL franchise to the big spending Yankees difficult, the similarities are undeniable. The modern Patriots dynasty is the NFL version of the Yankees 1996-2000 dynasty. For one thing, the swagger is starting to show up. They were uncharacteristically obnoxious during the Super Bowl (and no, I’m not just saying that because I’m an Eagles fan). The players are also starting to believe in their own invincibility. I mean, you win three championships and keep hearing how good you are, it’s only reasonable that you might start believing it.

There are also other things. The Tom Brady/Derek Jeter similarities, for example. Or, the tuck rule and Jeffrey Maier (both critical for the first championship). You need those kind of breaks to build dynasties but players don’t remember the break. It’s part of the story players build up about themselves, that they won the game by skill rather than a combination of skill and luck.

I just think it’s funny, anyway, because it is a Boston team. That’s pretty much it.

The Eagles game today and my roller coaster fantasy day has left me with little energy to comment on the weekend. So, here are some very brief comments:

First, Brian Dawkins and Donovan McNabb are what make the Eagles go. The sideline reporter during the game reported that Dawkins told the defense “They won’t score on us again” (or something like that). And sure enough, except for a meaningless TD late, the Chiefs didn’t score again. McNabb went out there nursing a number of injuries and simply threw another 300+ yard game. Talk softly and make big plays.

Second thought: Jerry Porter will be my biggest draft day mistake by the end of the season. The preseason hype and the logic behind it is solid, but watching the Raiders game today, I saw one big thing that worries me. Kerry Collins doesn’t scan the field very effectively. He only sees one side of the field it seems and that side is usually the side with Moss. Since Porter generally lines up on the other side of the field, Porter will only get good looks when Moss is on the sideline. With Donte Stallworth taking the #1 slot for New Orleans this week, I should’ve started him instead. I’ll need to figure something out for the rest of the season…. benching Porter will be expensive.

Third thought: Screw you, Neil Rackers.

This was a fun NFL weekend. Looking forward to my showdown tomorrow with Paul. I just need Kasay to hit like, say, 6 field goals for the win… yeah, I’m not holding my breath.

A very interesting article at ESPN.com applies an interesting metric to analyze the bubble QBs for the 2005 season. It’s Insider only but worth it. I’m a baseball fan and love the fact that performance is so quantifiable in baseball. It’s great to see the ways fans in other sports are working to analyze performance there. Between Hollinger and this guy we’ve got a good start on the NBA and NFL.

Interesting article at CNN Money about several companies’ plan to take on ESPN. Good read. From the article, talking about how the NFL could legitimize any upstart:

“We’re giving very serious consideration to being part of the launch of another major sports network on cable and satellite television,” Tagliabue said in February. “We’re also talking to other television networks and companies about the packages we have to sell, including the Thursday night/Saturday package we’re creating.”

It wouldn’t be the first time that the NFL was present in the delivery room for the birth of a major network.

Here’s the sports buzz for the past two weeks, the top ESPN.com stories chosen by bloggers. Sorry I can’t do any more insightful commentary, but I’ll leave you with a new twist. The “Read Blogs” link will go to IceRocket instead of Technorati. Let me know what you think of the change.
(Click here to read the rest of this post)

Take one guess at what the top story will be on this week’s sports buzz? One guess should do it…

The top blogged story this week was, unsurprisingly, Lance Armstrong taking his seventh Tour de France. Most of them were summary posts saying congrats. There were a couple of common threads that came up. Here’s one common sentiment, from JimPorett.com:

Unfortunately many of us Americans will probably not pay as much attention to the Tour de France, now that Lance has retired. That is a shame because these guys are true athletes and should be respected for that.

Thanks Lance for your example to never give up no matter the odds stacked against us.

It’s probably true that Americans will lose interest, but we’ll have to see next year if any American is even a serious contender. Some other bloggers were bummed that he doesn’t give credit to God for his surviving cancer and his seven victories. It’s an interesting question depending on how you view the world, and marks a departure from what we hear from many other athletes.

The second most blogged story this week was the Pistons signing Jasikevicius. This was the guy that tore up the U.S. during the Olympics for Lithuania. It will be interesting to see how he does here in the U.S. He was arguably the best player in Europe for many years. Looks like the Central Division fans are a bit worried about the new look Pacers:

His addition to a bitter Central Division rival, one that will feature the return of 2004 Defensive Player of the Year Ron Artest, will definitely raise the bar in the Eastern Conference. [ Cavaliers blog at MVN ]

and

I must say, Indiana’s looking very dangerous. O’Neal, Foster, Bender (if he’s magically healthy and learns how to dribble), Artest, Jackson, Granger (he should get a decent amount of PT), F. Jones, Tinsley, Jasikevicius (avoids having to play Anthony Johnson and his brutal jumper). Sure, Jones is the only real SG, but they’ll be alright. They’re better than Miami is right now. Detroit maybe, but certainly the Heat. It’s too bad the dumb division rule is there, the Eastern conference champion will be decided in round two (like we figured it would in the 2005 season before Artest went out). [ Motoring, the Pistons blog at MVN ]

A couple of moves in the NFL, MLB trade rumors, and some of the fallout from the NHL deal (Jagr leaving NHL?) round out the rest of the week’s top blogged stories. Click the link below to see the full list.

(Click here to read the rest of this post)

Here’s the latest sports buzz as defined by bloggers. The following ESPN.com articles were mentioned most often on blogs.

The Pistons blog at MVN, Motoring, has a good take on the top story, Larry Brown’s departure from Detroit. Because of the rumors that started during the playoffs, the story didn’t catch many by surprise. People were still annoyed, though. Read on.

16 – NBA – Pistons, Brown close to buyout of coaching contract [Read Blogs]
9 – GOLF/BRITISHOPEN05 – Woods goes wire to wire for British Open win [Read Blogs]
8 – Page 2 – Bayless: Riff Raff [Read Blogs]
7 – NFL – Super agent: Rosenhaus saves drowning boy [Read Blogs]
7 – http://games.espn.go.com/cgi/flb/OutOfTheBox/index [Read Blogs]
6 – NFL – Owens will report, but ‘won’t be happy’ [Read Blogs]
6 – NHL – Penguins win chance to draft phenom Crosby [Read Blogs]
6 – http://sports.espn.go.com/chat/sportsnation/fiftyfifty/index [Read Blogs]
6 – OLY/TDF2005 – Lance goes all out, wins Stage 20 [Read Blogs]
6 – NHL – NHL, players’ union reaches agreement in principle [Read Blogs]
6 – http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/recap?gameId=250720120 [Read Blogs]
5 – Page 2 – Jackpot Jay: Poker’s 10 commandments [Read Blogs]
5 – http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=4217 [Read Blogs]
5 – MLB – Leiter making Yankees return [Read Blogs]
5 – COLUMNIST – Wojciechowski: The Big One [Read Blogs]
5 – NBA – Net gains: Abdur-Rahim, Robinson agree to deals [Read Blogs]
5 – NCAA – Northwestern flip over White House visit flap [Read Blogs]
5 – http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/simmons/index [Read Blogs]

OK, next time I have an opportunity to go to Finland, I need to try this thing out! Oh man, that’s absolutely ridiculous…