L.A.-based Fox Sports Net took out a half-page
recruitment ad in Sunday's sports sections of the Hartford
Courant and New Haven Register, according to Tom Hoffarth of
the L.A. DAILY NEWS, who wonders who in the Hartford/New
Haven area "might happen to be the target audience?" The
ad, featuring a palm tree, read in part, "Work in a cold
environment? In a dead-end opportunity? Want to heat up
your career? Come join us in Los Angeles. ... Drive your
career forward and put your current situation in the rear-
view mirror." Fox Sports Net Exec Producer Scott Ackerson,
"well aware" that ESPN is based in Bristol, stated, "Since
it's graduation time, we just wanted to make sure people at
the University of Connecticut School of Broadcasting know
where to find us." FSN's Keith Olbermann, on the ads: "For
those ESPN employees who can afford to buy a newspaper, it's
a godsend." Meanwhile, Hoffarth writes that Ackerson has
been "on the cutting edge of the Internet-friendly, analyst-
loaded reshaping of" FSN's nightly show, "The National
Sports Report." Hoffarth: "For the last month, [the show]
has taken the typical 'SportsCenter' format to new high-tech
heights." Ackerson: "I think we've taken a good first
step. ... From the people I've talked to -- not in TV -- the
most universal thing they like is the analysts getting
involved in the highlights. Now we've got to get better at
picking the right things to show. We've lacked a bit in
that." Hoffarth notes that ESPN's "SportsCenter" has
"already borrowed the live news-flash across the bottom of
the screen that Fox began using on its major highlights
show. Which it borrowed from ESPN2's nightly practice. And
didn't CNN Headline News actually start it?" Ackerson:
"What it shows me, despite what you'll hear from our
neighbors to the north, is they do notice what we're doing,
they care about it" (L.A. DAILY NEWS, 5/19).
OLBERMANN'S POST-MORTEM ON "SPORTS NIGHT": Olbermann,
on ABC dropping "Sports Night" from its primetime schedule:
"I might've been the show's biggest fan, even though it
diverged wildly from what doing a show like that is really
like. ... This is as great an accomplishment as any fiction
can claim, getting people who were in the belly of the beast
to suspend their disbelief and perceive a larger truth.
It's called art, and it's no big surprise that ABC screwed
it up." More Olbermann, on the show's main characters, "Dan
Rydell" and "Casey McCall," being based on Olbermann and his
former ESPN partner Dan Patrick: "Disney had me once, in
fact, and lived to regret allowing me to leave, and now
they've had 'me' once in fiction, and will live to regret
allowing 'me' to leave. ("Sports Night") was their finest
show, and their inability to succeed with it is the
network's shame" (David Barron, HOUSTON CHRONICLE, 5/19).
