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Morning Buzz

Morning Buzz, October 8, 2003

The Daily Insider
Morning News & Headlines
Wednesday, October 8, 2003
9:00am ET

NHL Breaks New Ad Campaign Today As Season Opens With Three Games

Four Groups Expected To Bid Today To Buy The Nets In First Round Of Auction

Athens Police Officers To Begin Three-Day Protest Today; Threaten Strike

Mock Marathons Today Will Launch Kellogg’s Nutri-Grain Granola Bars & Bites

Marlins Execs Say That Only 15% Of NLCS Tickets Were Sold Out-Of-State

Morning Briefs/In Other News/Laugh Track/TV Monitor/Final Jeopardy!


NHL BREAKS NEW AD CAMPAIGN AS ’03-04 SEASON OPENS TODAY

The NHL season opens tonight with three games, and theleague today will unveil a new TV ad campaign featuring Shania Twain, JimBelushi, Denis Leary, Kiefer Sutherland and Cuba GoodingJr.  Spots featuring Twain andBelushi begin airing today, while the others will roll out over the course ofthe season.  All spots were produced byNHL Productions (NHL). SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL reports that the campaign “will air on the twounits per game the NHL receives on its local and national broadcasts, whichleague officials said equates to $15[M] worth of NHL air time” (SPORTSBUSINESSJOURNAL, 10/6 issue).

USA Today offers an NHL preview bonus section, whichincludes a two-page ad for Dodge; full-page ads for Nextel, DirecTV and ESPN;and a half-page ad for Sirius (THE DAILY).


FOUR GROUPS TO BID ON NETS TODAY IN FIRST ROUND OF AUCTION

The N.Y. TIMES reports that four groups are expected to bidtoday to buy the Nets “in the first round of an auction that could result inthe team’s relocation.”  The biddersinclude “an unidentified real estate developer with holdings on both sides ofthe Hudson River [who] is set to join three bidders known to have been vyingfor the team in recent months;” a group led by N.Y. developer Bruce Ratner;NJ developer Charles Kushner; and Islanders Owner Charles Wang (N.Y.TIMES, 10/8).


ATHENS POLICE OFFICERS WARN OF POSSIBLE STRIKE FOR OLYMPICS

The AP reports that Athens police officers today will begina three-day protest, after warning that they “could strike beforethe Olympics over a long-standing demand to receive hazard pay.”  More than 40,000 police officers “are to be deployed during nextsummer’s Athens Games as part of a $600[M] security plan.”  Police Union spokesperson DimitrisKyriazidis said that his union “will meet tomorrow with the leadership ofthe Greek public order ministry.  If itsdemands are not met,” the union will try to speak with ATHOC President GiannaAngelopoulos-Daskalaki and IOC leadership (AP,10/8).


MOCK MARATHONS TO BE STAGED THIS MORNING IN EIGHT CITIES

MEDIAPOST reported that Relay Sports & Event Marketingthis morning will “stagemock marathons in high-traffic downtown locations of eight major cities” tolaunch Kellogg’s Nutri-Grain Granola Bars and Bites.  Marathoners “clad in business attire and Nutri-Grain race ‘bibs’are scheduled to take part” in races in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, DC, Denver,Milwaukee, Minneapolis and Portland, as the “core creative concept behind alocal media blitz that will run in each of the markets” (MEDIAPOST,10/2).


MORNING BRIEFS

The MIAMI HERALD reports that, in an attempt to “quell fearsthat Cubs fans dominated Internet ticket sales,” Marlins execs said that lessthan 15% of the tickets for this weekend’s Cubs-Marlins NLDS games at ProPlayer Stadium “were sold to out-of-state fans” (MIAMIHERALD, 10/8).

An editorial in today’s N.Y. TIMES comments on a potentialRed Sox-Cubs World Series match-up: “With all due respect to our New Yorkreadership – Yankee fans among them – to George Steinbrenner and to theYankees themselves, we find it hard to resist the emotional tug and symmetricalpossibilities of a series between teams that seem to have been put on earth totantalize and then crush their zealous fans” (N.Y. TIMES, 10/8).

Following Lakers coach Phil Jackson saying that he isconsidering asking Michael Jordan to play with the club in case KobeBryant can not, USA TODAY reports that Jordan “put an abrupt end to anyspeculation about another comeback,” by saying in a brief statement, “It’s a100% no” (USATODAY, 10/8).

The L.A. TIMES reports that the NCAA has “proposed twoadditional ways of measuring the progress of student-athletes towardgraduation,” where each academic measure would be linked to a “so-calledIncentive-Disincentive program that would reward top-performing schools andpunish those that come up short” (L.A.TIMES, 10/8).

The Greensboro NEWS & RECORD reports that Greensborovoters yesterday “cleared the way for a new downtown minor-league baseballstadium, … the first time the city has embraced a baseball-related proposal inthe past decade” (GreensboroNEWS & RECORD, 10/8).

The N.Y. TIMES reports that the U.S. Supreme Court Mondaydecided “not to hear [the] case involving [Mark Weinberg’s] right tosell his muckraking book” on Blackhawks Owner William Wirtz outside theUnited Center.  Weinberg said that hewill “resume peddling his book when the Blackhawks open their season tonight”against the Wild (N.Y.TIMES, 10/8).

The PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER reports that Allan Eric Carlson,a “transplanted Phillies fan now living” in CA, yesterday was arrested by theFBI and “charged with computer-hacking attacks on the Phillies, ThePhiladelphia Inquirer, and Philadelphia Daily News that flooded the team, andsports writers and editors with tens of thousands of e-mailed complaints andexcoriations” (PHILADELPHIAINQUIRER, 10/8).

Giants co-Owner Wellington Mara reacted to JeremyShockey’s criticism of Giants fans by saying, “My response is, what’s he doing looking in the stands?  That’s my job.”  Giants VP/Communications Pat Hanlon: “He said it in a tonethat suggested Shockey’s comments were much ado about nothing” (N.Y. POST, 10/8).

ATTENDANCE WATCH:

  • The DETROIT NEWS reports that a “near-sellout crowd of 20,862” attended last night’s Cavaliers-Pistons NBA exhibition game at The Palace in Auburn Hills, featuring the preseason debut of LeBron James (DETROIT NEWS, 10/8).
  • The CHICAGO SUN-TIMES reports that a crowd of 39,567 attended last night’s Marlins-Cubs NLCS Game One at Wrigley Field (CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, 10/8).

A LIGHTER BUZZ

The MIAMI HERALD reports that South FL resident and“longtime Miami Heat fan Jimmy Buffett played turncoat Tuesday, leadingWrigley fans in the seventh-inning sing-along of Take Me Out to the Ballgame.”An “unapologetic” Buffet said, “I’ve been a Cubs fan for 32 years” (MIAMI HERALD,10/8).


THE BACK PAGES

The Morning Buzz offers today’s back page sportscovers from some of the nation’s major metropolitan tabloids:

N.Y. Daily News
N.Y. Daily News
N.Y. Post
Philadelphia Daily News

TODAY’S EVENTS

USA Basketball and the USCO will conduct a 2:00pm ETconference call to announce the first seven players of the ’04 U.S. Women’sBasketball Team, which will be coached by WNBA Comets coach Van Chancellor.

Sabres Managing Partner Larry Quinn will speak duringSt. Bonaventure Univ.’s Morning Call Executive Breakfast at 8:00am ET.

Cabarrus (NC) Regional Chamber of Commerce CEO John Cox,Cabarrus County Manager John Day and Lowe’s Motor Speedway President HumpyWheeler at 10:00am ET will announce a major increase in the economic impactproduced by the NASCAR Winston Cup Series UAW-GM Quality 500’s move to a nightrace.

The AFL expansion draft will begin at 1:00pm ET, with theNew Orleans Voodoo, Philadelphia Soul and Austin Wranglers participating.


IN OTHER NEWS….

The WALL STREET JOURNAL reports that GE and VivendiUniversal have “finalized their plans to merge Vivendi’s U.S. entertainmentassets with GE’s NBC network, producing a media giant with an estimated valueof $43[B].”  The new conglomerate willbe called NBC Universal (WALLSTREET JOURNAL, 10/8).

The N.Y. TIMES reports that PepsiCo's Q3 '03 income rose from $953M to $1.07B, while total revenue rose 8.4% to $6.83B (N.Y. TIMES, 10/8).

BLOOMBERG NEWS reports that Coca-Cola has “agreed to pay$540,000 to settle two lawsuits by” former Supply Management Finance Dir MatthewWhitley, who “claimed he was improperly fired because he exposed accountingfraud at the company.”  Whitley will bepaid “$100,000 in addition to $140,000 in severance pay.  The company also will pay his attorney’sfees of $300,000” (BLOOMBERGNEWS, 10/8).


FINAL JEOPARDY!

Last night’s “Final Jeopardy!” category was “Famous Lasts.”

“It’s where Sergei Zalyotin switched off the lightson June 15, 2000.”


LAUGH TRACK

THEMONOLOGUES:

CBS’ DavidLetterman: “I’ve heard so much about Arnold Schwarzenegger and GrayDavis, and for some reason I get up this morning, and I go to a high schoolgym looking to vote. ... Arnold Schwarzenegger is very shrewd.  This morning, he tried to expand his lead bygroping minorities. ... According to the Census Bureau, in the last five yearsthe population of California has decreased by 250,000.  In the last five years, a quarter of a millionpeople have left California.  Hey, waituntil tomorrow. ... Everybody is crazy about the Yankees and the Red Soxseries.  As a matter of fact, earliertoday Ted Williams had himself defrosted so he could watch. ... In NewYork, there’s a guy living in a studio apartment, and in the studio apartment,he’s got a 400-pound tiger, and of course, when you have the 400-pound tiger,what do you need to go with it?  Analligator.  The place was crazy.  The cops were tipped off by the parrot. ...The tiger lived on canned tuna and the occasional UPS guy” ("LateShow," CBS, 10/7).

NBC’sJay Leno: “Today, of course, is the election day in California, or as wecall it here, The People’s Choice Awards. They say this could be the largest number of people that voted inCalifornia since ‘American Idol.’ ... Tonight, Davis will find out if he stillhas the job in Sacramento and, of course, tomorrow Gary Coleman willfind out if he still has the job at the mall. ... Voting in Beverly Hills is sostrange.  My polling place is also atanning booth.  You actually punch theballot with a Botox needle. ... In Chicago, garbage collectors are onstrike.  Trash is piling up at the rateof 15,000 tons a day.  So for the firsttime in years, the Cubs don’t stink, but now the city does. ... The Cubs won aplayoff series for the first time in 95 years. This is really strange for the people of Chicago.  Usually this time of year, Wrigley Field isfilled with RVs for sale. ... Kobe Bryant arrived late at the Lakerstraining camp in Hawaii, but the tough part now for Kobe, of course, gettingroom service at the hotel” ("The Tonight Show," NBC, 10/7).

LATENIGHT LAUGHS:

Last night’s Top Ten list was “Top Ten Possible CaliforniaNewspaper Headlines For Tomorrow” ("Late Show," CBS, 10/7).

10) “135-way tie throws state into confusion.”

9) “Gray Davis fails to convince self to vote for self.”

8) “Governor Gary Coleman names Lieutenant Governor Urkel.”

7) “Recall election just elaborate ‘Punk’d’ prank.”

6) “Dejected comedian Gallagher takes sledgehammer to own head.”

5) “Screw the recall.  How did the Cubs and the Red Sox get in the playoffs?”

4) “Millions of Californians move to Nevada.”

3) “Confused Al Gore demands recount.”

2) “Bush reminds nation ‘you can’t recall a president.’”

1) “Maria to Arnold: ‘Why don’t you ever grope me?’”


TUESDAY NIGHT’S TV MONITOR

Net

Show

Lead

Next Items

ESPN

“Around The Horn”

Red Sox-Yankees

Colts-Buccaneers; Lakers

ESPN

“PTI”

Red Sox-A’s

George Steinbrenner; Marlins-Cubs

ESPN

11:00pm ET “SportsCenter”

Cavaliers-Pistons

Lakers; Magic-Mavericks

FSN

“BDSSP”

Red Sox-A’s

Showboating; Red Sox CF Johnny Damon

FSN

“Southern Sports Report”

Dany Heatley

Braves P John Smoltz; Braves losing in NLDS

FSN

“Southwest Sports Report”

Oklahoma-Texas NCAA football

Eagles-Cowboys; Texans-Titans


FINAL JEOPARDY ANSWER

“What was the Mir Space Station?”


If you haveany questions, comments or suggestions, please let us know at:
dailyinsider@sportsbusinessdaily.com

TheMorning Buzz provides an early update of the news and headlines each Mondaythrough Friday at approximately 9:00am ET. If you would like to sign up for ane-mail alert to the Morning Buzz, go to My Account and personalize your e-mail alert options.

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