| | The Daily Insider
Morning News & Headlines
Monday, October 4, 2004
9:00am ET | |
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| • | In Conjunction With League, MLB Playoff Teams Hosting Inaugural Rally Monday |
| • | Bob DuPuy Continuing Talks This Week With Peter Angelos Over Expos Move |
| • | TBS Today To Announce That Chip Caray Will Join Braves Broadcast Team |
| • | Manchester United Receives “Preliminary Approach” About Possible Takeover |
| • | Lehman Brothers Has Advice For The NFL Giants: Build A New Stadium |
| • | Morning Briefs/In Other News/Laugh Track/TV Monitor/Final Jeopardy! |
MLB PLAYOFF TEAMS REVVING UP EXCITEMENT WITH RALLY MONDAY
MLB.com noted that each of the eight playoff-bound MLB clubs, in conjunction with the league, today will host “Rally Monday” at their home ballparks. The festivities are free of charge and “may include live music, giveaways, ultimate fan contests and celebrity appearances.” “Rally Monday” also “gives local and national business partners a chance to capitalize on the excitement of each club’s advancement into the postseason, engaging fans at their giddiest” (MLB.com, 10/3).
View the television schedule for the MLB Playoffs.
MLB teams drew league-record 73,022,969 fans this season, a 3.8% increase over the previous record of 72,748,970 and 8.1% higher than last year’s total of 67,568,397. Average attendance per game was 30,401, the third-highest ever (MLB.com, 10/3).
MLB runs a full-page ad in USA Today congratulating Ichiro Suzuki on setting the single-season hits record with 262. The ad reads, “When you hold the single-season hits record, everyone knows you by your first name. Congratulations, Ichiro” (THE DAILY).
DUPUY AND ANGELOS CONTINUING EXPOS NEGOTIATIONS THIS WEEK
The WASHINGTON POST reports that MLB President & COO Bob DuPuy and Orioles Owner Peter Angelos will resume negotiations this week on a compensation package to offset the Expos’ relocation to Washington, DC. The two “met for several hours yesterday.” Among the bargaining points is whether MLB will guarantee that the Orioles “earn a minimum amount of annual revenue. Another point is how long the guarantee will last” (WASHINGTON POST, 10/4).
CHIP CARAY JOINING FATHER ON BRAVES’ BROADCAST TEAM
USA TODAY reports that TBS today will formally announce that Cubs broadcaster Chip Caray will join the net’s Braves coverage alongside current broadcasters Pete Van Wieren, Joe Simpson, Don Sutton and Chip’s father, Skip. Caray and his WGN partner, Steve Stone, were criticized by Cubs players and coaches this past season for being “insufficiently supportive of the team” (USA TODAY, 10/4). Chip Caray said of his decision, “It’s not about the Cubs. The Cubs have treated me and my family better than anyone” (CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, 10/4).
WGN offered Chip Caray a new contract, but it included “only a nominal raise over his estimated salary of $400,000 per year” (CHICAGO TRIBUNE, 10/3).
MANU RECEIEVES “PRELIMINARY APPROACH” TO BUY CLUB
Manchester United today confirmed to the London Stock Exchange that they have received a “preliminary approach” regarding a possible offer to buy the club. The announcement “follows increased speculation” that Buccaneers Owner Malcolm Glazer is planning to meet with ManU CEO David Gill “later this month to discuss a possible takeover” (TELEGRAPH.co.uk, 10/4).
MORNING BRIEFS
Lehman Bros. has told NFL Giants execs that they “should build a new home.” While Giants Exec VP & COO John Mara favors a $700M stadium, co-Owner Robert Tisch favors a $300[M] renovation to Giants Stadium (Newark STAR-LEDGER, 10/2).
The N.Y. DAILY NEWS reported that the “buzz” is that Mets Owner Fred Wilpon has “held a number of ‘productive’ conversations with Time Warner suits about becoming his partner” in creating his own TV network (N.Y. DAILY NEWS, 10/3).
The NLL over the weekend reached a three-year CBA with the Professional Lacrosse Players’ Association. The agreement runs through the ’07 season and includes a 4.3% increase in average salary over the life of the deal (NLL).
Jaguars Owner Wayne Weaver bought the remaining 1,500 tickets that needed to be sold Friday to avoid a blackout of yesterday’s Colts-Jaguars game. Weaver donated the tickets to workers who took part in hurricane relief (FLORIDA TIMES-UNION, 10/2).
Blue Jays television announcer John Cerutti “was found dead in his hotel room” before yesterday’s game against the Yankees. It is believed that Cerutti died of natural causes (AP, 10/3).
A LIGHTER BUZZ
The Ft. Lauderdale SUN-SENTINEL reports that before the season, Marlins President David Samson, who last season “correctly predicted the Marlins would win 91 games, gave four local media members sealed envelopes with instructions not to open them until the last day of the regular season. The envelopes presumably had another prediction, but instead they contained pieces of a message that when put together read: ‘Gentleman, of course I am retired.’” Samson: “How would it be possible to top my accuracy of last year? I am the Barry Sanders of predictions” (Ft. Lauderdale SUN-SENTINEL, 10/4).
THE BACK PAGES
The Morning Buzz offers today’s back page sports covers from some of the nation’s major metropolitan tabloids:
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| N.Y. Post | N.Y. Daily News |
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| Philadelphia Daily News | Newsday |
TODAY’S EVENTS
Fox Sports will host a 1:00pm ET conference call to discuss its coverage of the MLB Playoffs. Fox Sports President Ed Goren and the “MLB on Fox” broadcast team of Thom Brennaman and Tim McCarver will participate.
ESPN will host a conference call at 2:00pm ET to discuss its coverage of the MLB Playoffs. ESPN Senior Coordinating Producer Tim Scanlan and broadcasters Jon Miller, Joe Morgan and Steve Phillips will participate.
DaimlerChrysler will announce that the Dodge Charger “will return to NASCAR next season for the first time since 1977” (USA TODAY, 10/4).
The Single-A South Atlantic League Greensboro Bats today become the Greensboro Grasshoppers. The nickname change “coincides with the franchise’s move into a new downtown stadium for the 2005 season.” The Grasshoppers’ Web site also becomes operational today (Greensboro NEWS & RECORD, 10/4).
FCC Chair Michael Powell will host a 10:00am ET press conference at FCC HQs in DC to kick off an educational campaign to highlight the importance of digital TV. Officials from ESPN, Fox, CBS, HBO, Discovery, NCTA, CEA, DirecTV and Emmis Communications will participate.
WEEKEND RAP
The following are excerpts from the panelists’ “parting shots” on Sunday’s edition of ESPN’s “The Sports Reporters”:
- Miami Herald columnist Dan LeBatard, on Giants LF Barry Bonds: “We love our clubs down in South Beach, but Barry Bonds is in danger of entering the worse one in sports. … The name of the club: Best Athlete Without A Title. I know, I know, it’s an awful name, has no ring to it. Barry Bonds, the biggest and best member ever, is still outside, fighting off the bouncers with a baseball bat.”
- N.Y. Daily News columnist Mike Lupica: “In the hours after Kobe Bryant was accused of forcing sex on a woman in Colorado, … he told investigators that Shaquille O’Neal has paid up to a million dollars to get himself out of what Bryant called ‘situations like this.’ Shaq came right back by calling Kobe a clown. … So even though the two of them aren’t teammates anymore, they’re still engaging in something that almost always sounds to me like lifestyles of the rich and famous for dummies, the next installment of which really should come on Christmas Day when it will be on national TV. … It’ll be a lot harder for Kobe to shut up Shaq than it will that young woman from Colorado.”
- K.C. Star columnist Jason Whitlock, on Chiefs head coach Dick Vermeil: “Vermeil delegates everything. His 20-man assistant coaching staff is one of the largest in the NFL. … My suspicion is Vermeil doesn’t really want to coach as bad as he use to.”
- ESPN’s John Saunders: “What a glorious time it is to be a sports fan (with Bonds chasing the home run record, Lance Armstrong winning his sixth Tour de France and the success of the Athens Games), but everything I have mentioned has a cloud of suspicion (of drug use and doping) hanging above. … I’m afraid we’re missing the trap of this suspicion. What if kids believe these guys are cheating and decide if it’s okay for the pros it’s okay for them?” (“The Sports Reporters,” ESPN, 10/3).
Heard elsewhere over the weekend:
- Dale Earnhardt Jr., when asked what it meant to have won at Talladega Superspeedway for the fifth time in his career: “It don’t mean shit right now. Daddy won here ten times.” The expletive caught by NBC’s microphones “drew an immediate on-air apology from race anchor Bill Weber, as well as attention from NASCAR officials, who scurried over to the post-race celebration to inform the team the matter was under review” (CHARLOTTE OBSERVER, 10/4).
- ESPN’s Mike Ditka, on Cowboys SS Roy Williams being fined for hitting Redskins WR Laveranues Coles: “Be careful you don’t take hitting out of football” (“Sunday NFL Countdown,” ESPN, 10/3).
- CBS Sports’ Shannon Sharpe, on the Colts reaching the Super Bowl: “I have a better chance of hitting a grand slam home run in Yankee Stadium with a toothpick than they have of winning the Super Bowl with that defense” (CBS, 10/3).
- Nike Air Zoom Vick II Designer E. Scott Morris, on Michael Vick: “He brought shoes with him from day one. Met him at the restaurant and he had a bag of shoes. ‘Let me show you my favorite shoes, let me show you, E,’ and I’m thinking, ‘Wow, this guy’s got his own stuff’” (Fox Sports, 10/3).
THIS WEEK IN SISTER PUBLICATION SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL…..
This week’s front-page story examines new IMG Owner Ted Forstmann’s plans for the agency.
| Also in this week’s issue: |
| • | Five founding sponsors step up for Dew Action Sports Tour. |
| • | Broncos Owner Pat Bowlen builds a mile-high reputation. |
| • | MLB Cardinals may prove profitable despite high payroll. |
| • | One-On-One with AFL Properties Exec VP Glenn Horine. |
IN OTHER NEWS….
This week’s cover of TIME examines “Visions of Tomorrow,” while NEWSWEEK offers “Off The Ropes.”
The N.Y. TIMES reported that the Hallmark Channel has “hit upon a novel way to nurture its business relationships: having executives of its corporate partners play murder victims in original movies.” Hallmark Channel VP/Network Program Publicity Pam Slay: “It’s a little something to entice and excite the affiliates” (N.Y. TIMES, 10/3).
FINAL JEOPARDY!
Friday’s “Final Jeopardy!” category was “Americanisms.”
“Around 1900 Monroe Rosenfeld remarked that the music heard along NYC’s 28th Street sounded like this.”
LAUGH TRACK
THE MONOLOGUES:
CBS’ David Letterman: “It’s the beginning of the cold and flu season, so be very, very careful. Do you want to know how I know? I was walking through Central Park today on my lunch hour, and I saw a little old lady sitting on a bench tossing Sucrets to the pigeons. … The presidential debates was a big night either way you look at it, and for the first time in his life, Jim Lehrer was the most exciting person in the room. … Bush and Kerry debated foreign policy in Miami last night. Is Miami having a bad year or what? Haven’t these people suffered enough? Last night’s debate was on foreign policy and if you saw it, you know that Bush spent the entire evening gloating about the arrest of Cat Stevens. … One of the ground rules for the debate was Bush and Kerry were not allowed to touch during the debates, but don’t worry, they made up for it after the show. … That’s it for George Bush. He will not have to be in the next debate. His dad got him out of it” (“Late Show,” CBS, 10/1).
NBC’s Jay Leno: “Did you watch the debate last night or as the networks are calling it, ‘Rich White Guy Survivor.’ … It’s like a boxing match: the big head versus the airhead. … I guess a lot of people felt Kerry won the debate last night. Even a lot of Bush supporters felt he won. Bush did not have a good night if you saw it. He hadn’t choked that bad since the last time he had a pretzel. … You know the debate I want to see: Shaq versus Kobe. I don’t know what Kobe is doing. This is pretty sleazy to me. Apparently, Kobe Bryant told Denver police that Shaquille O’Neal paid women millions of dollars to keep quiet even though there’s never ever been a charge like that against Shaq. Although, there was a rumor that Shaq’s record company once paid Shaq to keep quiet. … Good news for CBS. According to a poll, 56% of people asked thought Dan Rather made an honest mistake. The bad news: the poll was taken by Dan Rather” (“The Tonight Show,” NBC, 10/1).
LATE NIGHT LAUGHS:
Friday night’s Top Ten list was “Top Ten Highlights Of Last Night’s Presidential Debate” (“Late Show,” CBS, 10/1).
| 10) “Bush tearing apart Kerry’s podium in a futile search for weapons of mass destruction.” |
| 9) “Thanks to make-up, Cheney pulled off a surprisingly good Bush impersonation.” |
| 8) “Moderator Jim Lehrer’s ‘girlfriend’ who was obviously a hooker.” |
| 7) “When the camera was on Bush, Kerry was giving him the finger.” |
| 6) “Kerry’s attempt to reach the youth vote by saying, ‘Yo yo – let’s stick it to W., so I can get my props up in the White Hizzy, yo.’” |
| 5) “John Kerry’s stirring rendition of Jeffrey Osborne’s ‘On the Wings of Love.’” |
| 4) “A belligerent Ralph Nader being tasered by Secret Service.” |
| 3) “Bush’s taunting that he nailed Teresa.” |
| 2) “Bush and Kerry greeting each other with a wet, open-mouth kiss.” |
| 1) “Whenever the proceedings lagged, Oprah came out to give away cars.” |
Skateboarders Tony Hawk, Andy MacDonald and Lincoln Ueda appeared on Friday’s edition of NBC’s “The Tonight Show,” where they performed stunts and tricks on a skateboard ramp from Hawk’s Boom Boom Huck Jam Tour outside the studio. Hawk, on when he decided skateboarding would be his career: “Right around my later years in high school when I started making a pretty good living with endorsements and competition earnings and royalties. … I was making near six figures and my senior year of high school I bought a house. It’s a little hard to focus on your schoolwork, though, when you have that freedom.” Hawk, on his newest video game, “Tony Hawk’s Underground 2”: “These keep going. I’m just amazed that we got to do one at all and then we get to do ‘Underground 2.’ The technology keeps getting better so our game keeps getting better. It’s a lot of fun. … I’m just trying to keep it authentic. My allegiance is to the skate world. I want it to be fun to play but I don’t want it to be too goofy” (“The Tonight Show,” NBC, 10/1).
SUNDAY NIGHT’S TV MONITOR
ESPN’s 2:00am ET edition of “SportsCenter” led with the Astros defeating the Rockies to win the National League Wild Card, followed by Patriots-Bills.
WEEKEND BOX OFFICE
The HOLLYWOOD REPORTER notes that the $71.9M combined gross of “Shark Tale” and “Ladder 49” was “greater than the sum total of all films last weekend.” The estimated total for the top 12 films was $104.5M, a 31% increase from the comparable weekend last year. The total for all films is forecast to be in the mid- to high-$110M range, up from last year’s $92.3M (HOLLYWOOD REPORTER, 10/4).
| Title | Weekend | Cumulative |
| “Shark Tale” | $49.1M | $49.1M |
| “Ladder 49” | $22.8M | $22.8M |
| “The Forgotten” | $12.0M | $38.3M |
| “Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow” | $3.4M | $30.7M |
| “Mr. 3000” | $2.6M | $19.2M |
| “Woman Thou Art Loosed” | $2.5M | $2.5M |
| “Shaun of the Dead” | $2.4M | $6.9M |
| “Resident Evil: Apocalypse” | $2.3M | $47.0M |
| “First Daughter” | $2.2M | $7.1M |
| “Cellular” | $2.0M | $28.2M |
FINAL JEOPARDY ANSWER
“What are tin pans?”
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