MEDIA ROUNDTABLE GRADES FOX' COVERAGE WITH MOSTLY GOOD MARKS
While much of the story of Fox' first season of NASCAR
coverage has been fueled by the increase in ratings, the
network's coverage has also been a critical success.
Recently, THE DAILY conducted a roundtable discussion with
The Sporting News' Lee Spencer, the Charlotte Observer's
David Poole, the Gaston Gazette's Monte Dutton, the
Nashville Tennessean's Larry Woody and the Philadelphia
Daily News' Bill Fleischman to get their views on Fox.
GENERAL REAX: Poole acknowledges that Dale Earnhardt's
death in February had a major effect on driving the TV
audience to NASCAR, which has resulted in improved ratings.
Poole: "What's happened is that the sport has managed to
hold onto a relatively small percentage -- but nonetheless
an important percentage -- of those viewers." In discussing
Fox' coverage as a whole, TSN's Spencer calls it "excellent.
The technology has extenuated the broadcast, and bringing in
people who are familiar with the sport from the inside is
certainly giving credence to what Fox does." Fleischman
says Fox has been "better than good in a deal that they've
never done before." Fleischman says Larry McReynolds and
Darrell Waltrip "are good together," while Mike Joy is "a
pretty good traffic director that keeps them on the right
path." Woody says the broadcast personalities "play off
each other well. I would compare the Waltrip-McReynolds-Joy
team to the early ABC 'Monday Night Football' team of
Gifford, Cosell and Meredith." Poole agrees: "There's
almost a Cosell factor developing with Darrell."
LOOK, FEEL, SOUND: Dutton: "The resources that Fox is
dedicating to the coverage are quite obviously far beyond
what has been done in the past." While Dutton says
announcers "seem a little late getting to developments,"
that is "more than compensated by the fact that they have so
many camera angles and in-car cameras." Poole says while
Fox has kept the basic broadcast "fairly intact," it has
"definitely put its own mark on the broadcasts and has
presented racing that's both comfortable and yet appealing."
SHOULD TAPE-DELAY BE CHANGED? All of the writers
question Fox' tape-delay strategy in certain markets. Woody
is unconvinced that race fans "will follow the sport in the
long-term on a tape-delayed basis." Dutton calls it "a
major problem" and suggests "it might be beneficial for Fox
to arrange some sort of alternative relationship so that
NASCAR could have live coverage on FSN in that area."
Spencer: "It's confusing when you can't find a race when you
are a dedicated race fan, and one of the largest selling
points that they made with this TV deal was the consistency
of knowing where to find the broadcasts every week. But
then when you look at markets like Boston and New York and
they're completely excluded from live broadcasts, I find
that hard to take." But Poole calls tape-delay an
"overblown story. ... Over time, there will be better
coordination among Fox affiliates."
This story appeared in The Sports Business Daily's Special Motorsports
Marketing issue published on May 25, 2001.
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