Satirical news outlet 'The Onion' spoofs sportscasts

Chris Zelkovich

thestar.com


If you happen to confuse Wednesday’s Canadian debut of the Onion SportsDome with real sports highlights, then the creators of the new comedy show have done their job.

It’s the latest project from the satirical news outlet The Onion and aims to entertain, satirize and confuse.

“What we’re trying to accomplish is what The Onion is always trying to accomplish, which is to misinform people as much as possible, deceive them and trick them into thinking they’re watching real news,” says Jack Kukoda, co-executive producer and head writer of the show that’s scheduled to run 10 episodes on the Comedy Network (Wednesdays, 10 p.m.).

The show is a bang-on takeoff on ESPN’s SportsCenter and will strike a chord with Canadians because TSN’s SportsCentre and its counterparts on The Score and Rogers Sportsnet look so much like the American version.

The overheated, overly serious delivery peppered with catchphrases are only slightly exaggerated versions of what sports fans see every night on honest-to-goodness sports shows. The stories? Not so much.

On the other hand, a report on NHL commissioner Gary Bettman staging a fake kidnapping to bring much-needed publicity to “his strange ice sport” looks quite real, as does another detailing NBA rule changes inspired by LeBron James, Chris Bosh and Dwyane Wade (“dribbling will be optional if you’re planning to do a really sweet dunk.”)

It’s hilarious at times, tasteless at others. And a rapid-fire segment entitled “Who Would You Kill?” couldn’t have come at a worse time considering the events of the past week.

Kukoda says that although it isn’t always in good taste, the beauty of the show is that it has no limits.

“It’s less like The Daily Show, which is reacting to real events, but more The Onion style where we’re not bound by reality,” he says.

We asked five Canadian sportscasters to give their impressions of the show.

• Jim Van Horne, College of Sports Media television co-ordinator and former sports anchor:

“I really loved the banter between the hosts. It’s a real shot at your typical sportscaster.

“ Every guy who’s been on the air has done what you see there, me included. If anybody denies that they haven’t done that at some point, they’re lying.

“We all want to use the jargon, the clichés and come across as the macho man.

“I’m curious to see how long it is before somebody takes one of these stories seriously. Somebody will because it’s so authentic-looking. It looks just like ESPN or TSN.”

• Renee Paquette, The Score:

“I absolutely loved it. The way they executed it was bang on.

“Somebody totally will take this seriously, because so many of the announcers’ opinions are the same ones the common sports fan would have.

“I don’t think I saw myself there because I don’t think I have the typical sportscaster delivery.

“There were a few things that made me think they shouldn’t have done that, but it’s on the Comedy Network so they might as well go for it. . . . I felt guilty about laughing at some of the stuff, but it was funny.”

• James Duthie, TSN host and former anchor:

“I laughed a few times. The National Crystal Meth Hallucination League was pretty funny.

“The challenge this show will have is that many of us realize how silly some of the things we do are, and so we already parody ourselves.

“We do that on The Quiz. Jay Onrait and Dan O’Toole do it on SportsCentre every morning. It’s much easier to make fun of something when it takes it self too seriously, like The Daily Show does with U.S. politics and news.

“We try not to take ourselves too seriously. At least most of the time.”

• Sean McCormick, former Sportsnet anchor:

“I thought it was comedy genius.

“It does a pretty good job of taking every stereotype about sports announcers and making fun of it.

“I loved the interplay between the hosts, but the one guy looked a bit too much like Stephen Colbert. They’re trying to piggyback on that, but the stereotypes were bang on, from the BlackBerry on the desk and the line about the announcer being glad he doesn’t have a family. You know who those guys are.

“I’m setting my PVR now. That’s destination viewing for me.”

• Tas Melas, The Score:

“There are some great writers on that team, but I kind of question how they can sustain those storylines for 10 episodes. Sportswriting/comedy writing is a pretty hard road to travel.

“I’m not sure it’s possible. Some of the storylines, like the Miami Heat story, happened seven months ago. That’s a bit stale.

“I loved the whole story about St. Louis trying to keep Albert Pujols by giving him the keys to every building in the city and letting him sleep in your basement.”

"Janet Jackson's 'wardrobe malfunction' was so crass and so sleazy that Fox television is launching its own investigation why they didn't do it first."

- Craig Kilborn

Debunking the billion-viewers myth
WILLIAM HOUSTON
Globe and Mail

CBS’s Sunday morning Face the Nation will be based at Dolphin Stadium. CBS will provide six hours of pregame programming, starting at noon on Sunday. Features will include Randy Cross reporting from Baghdad on a flag football game involving U.S. troops.

The Super Bowl audience
The 1967 game (Green Bay Packers-Kansas City Chiefs) drew 51.2 million viewers. However, CBS's 1967 rating (percentage of households tuned in) was 41.1, not far off last year's 41.6 for ABC's telecast.

Cost of Commercials
In 1967, a 30-second spot fetched $40,000 (all figures U.S.) — $245,000 when adjusted for inflation. This year, CBS is charging a record $2.6-million.
Super Bowl's Greatest Commercials will be on tonight at 9pm (CBS)

# of countries
It will be aired in 232 countries and territories by 54 international broadcasters in 33 languages.
# of cameras
Dolphin Stadium will be loaded with HDTV cameras, 47 in total, compared with the 18 to 20 that are used for a National Football League playoff game. Included will be two goal-post cameras, robotic cameras near the coaches, two in the broadcast booth, one on a tower atop a CBS building in Miami and four in the hallways near the locker rooms. A new lighting system will assimilate the existing lights in the stadium to produce a clearer HDTV picture. The CBS broadcast crew will number 500.

# of viewers
The Super Bowl does not draw a worldwide TV audience of one billion.
According to SportsBusiness Daily, last year's game (Pittsburgh Steelers-Seattle Seahawks) was watched by 98 million viewers, 90.7 million of whom were in the United States. (In Canada, Global Television drew 4.28 million.)
The World Cup soccer final (Italy-France) led 2006 sports audiences with 260 million. The Turin Olympics' opening ceremony drew 87 million. Barcelona-Arsenal in the UEFA Champions League final had 86 million.

Hyper-Jocksniffing vs. uber-cynicism?

Teams divulge secrets to broadcasters
WILLIAM HOUSTON
Globe and Mail

Long before the Super Bowl starts, CBS broadcasters Jim Nantz and Phil Simms will know in a good amount of detail each team's game plan.
In fact, it goes further than that. They could very well know what the opening set of plays will be.
This extraordinary access is the domain of the television broadcast rights holders only. While sportswriters and broadcasters assemble for prearranged sessions this week, CBS will get the real story behind closed doors.
Yesterday, Nantz and Simms described just how far inside National Football League rights holders can get.
Today and tomorrow, Nantz and Simms, along with CBS's Super Bowl director and producer will meet in a room with the coaching staff and perhaps also the quarterbacks of the Chicago Bears and Indianapolis Colts, respectively.
Nantz described a hypothetical scene in which Colts quarterback Peyton Manning will come in and talk about a special formation he will use for throwing deep touchdown passes.
Nothing is electronically recorded, but notes are taken. And, of course, everything is confidential.
"It's a huge responsibility, because, after you walk out of the second meeting with the second team, you know what the game plan is for each side," Nantz said yesterday. "And you know if someone is prepared to counter what the other has cooked up."
Nantz noted that care has to be taken to not frame a question in a way that tips off one team about the other's strategy. "Obviously, your questioning can't be leading," he said. "You can't steer them in the direction. So, you have to be careful in that respect."
For Simms, the game analyst, the information is invaluable. He gave an example of what the Colts might tell him: "If this week, the Colts say they have a special offence, that they're going to come out with five wide receivers and no huddle and it's going to be really, really, fast — if they tell us that, we'll know why they're doing it and what they're trying to accomplish. So, we'll be ready for it, instead of guessing at what they're doing."
The co-operation of coaching staffs over the course of a season is often measured by the success of the team. But more often than not, they are surprisingly forthcoming.
"We're sometimes amazed by how long they want us to stay in the room and just chat," Nantz said. "Peyton Manning will come in and, after an hour, you want to say, 'Don't you have something else you need to be doing right now?' "
The relationship between the two sides, of course, is based on trust. If the information ever leaked, the network wouldn't get back in the room.
"If you ever go into those meetings and violate anything that's been told to you, you will never have that access again," Nantz said.

Fyi: By the age of 70, today children will have spent 7 to 10 years of their lives watching TV

Our free TV ride nearing end?
Rob Brodie

How important is Hockey Night in Canada to your Saturday nights?
Enough that the thought of shelling out a few bucks to keep it beaming into your living room won't dim your passion for the oldest, most beloved tradition in Canadian sports television?
No, we're not suggesting for a minute that this CBC icon is headed for the world of pay-per-view. But it's a question that jumps to mind this week as the CRTC delves into a series of hearings that could affect exactly how much money you'll have to fork over on future cable or satellite television bills.
On the one side, you've got a group of "over the air" conventional networks -- CTV, Global and CBC among them -- asking for the same type of "fee for carriage" that specialty and digital channels now enjoy (initially awarded to compensate for their higher placement on the various tiers of channels).
Then, there's the cable and satellite guys, who want no part of the added fees because a) they think the conventional networks are doing just fine, thank you, without them, and b) they have every intention of passing the extra cost on to their customers if it goes through (and guess who's going to have to take the angry calls about it all?).
In the middle are folks like me who can remember the days when we didn't pay a dime for any TV channels, and got just about all we needed with the right antenna. Ah, but that was long before the world of specialty and digital television arrived. Who knew the wonders that a TSN or Rogers Sportsnet or The Score, or any of the dozens of other sports-specific networks that now exist, could bring into our lives?
All that being said, it'll be interesting to see the reaction to the new fees if they are indeed approved. Cable mogul Ted Rogers told the CRTC hearings he figures it would add about $5 to each customer's tab, and that he'd make sure a line on their bills would tell one and all who was responsible for the increase (the networks point out the cable guys add new charges all the time, and not always for a good reason).
Some folks will see $5 for what it is to their home budget -- less than 20 cents a day -- and not bat an eyelash. Others will be outraged at the thought of paying anything extra for something they've basically gotten for free their entire lives.
But, then again, isn't that the way our world is going these days? And just another indication that nothing, it seems, stays free forever.