ON THE DL
Spring Training Begins With Tim Kurkjian
Tim Kurkjian of ESPN joins the show on the day Spring Training officially starts (you know, with games).
We give Kurkjian an intro that sounds ripped right from one of his ESPN reports and wonder if the man knows everything about the sport (note: the Elias Sports Bureau is the greatest organization on Earth).
I ask him, as a DC-area native, what he thinks of the Nationals and what would be worse -- having a terrible team or no team at all?
We then take a look at the sub-head of his book “From A-Rod’s Heart to Zim’s Head” to talk about the current situation surrounding A-Rod. Does Kurkjian still think he’s the best player of the last decade? How do we delineate greatness anymore?
On Tirico & Van Pelt, Kurkjian said, of A-Rod:
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“I’m not going to say he’s stupid. But he’s not the smartest guy in the world. I mean, he’s a baseball player. Let’s be honest about this. He didn’t go to college. He’s not prepared to handle the type of heat that he’s come under. Most people – really, really educated people – wouldn’t be able to handle this kind of heat. And clearly he hasn’t handled it very well.”
It’s a great quote, and it leads to the question of why his handlers aren’t, you know, HANDLING THIS. Has everyone around him let him down?
That leads to a very interesting discussion about getting what you can out of an interview when you’ve been told certain things are off limits. I ask if Kurkjian has ever pulled out of an interview because the terms were too stringent, and he gives a great example of an interview with Jason Giambi to illustrate how reporters often have to dance to get what they need.
We bring up the other 103 names (not the actual names) and I ask, with the whole steroid era still looming over the game, if he feels duped or cheated as a reporter. This leads to a debate about whose responsibility it is to break these stories. Beat writers? Tim thinks no.
Which leads us to the Hall of Fame -- Kurkjian is a voter -- and wonder if any player will ever get 100-percent of the vote (Greg Maddox). How has this not happened yet? And is there a difference between a first-ballot HOFer and a guy like Jim Rice? Clearly to some media members there is a difference.
With the bankruptcy hearings the top story in Philadelphia right now, I ask Kurkjian if we’re making more of this ‘end of newspapers’ than we need to. This happened with records/cassettes/CDs in the music industry, but we still listen to music. Isn’t news news, no matter how we consume it? As an old newspaper guy, he takes umbrage with that notion.
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“I’ve acknowledged several times on that show that ‘this is the stupidest show I’ve ever been on.’ And I really mean that and I actually mean that in a really nice way. You suspend all journalism, obviously, when you go on that show, and I’ve made the point several times that I used to be a journalist, but now I’m a cartoon character when I go on their show.”
What makes them different....
It’s great to have baseball back.
Link to this:
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Thursday, February 26, 2009
Above is the entire show. At the bottom, or by clicking the header, you can link to subscribe to the show.
Below are some highlights from the show, for the ADD afflicted, like me.
CLIPS
Buy the new On the DL merchandise for 2009! While supplies last (which means forever).
Watch the Astros piece, including Oswalt’s comments, here.
Don’t forget to come back Monday morning for the first week of On the DL Daily.
