Bt Sport Coverage

[stevebrum]

Nothing wrong with Pearson and Tatum on TV. Much prefer there exuberance.

[ray c]

3 hours ago, ytsejam said:

I know that in your eyes EVERYTHING connected to speedway is always perfect, but put your tongue away please just for ONCE and actually LISTEN to his commentary next time two riders pass each other on the final lap of a GP race for example.....it will be screams and noises, NO WORDS. Now go and compare that to how a proper professional commentator i.e. Lanning, used to do it. 

Then come back with your stupid comments if you still think Pearson doesnt sound like a monkey in comparison!

Just think you could be listening to ermolenko then you have something to moan about !!!

[PHILIPRISING]

4 hours ago, ytsejam said:

I know that in your eyes EVERYTHING connected to speedway is always perfect, but put your tongue away please just for ONCE and actually LISTEN to his commentary next time two riders pass each other on the final lap of a GP race for example.....it will be screams and noises, NO WORDS. Now go and compare that to how a proper professional commentator i.e. Lanning, used to do it. 

Then come back with your stupid comments if you still think Pearson doesnt sound like a monkey in comparison!

I HAVE been a vocal and vociferous critic of many things in speedway for over 50 years and could come up with a long list of things that are wrong with the sport today. Nigel just screams, sounds like a monkey, doesn't use any words. Do you actually read what you write? Of course, he is not everyone's cup of tea, no one is, but your comments are so ludicrous that no one will take them seriously. 

[hyderd]

14 hours ago, ytsejam said:

I know that in your eyes EVERYTHING connected to speedway is always perfect, but put your tongue away please just for ONCE and actually LISTEN to his commentary next time two riders pass each other on the final lap of a GP race for example.....it will be screams and noises, NO WORDS. Now go and compare that to how a proper professional commentator i.e. Lanning, used to do it. 

Then come back with your stupid comments if you still think Pearson doesnt sound like a monkey in comparison!

Change the record,if you don't like the commentating, turn the sound off. 

[ProudtobeaBrummie]

13 hours ago, stevebrum said:

Nothing wrong with Pearson and Tatum on TV. Much prefer there exuberance.

Completely agree i never understand why all the hate for them and Pearson in particular who does a lot to try and  promote the sport.

[Catalan]

If anyone had the misfortune of watching the boat race yesterday will know what crap commentary is.

Nigel Pearson certainly a lot better.

[ray c]

agree nigel is 100% committed in what he does . doing simon steads meeting on the center green today as well

Edited March 25, 2018 by ray c

[RobMcCaffery]

Here we go again. New 'name'. same old tired, obsessive argument....

The late Dave Lanning once commented on his lively style that he would get messages in his earpiece from his director "Rave Dave, RAVE!".

There seems to be an attitude amongst motor sport producers and directors that the commentators have to snarl like the engines and be extremely over the top, in the style of Murray Walker.

If people think that commentators have a free choice then they are deluded. 

Nigel Pearson has worked extensively for both Sky and Talksport which are associated and both look for the controversial and sensational in the same way a 'red top' tabloid newspaper would. There's a market for it and while it may irritate those who know something about the subject the commentary team is normally focussing on the casual viewer who in a TV broadcast are probably in the majority. Nigel often says "It's all about opinions". Well, I wouldn't agree but then I favour a different form of journalism. It doesn't make him wrong and me right. It's just that different people have different needs.

I was rightly criticised for my commentaries that they weren't lively enough, but then I made the mistake of pitching what I said to those who loved and understood the sport instead of simply trying to sensationalise, which to be honest is what most sports commentary tends to be these days outside the BBC. It didn't help in my case that I never got to see or hear my own work. I couldn't receive the channel and everyone was far too busy to let me have copies. Now I realise how I could and should have changed.

Returning to the present, the stupid trend to make everything totally black or totally white shows up in the backward majesty's inane claim that Pearson and Tatum just gibber and shout incoherently and is disturbingly familiar and echos the same endless repetition by contributors who seemed to disappear just before another new name took up the 'divine cause'. It's ironic that they all claim that the commentators blabber on incoherently. I'd suggest they look in the mirror. I suspect also it will be one face and one mirror.

Endless repetition of attempts to bludgeon their twisted views into others do little for their argument and cause you to be concerned about their mental health. 

Pearson and Tatum get it wrong sometimes, as did Dave Lanning, as did anyone who dared to try to commentate on speedway. Humans make mistakes. The trick is not to make it your life's cause to keep on repeating it in the stupid hope that others will be browbeaten into joining the divine cause and the loony's tantrum eventually gets his childish way.

It's not going to happen. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited March 25, 2018 by RobMcCaffery

[RobMcCaffery]

1 hour ago, Richard Weston said:

Very poor commentary on Boat Race and agree 'Scoop' is much better.

I have been told by those associated with Sky that the commentary has to be what they term "high energy" and if the voices of the commentators begins to lessen, the producer literally has a word in their ear to up the decibels and excitement.

Precisely.

[Daniel Smith]

If people don't like Screamy and Shouty then the option is to mute or don't watch.

The broadcaster need to make it appealing to the masses and not the few (us actual Speedway fans).

This is something the BSPA get wrong in just trying to appeal to the few and still get it wrong.

 

[BWitcher]

On 24/03/2018 at 6:08 PM, ytsejam said:

I know that in your eyes EVERYTHING connected to speedway is always perfect, but put your tongue away please just for ONCE and actually LISTEN to his commentary next time two riders pass each other on the final lap of a GP race for example.....it will be screams and noises, NO WORDS. Now go and compare that to how a proper professional commentator i.e. Lanning, used to do it. 

Then come back with your stupid comments if you still think Pearson doesnt sound like a monkey in comparison!

Yes, and effective it is to convey excitement.

Which is what speedway is meant to be.

Seems some just want it to be like at their local track, an amazing race greeted by a polite ripple of applause (if lucky) or a raised programme board. The kind of atmosphere that sends anyone new to the sport to sleep.

There was a classic run off race in 1996 between Mikael Karlsson and Ryan Sullivan at Peterborough. I have the race on two tapes with different commentaries. One was full on excitement and the race to this day still give me chills. The other is a mundane commentary with no excitement shown at all. No chills whatsoever, totally destroyed by the commentary. Exactly the same race, two very different results in terms of effectiveness.

[mikebv]

22 hours ago, BWitcher said:

Yes, and effective it is to convey excitement.

Which is what speedway is meant to be.

Seems some just want it to be like at their local track, an amazing race greeted by a polite ripple of applause (if lucky) or a raised programme board. The kind of atmosphere that sends anyone new to the sport to sleep.

There was a classic run off race in 1996 between Mikael Karlsson and Ryan Sullivan at Peterborough. I have the race on two tapes with different commentaries. One was full on excitement and the race to this day still give me chills. The other is a mundane commentary with no excitement shown at all. No chills whatsoever, totally destroyed by the commentary. Exactly the same race, two very different results in terms of effectiveness.

Spot on....

Watch any of the PDC darts streams from the 'floor tournaments' that take place almost weekly around the country as qualifiers for other TV tournaments. Many have no commentary at all....

Many are played in sports halls in front of 'one man and his dog' and sometimes played out in front of no public whatsoever. If a stream has any commentary it is often just someone detailing the scores..

It can very often be therefore mind numbingly dull, with the only sound heard being the match score announcer and the 'thud' of a dart going into the board. There's no way on earth watching that would get you 'into the darts'...

Then equate that to watching darts on Sky and ITV...

The SAME 'sport'. The SAME players, MVG, Anderson, Cross, Wright, Lewis, Wade etc etc have to play these 'floor tournaments' but its millions and millions of miles away from exactly the same thing played out on a Thursday night in the PL, in front of huge 10,000 crowds with commentators shouting out loudly what's happening above the ear splitting crowd noise. ..

Tatum and Pearson bring their passion to the Sport, and as it's a high adrenaline, high octane Sport, there is nothing wrong with trying to impart how exciting it can actually be to a (often ignorant of Speedway) watching nation..

More power to their elbows (and vocal chords)...

Edited March 27, 2018 by mikebv

[someone]

I agree with the above, Pearson and Tatum convey excitement, which on TV is important.  Otherwise you are sat in a quiet room looking at a small-ish screen.  Which is not like seeing something live, where the event is all around you and you fully experience the sounds and smells.  The best atmosphere can easily be lost through TV because of how it is experienced, which is why experiments with not having commentators have not been successful.

I am not sure what is that different about Rowe and Ermolenko on Eurosport, they just do not draw me into the meetings and make them feel completely flat.  But I do like Dave Goddard on Premier Sport/FreeSports, even though he is just on his own describing what he is watching on a TV.  Just shows how difficult a job it is to do well.

There are definitely times I find Pearson can get irritating, but very few commentators are not hated by some.  And those who get the most vocal criticism tend to be by people who would watch anyway, yet are very popular with neutrals who would not watch without someone to help make the experience an enjoyable one for them.

So he gets the biggest jobs with BSI and BT because he makes the sport come alive on TV to more than just those wanting dry technical analysis.

[ray c]

9 minutes ago, someone said:

I agree with the above, Pearson and Tatum convey excitement, which on TV is important.  Otherwise you are sat in a quiet room looking at a small-ish screen.  Which is not like seeing something live, where the event is all around you and you fully experience the sounds and smells.  The best atmosphere can easily be lost through TV because of how it is experienced, which is why experiments with not having commentators have not been successful.

I am not sure what is that different about Rowe and Ermolenko on Eurosport, they just do not draw me into the meetings and make them feel completely flat.  But I do like Dave Goddard on Premier Sport/FreeSports, even though he is just on his own describing what he is watching on a TV.  Just shows how difficult a job it is to do well.

There are definitely times I find Pearson can get irritating, but very few commentators are not hated by some.  And those who get the most vocal criticism tend to be by people who would watch anyway, yet are very popular with neutrals who would not watch without someone to help make the experience an enjoyable one for them.

So he gets the biggest jobs with BSI and BT because he makes the sport come alive on TV to more than just those wanting dry technical analysis.

Well said my sentiment exactly 

[BomberHammer]

With the current BT deal to show league racing being a lot less money wise,

Will BT renew the deal to show the Grand Prixs after the deal ends at the end of this season ?,

Thanks

[PHILIPRISING]

3 minutes ago, BomberHammer said:

With the current BT deal to show league racing being a lot less money wise,

Will BT renew the deal to show the Grand Prixs after the deal ends at the end of this season ?,

Thanks

ONE would hope so. The deal with the BSPA is for two years which may help.

[Hawk127]

If need be BT could do worse than contract to show both leagues given that the quality of racing, competiveness and standards are not a lot different but overall questions marks must hang over the sport that is so far in decline. 

Live racing is probably a bad choice. Highlights of a league meeting and extracts from other European league racing may attract a few moreuntes.

The Freesport offering does seem to outstrip the BT offering and given the state of British speedway, I do wonder why BT sport makes any bids for domestic racing. I can understand the GPs but that promoted by the BSPA Is simply not worthy of national exposure. Time will tell where the U.K. exposure ends up.

[RobMcCaffery]

2 hours ago, Hawk127 said:

If need be BT could do worse than contract to show both leagues given that the quality of racing, competiveness and standards are not a lot different but overall questions marks must hang over the sport that is so far in decline. 

Live racing is probably a bad choice. Highlights of a league meeting and extracts from other European league racing may attract a few moreuntes.

The Freesport offering does seem to outstrip the BT offering and given the state of British speedway, I do wonder why BT sport makes any bids for domestic racing. I can understand the GPs but that promoted by the BSPA Is simply not worthy of national exposure. Time will tell where the U.K. exposure ends up.

Sorry, highlights just don't cut it. You have to see the full story to understand the scoring. Many people want to keep a scorecard going while watching and the result would probably be known which would ruin it all. If you want to watch bikes going round then fine, but I think speedway supporters look for more.

To me, if it's not the whole meeting I couldn't be bothered. After all it only takes under half an hour to show a complete  meeting. Also the emphasis on services like BT and Sky is very much live sport. As for highlights of other meetings much of the video footage shot at UK tracks isn't really of broadcast TV standard technically, especially when shot single camera from the back of the terracing. Of course some are up to standard but it would be a tangled web. I expect you'd have to pay out for full match coverage rights of Polish and Swedish matches - and then just show one or two heats? Not cost-effective.

If nothing else doesn't such a line send out the message that speedway really isn't worth watching unless you just cut it down to a few minutes of action? Things are bad but not that bad!

While BT aren't paying much for their coverage their on-air promotion of the sport is top quality. Trails for the SGP and Premiership coverage are shown constantly, often during their coverage of major sports. In addition you often see a trailer run between say a top football Champions League match trailer and one for a top Rugby match. These are big money deals and there is speedway being given equal prominence. 

During the Champions League final, which was watched by just under three million viewers which is incredibly high for pay_TV, during a break in coverage, there was the Rye House Rockets logo on screen as part of a promo for the following Monday's Premiership match. As a Rockets fan of old (back to Rayleigh) I could never dream of the team getting a mention during what used to be the European Cup Final!

You can't buy publicity like that! Well you could, but we certainly couldn't afford that. On air, BT take the sport very seriously, promote it heavily and give it high prominence. Hopefully in time the financial deal will reflect this. 

 

Edited June 3, 2018 by RobMcCaffery

[waytogo28]

8 hours ago, RobMcCaffery said:

During the Champions League final, which was watched by just under three million viewers which is incredibly high for pay_TV, during a break in coverage, there was the Rye House Rockets logo on screen as part of a promo for the following Monday's Premiership match. As a Rockets fan of old (back to Rayleigh) I could never dream of the team getting a mention during what used to be the European Cup Final!

You can't buy publicity like that! Well you could, but we certainly couldn't afford that. On air, BT take the sport very seriously, promote it heavily and give it high prominence. Hopefully in time the financial deal will reflect this. 

But then the Rye House promotion took the decision that it would be full price admission for the televised match and we saw less than 500 people watching  a "high profile" speedway match. It should have been heaving! Lost opportunity there.

Edited June 4, 2018 by waytogo28
Additional point made

[someone]

13 hours ago, RobMcCaffery said:

To me, if it's not the whole meeting I couldn't be bothered. After all it only takes under half an hour to show a complete  meeting.

I assumed that is what was meant by highlights.  Most of a live speedway broadcast is filling time while riders are still in the pits or the track is being graded.  A 30–45 minute programme could show the highlights, i.e. the actual racing, with commercials and analysis without requiring people to give up two hours.

Although I am not so sure it would have the desired effect, as I do not think there are that many people unwilling to sample or watch speedway just because of that.  Otherwise sports like athletics would not be popular live either.

Anyway, whilst BT Sport has a good deal with the BPSA and it will continue I would be surprised if they drop the sport as it provides live content in the summer, where they have less options to fill out their schedule.  Personally I would rather it went elsewhere, though, simply because I cannot justify a BT subscription only for speedway. Although everyone is making it sound that we have such an awful competition now maybe I should be grateful I cannot watch.