Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Olympic Update

We are a few days into the Winter Olympics Games; so let me give you my quick thoughts. Overall NBC is doing a nice job but they could make some changes, like not holding some marquee events for prime time. I know that they have to make choices when they show events happening at the same time but they have other cable networks that are not being used. I guess I have to avoid the Internet for duration of the Olympics.

One thing I don’t like is when they switch from one event to the other. Stay on one event live until we know who wins the Gold medal. If you have to tape the other event then do it. They should always show the words "LIVE" so we know and we don’t have to guess. Most of the time they will flash the word live on screen then take it off after a few seconds. Monday night they showed the words “LIVE” during the Gold medal ceremony for Men’s Moguls. Why can’t they do this for the competition? Also, please limit the commercial breaks. I know this is how NBC makes its money, but give me more than 2 minutes of action at a time.

I’M disappointed and sad at the same time for Al Michaels as daytime host. He looks very nervous in the studio. I hope he gets comfortable as the games go on. In prime time the host Bob Costas can host the games until I die, he is the best in the business in the studio.

Todd Harris is the worst announcer of all times. Thank goodness that Johnny Moseley was very good in his Olympics broadcasting debut. Harris used other announcer’s lines and at the end of the Men’s Moguls he described the winner’s brother, who happens to have cerebral palsy as suffering from. Todd, he was born with it and he is a person who happens to have it. Mr. Harris also stole a call from early in the day. When Johnny Spillane won the USA first medal ever in Nordic Combined, Chad Salmela said, “The medal drought is over!” Todd said the “The Drought is over” when Alexandre Bilodeau won Canada’s first Gold medal ever on home turf. (1976 Summer Games in Montreal and 1988 Winter Games in Calgary no Gold’s) Please use original lines Mr. Harris.

Dan Patrick did a very good job in his role of setting the scene at the mogul’s completion. I hope he continues to doing this through out the games.
Update: He’s not, Tuesday he was back in New York doing his radio show.


I can’t believe more people watched the Winter Olympics on Sunday than the Daytona 500. Why I don’t know, but the Daytona 500 was delayed twice by potholes developing on the track. The Olympics coverage is up nearly 25% for the opening weekend over the 2006 Winter Games in Turin. I think more people are out of work and home and want something compelling to watch so they turn to the Olympics.

Until next time.

Jamie Lazaroff

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Curling schedule

Like I promised here is the Curling TV schedule for the Winter Olympic. I have edited the schedule down to ownly the day time covarge. Like I said Curling is all over the place on NBC's family of network's. You can go to nbcolympics.com to find were USA Network, CNBC and MSNBC is on you cable provider. Remember the Opening Ceremony starts at 7:30 this Friday on your local NBC station.(NBC 30 in Connecticut) I hope to post a daliy Olympic viewer guide this weekend. Enjoy

Tuesday, February 16
Time (ET) Network Description
12:00p - 3:00p USA Network USA Men vs. Germany.
5:00p - 8:00p CNBC U.S. Women's team takes on Japan.
Wednesday, February 17
12:00p - 3:00p USA Network Team USA Women take on Germany.
5:00p - 8:00p CNBC The American men take on Switzerland.
Thursday, February 18
12:00p - 3:00p USA Network Men's Curling vs. Denmark, live.
5:00p - 8:00p CNBC Women's Team USA squad takes on Denmark.
Friday, February 19
12:00p - 3:00p USA Network Women's Curling Team USA take on Russia.
5:00p - 8:00p CNBC American men take on France.
Saturday, February 20
12:00p - 3:00p MSNBC Men's Curling Team USA takes on Sweden.
5:00p - 8:00p CNBC Women's Curling Team USA takes on Great Britain.
Sunday, February 21
12:00p - 3:00p MSNBC Women's Curling Team USA finds itself in a hostile environment as they take on Team Canada in front of 6,000 home fans.
5:00p - 8:00p CNBC The American men take on Great Britain.
Monday, February 22
12:00p - 3:00p USA Network The American men head into hostile territory when they take on host and gold medal-favorite Canada
5:00p - 8:00p CNBC Women's Curling Gold medal-favorites Team Canada continue their march toward the podium as they take on Sweden.
Tuesday, February 23
12:00p - 3:00p USA Network Women's Team USA take on China.
5:00p - 8:00p CNBC Men's Curling Gold medal- and hometown-favorites Team Canada continue their medal quest as they take on China.
Wednesday, February 24
5:00p - 8:00p MSNBC Curling With medal hopes and advancing on the line, MSNBC has coverage of Curling's tiebreaker round.
Thursday, February 25
12:00p - 3:00p USA Network Women's Curling: Semifinal rounds begin.
5:00p - 8:00p CNBC Men's Curling: men's semifinals begin.
Friday, February 26
12:00p - 3:00p USA Network Women's Curling: Bronze Game
6:00p - 9:00p CNBC Women's Curling reaches its climax with the gold medal match up live from Vancouver.
Saturday, February 27
12:00p - 3:00p USA Network Men's Curling: Bronze medal Game.
6:00p - 9:00p CNBC Men's Curling Gold Medal Match

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

WinterOlympic Preview

Less than a week before the Winter Olympics in Vancouver now is the time for my preview. Friday is the opening ceremonies on NBC. The marquee events you will see in primetime on NBC starting on Saturday are Figure Skating, Alpine Skiing, and Snowboarding along with Freestyle Skiing. Lindsey Vonn is the biggest favorite of the games for the USA in the Alpine Skiing’s downhill and super-G. She has won the last two World Cup overall titles and leads this years standing. The other athletes to look out for are Shaun White in Snowboarding Half-Pipe. His event is on Wednesday the 17th. Watch the boy fly. Shani Davis is another one the watch, he has dominated the 1,000 and 1,500 meters in long tack Speed Skating in the past two years and no one has come close to his times. The spotlight event of the games is Ladies Figure Skating, this year for the first time in a long time; the US does not have a favorite for a medal in this competition. It will be a wide-open event. Men Figure Skating has medal hopefuls in Johnny Weir and Evan Lysacek. The pair’s Figure Skating is a battle between the team of Ben Agosto and Tanith Belbin against the team that beat them at the national championship last month Meryl Davis and Charlie White. Should be a good battle. Team USA has a chance to medal in a lot of sports for the first time. Erin Hamlin in Woman’s Luge, Tim Burke in Biathlon, Kikkan Randall in Woman’s Cross-Country Skiing and Todd Lodwick, Johnny Spillane and Bill Demong in Nordic Combined. Steve Holcomb has a good change to end a drought since 1948 with out a gold medal in Four-Man Bobsled. His team is peaking at the right time just winning the world cup title in four-man and the overall. Two-Men is the other bobsled discipline. The Nordic Combined team has a very good chance for gold. At last year’s World Championship the USA won all three individual gold medals contested. Johnny and Bill have won World Cup races this year. By the way Nordic Combined is Ski Jumping and Cross-Country Skiing on the same day. Should be fun. Then you have my favorite winter Olympic sport, Curling. Please check it out. Curling is like shuffle board on ice. It will be on USA network most of the two weeks starting Tuesday February 16th, it will also be on CNBC, I hope to post the TV schedule this week. I will also attempt to post the daily TV schedule for the whole Olympics.

In other news, congratulations to the New Orleans Saints for winning the Super Bowl over the Indianapolis Colts. What a great game, 153.4 million viewers watched to make it the most watched show in U.S. television history according to Nielsen Media Research topping the previous mark of 106 million for the series finale of M*A*S*H in 1983.

Wow, that’s a lot of people watching one event at the same time.

Enjoy the Olympics.

Jamie Lazaroff

Friday, February 5, 2010

self-advocate

As a self-advocate, I would like to comment on the R-word. As you may know, it came out this week that White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel used the word in anger at a political strategy meeting last year. There is no excuse for using the R-word. My question is where’s the outrage over Rush Limbaugh, he used the word about 5 to 6 times in a row, live, on his radio show. I’M sorry to tell you Rush, this is not politically correct. It is just the way it, just like not using the N-word. I guess if you had or have a family member with an intellectual disability you don’t get it how it hurts.

People with Intellectual disabilities have abilities and are capable of many things, but ignorance leads some to describe us in this way. We know you don't mean to make us feel that way, but it hurts and is very demeaning. When people start making "retard" jokes or references, it makes me very sad. I would just ask you to please start putting yourself in my shoes and imagine if we started making jokes using a term that describes you. It would hurt you to.

I get it; people who use the term “retard” don’t always realize how it hurts those of us who have an intellectual disability. The problem is, it isn’t OK to those of us who make up the largest minority group in the country. If you think a "retard" is someone who is dumb and stupid you haven’t met anyone who has the medical diagnosis of mental retardation. Well I am here to tell you that I have that medical diagnosis and I am not dumb or stupid, I have been a broadcaster, I have interviewed Governors, and spoken in front of five thousand plus people. Do you think a dumb or stupid person could do all of this? Every time the term is used in a negative way it tells other people that it is OK to think of me and all of my friends this way.

The R-Word is the 21-century N-Word. Would you use the N-Word to describe black people? No, than please stop using the R-Word.

Just my opinion

Tuesday, February 2, 2010

A view form the chair

Time to answer one comment on my blog. Mary Ellen asked why I don’t mention the UConn women's basketball team? First off I enjoy women’s basketball a lot more than the men’s game because it is played below the rim. I don’t mention them because they have won 61 games in a row and beat all of their opponents by 25 or more points. It is like one sportscaster said this weekend, ho hum, they win again. Every time we think they’re going into a tough game, like Stanford or North Carolina, they keep it close for the first half then pull away in the second half. In the past I have talked about Head Coach Geno Auriemma. I happen to think he is overrated. This month on ESPN College Gameday Geno gave great insight to why the program is so successful and kind of changed my mind about him. He said that they practice for every game and don’t over look any opponents. He also recruits players that want to be great and not just good. For a good source of information I would direct you to the site sox and dawgs. I have posted the link in the links section of this blog. Each day they have daily links to all the beat writers around the state that cover the UCONN women. Without access I can just write what I see. If you have questions about a team or event that you head about on the news or on the radio, send me an e-mail at jdlazaroff@yahoo.com, I would love to hear from you.

Congratulations to Kelly Kulick for being to first women to win a Professional Bowlers Association title. Kulick beat Chris Barnes to win the prestigious Tournament of Champions event. You go girl!


Two big events last weekend were the Strikeforce MMA event on Showtime Saturday night. I talked about this stacked card about a month ago so I wont go further. I do want to talk about Bobby Lashley’s opponent UFC veteran Wes Sims. Wes will not be an easy win for Lashley. This will be a very interesting fight. The other interesting person who is making his MMA debut is 1982 Heisman Trophy win Herschel Walker. At first I thought this was a joke but in recent interviews Herschel has stated the he is very serious about this and is training every day for this fight. How will a 47-year-old man do in a young man’s game?
Update: It was very interesting; Herschel Walker beat his younger opponent in the third round via a TKO. From what I have seen and heard he was very impressive. In his post fight news conference, Herschel said that this was just a one-fight deal and he’s done with MMA. Good job Herschel you did it and won now leave the stage.
The other event is the NFL Pro Bowl. This is the first year it was held one week before the Super Bowl. When this was first announced (the Pro Bowl is usually the week after the Super Bowl) I thought this would not work. It is not a very well played game because there’s nothing to play for. I now think it is a good idea. After the Super Bowl a lot of people consider football season over. You now have the NFL’s best (minus the players in the Super Bowl) on the same stage as the Super Bowl.
Update: I watched and I now think whenever the Pro Bowl is played it is a bad idea because like any All-Star game there is no defense played in the game and this makes it boring.

Update on the story I brought you last time about the Togo National Team being attacked on their way to the African Nationals Cup Soccer Tournament in January. The new news is that the Confederation of African Football has banned the Togo Team from the next two African Nations Cup tournaments for withdrawal from this year's tournament in the wake of a gun attack on their team bus. My question is why are they being banned? They did nothing wrong, and were not even the target of the attack. Two members of their delegation were killed in the ambush; I would leave the tournament too to bury my friends. I think this ban is insensitive and just wrong.

What I’M looking forward to this weekend

Sunday is the Super Bowl at 6:25 on CBS. The year’s game is the Indianapolis Colts against the New Orleans Saints. I think the game will be a shootout as you have two of the best quartbacks in the league, with Peyton Manning of the Colts against Drew Brees of the Saints. I will be having my party of one on Sunday.

I think this will be the first time the Six Nations (England, Wales, Scotland, Ireland, France and Italy) Rugby Championships will be on America TV and the best part is it will be Live. The first game will be this Saturday at 12 noon when Wales takes on England from London. It will be on BBC America. I can’t wait!!

Next week I hope to have my Winter Olympic preview.

Jamie Lazaroff