In The Big Inning...

I've never been as vehemently opposed to "list shows" as some people. You know, the shows that countdown the top 10 or 25 of something or other, and seem to be multiplying in recent years like horny bunnies on crack. I find them usually trashy, arbitrary, and mostly harmless, and sometimes they're insightful or nostalgic.

I figured that ESPN, which has been celebrating its 25th anniversary for what already seems like 3 years, would be on the insightful side of the scale when it presented its multiple top 25 shows. They're basically running things like "top 25 sports personalities", "top 25 teams", "top 25 plays", etc... all over the past 25 years. So, I saw the "top 25 sports blunders" and figured I would record it. At the very least, I figured it would be amusing. I would have been more accurate if I asserted that there were WMD in Iraq.

I don't think I've ever seen a list show quite as bad as this one. I won't really debate the items on the list, although it's tough to believe that Bill Buckner's boot in the 1986 World Series wasn't on there. But that glaring flaw was relatively minor. The show was a full hour long. It had about 5 commercial breaks. After each commercial break, they reviewed the entire list. Is our memory that short? We couldn't remember items presented 10 minutes ago? Review them once, at the end. Sheesh. So, between the commercials and the repetition of the list, we're down to less than 40 actual minutes of programming.

By far, though, the worst part was the announcement of the numbers. For every single stinking number, they had edited together this horrible seizure-inducing montage consisting of weird clips of billboards and a couple circus-type performers and opera singers announcing the numbers. It was so violently editing and jarring that I actually had to look away from the screen because it was giving me a headache. I think each number clip lasted at least thirty seconds. They'd edit so quickly that one person would say "fif", and the other would say "teen". They'd show the number of a chalkboard, then on some posterboard, then on a phone. It had NOTHING to do with sports. 30 seconds times 25 numbers is another 12.5 minutes. We're down to like 27.5 minutes of programming.

As if that wasn't enough, a full fifty percent of the items on the list weren't even shown live. For some of them, they had still photos of the event (or newspaper coverage of the event) attached to posterboard and shown on the screen. Remember, these all happened in the past 25 years, so most, if not all, should have the footage available. I don't know if they didn't want to pay for the rights or what, but they didn't even show #3 or #2 (both Leon Lett-related). They barely even showed pictures of them occurring. It was disgraceful.

What they should have done was take those 12 items they had footage for and edited a top 12 list over half an hour. I should claim I had (or got) epilepsy from this stupid show. It really was shameless. I refuse to watch ESPN ever again. Well, except for Baseball Tonight. And Sunday Night Football. And Monday and Wednesday Night Baseball. And Beg, Borrow, and Deal if it ever comes on. Damn, I'm a seizure-loving sucker.