Nothing "funny" about moving tail end of NASCAR race to ESPN2

Autoracing Betting Lines

11/10/2008 - Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - With the second-to-last race in the "Chase for the Sprint Cup" reaching its climactic point and Jimmie Johnson on the verge of clinching his record-tying third consecutive series championship, viewers in the Eastern and Central time zones were stunned to see the remaining 34 laps of Sunday's Checker O'Reilly Auto Parts 500 at Phoenix International Raceway switched from ABC to ESPN2.

ABC made the decision to continue its coverage of the race on their sister network in order to air an episode of "America's Funniest Home Videos" at 7:30 p.m. (et). The race remained on ABC in the Mountain and Pacific time zones.

"After two red flags, rain in Phoenix and 4 1/2 hours on ABC, we were still 34 minutes from the end of the telecast as it turned out," ESPN spokesman George McNeilly said in a statement. "We told fans in the East and Central from the second red flag on that the race was moving to ESPN2. ABC's entertainment viewers and NASCAR fans were both well served in a tough spot, and we are fortunate to have ESPN2 among our networks to serve the fans."

Though Johnson dominated at Phoenix, leading 217 of 313 laps, the race concluded with Kurt Busch making a last ditch effort to catch Johnson in a green-white-checkered finish and Carl Edwards rallying for a fourth-place finish to barely remain alive in the championship hunt.

For ABC to pull the plug on the race in half of the country to show funny home videos was not only a joke, but also a disgrace to NASCAR and its fans.

And some in the sport would agree with that.

"It seems a little odd to me as big as NASCAR is and as many people watch the sport, I can't imagine being a race fan and being on the East Coast and trying to watch this and then going to that," driver Jamie McMurray said after his third-place finish at Phoenix. "I mean, maybe if the President was going to talk, maybe if something big had happened, but I can't believe that 'America's Funniest Home Videos' would take priority over us."

Even Johnson echoed a similar sentiment.

"Well, I thought it went dark and nobody could watch it," he said. "So the fact that it was on another television channel was, I mean, it's better. It's still somewhat on a prime channel of course on ABC, but to go to 'America's Funniest Home Videos,' that one hurts, no doubt. I thought we have a lot of characters. Why do we need that show?"

Sure NASCAR is different from your usual stick-and-ball sport, but what sense does it make to switch a race from one network to another when the event is still ongoing.

CBS and FOX do not interrupt their coverage of football for their regularly scheduled prime-time programming on Sundays.

The start time for next Sunday's season-finale Ford 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway is scheduled for 3:45 p.m. (et). Let's just hope there are no weather issues in South Florida, so ABC can air the race in its entirety and show the trophy presentation to the Cup championship.

With Johnson taking a 141-point lead into Homestead and needing to finish only 36th or better to clinch the title, it would be a shame if the network skips out on airing a historic moment for NASCAR to show videos of some kid falling off his bicycle or a cat getting tangled up in a ball of yarn.

Jszzsports Autoracing Betting News

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FOOTBALL TRASH TALK

NFL Football Trash Talk

Trash talk has a place in every competitive endeavor (except baseball; those stirrup-wearers are too busy chewing on their sunflower seeds and their supplements to worry about what their opponents are doing).

Fantasy sports is no exception. Any intelligent discussion of the subject would probably start with a thesis statement or a definition of terms. Thankfully, this wont be an intelligent discussion.

Let me just say that I am happy to take a place in this space alongside my talented colleagues, even our commissioner. (You should see how she bleats like a demented paper boy about league fees on our fantasy site).

Trash talking, I would argue, is primarily about amusing your friends, their sheeplike demeanors and sloping foreheads notwithstanding. The best place I have found for football trash talking is at www.SportsAlarm.com.

Beyond the entertainment factor, though, I would recognize that the sophomoric ritual has one advantage, when properly applied. It magnifies your fantasy triumphs and mitigates your fantasy failures by transforming the eventual point total into an afterthought. Winning makes it seem like your opponent really is a truss-owning, lapel-pin-wearing nitwit. And in defeat, trash talk can be the air bag to break the fall from your hyperbolic heights. The plug-necked yahoos on your team, you can say, will be sacking groceries by the end of the season.

The best trash talk, in my view, is layered and nuanced. And it doesnt focus only on your opponents team. It picks apart your opponent. The idea is to create a shock-and-awe-scale blizzard of nonsense, and the goal is to make your opponent drop his hands from his keyboard in exasperation.

What team does your opponent root for? Accuse a Giants fan of having a Joe Namath pillowcase. Wheres your opponent from? Give a look of concern no matter his reply, then say, I'll try to type slower for you next time. Is your opponent into politics? Label everyone a tax-and-spend corporate shill.

Cap all that with a liberal application of irrelevance. For instance, dont just conclude by saying your opponent is a twerp who drafts like my grandmother. Say that your opponent is a sweater-wearing, eyebrow-plucking twerp who drafts his team about as well as Zsa Zsa Gabor gave acceptance speeches at the Oscars. By the time your foe makes sense of that, his starting running back will have had puppies.

But what about you? Hmm? Recall a memorable slam? Have a tried-and-true technique? Know someone who seems impervious to insult? Take a moment and tells us about it. Put together some (fit-for-publication) thoughts. You wont be too busy returning phone messages from your friends, Im sure, to reply.

In addition to the trash talking, the Sports Alarm has a huge gallery of high resolution pictures of beautiful women and models in bikinis. The most popular models are: Lindsay Lohan, Carrie Underwood, Alessandra Ambrosio, and Paris Hilton.