Nbc Sports

NBC Sports says it had 170 employees in Baltimore this week to cover the Preakness, and from the looks of the TV package it presented, all of them earned their keep. NBC's network coverage started at 4:30 p.m., and it hardly ever sagged for more than a minute or two right up until the start of the race some two hours later. And that's no mean feat given that the horse racing world is essentially on hold until the start of the race on the day of a Triple Crown event. What I am saying is that once you show the infield crowd dancing to Maroon 5, overhead shots of the Inner Harbor and Pimlico, ground level shots of the grandstand, women in hats, tables full of crab cakes, Black-eyed Susans all in a row, and the horses in their stalls, what do you do for the other hour and 50 minutes?

NBC Sports says it had 170 employees in Baltimore this week to cover the Preakness, and from the looks of the TV package it presented, all of them earned their keep. NBC's network coverage started at 4:30 p.m., and it hardly ever sagged for more than a minute or two right up until the start of the race some two hours later. And that's no mean feat given that the horse racing world is essentially on hold until the start of the race on the day of a Triple Crown event. What I am saying is that once you show the infield crowd dancing to Maroon 5, overhead shots of the Inner Harbor and Pimlico, ground level shots of the grandstand, women in hats, tables full of crab cakes, Black-eyed Susans all in a row, and the horses in their stalls, what do you do for the other hour and 50 minutes?

Last year, 8.8 million viewers saw NBC's coverage of the Preakness. That's the kind of big-tent mass audience that makes the race one of Baltimore's showcase events. And that doesn't count the hundreds of thousands who will watch pre- and post-race coverage on the NBC Sports Network cable channel. But how Baltimore is seen by all those eyeballs largely depends on how NBC Sports chooses to cover the race and related events starting Saturday at 2:30 p.m on NBC Sports Network. NBC's network coverage of the race starts at 4:30 p.m. and runs until 6:30 p.m., with a closing half hour from 6:30 to 7 on NBC Sports Network.

Last year, 8.8 million viewers saw NBC's coverage of the Preakness. That's the kind of big-tent mass audience that makes the race one of Baltimore's showcase events. And that doesn't count the hundreds of thousands who will watch pre- and post-race coverage on the NBC Sports Network cable channel. But how Baltimore is seen by all those eyeballs largely depends on how NBC Sports chooses to cover the race and related events starting Saturday at 2:30 p.m on NBC Sports Network. NBC's network coverage of the race starts at 4:30 p.m. and runs until 6:30 p.m., with a closing half hour from 6:30 to 7 on NBC Sports Network.

NBC Sports selected the Washington Capitals' home game against the Boston Bruins on April 11 as the network's game of the week, and it will be played at noon. The game is a potential first-round playoff preview, as the top-seeded Capitals would face the eighth-seeded Bruins if the season were to end today.

As head of NBC Sports, Dick Ebersol has - as that motel commercial says - been everywhere, man. But he's spending this weekend in Baltimore, and it's a place as close to his heart as anywhere, thanks to two Maryland families that have touched him deeply in his professional and personal life. Ebersol, chairman of NBC Universal Sports and Olympics, who is in town to serve as executive producer for tomorrow night's Ravens-Washington Redskins telecast, said: "Baltimore has been the source of the high and low end of my emotions this year."

DENVER - A charter jet crashed on takeoff yesterday morning from a small southwest Colorado airport, killing at least two people and injuring NBC Sports chairman Dick Ebersol, his son Charles and an unidentified passenger. The pilot and co-pilot were killed. Another Ebersol son, Teddy, 14, was missing. Police used helicopters to search for him late last night. The seat he had occupied also had not been found. The CL-601 Challenger aircraft crashed at Montrose Regional Airport, just outside the ski resort of Telluride in southwest Colorado.

A report in the New York Daily News says Bill Walsh will not return to NBC's NFL broadcast booth next season.Whether Walsh, whose two-year deal with NBC Sports expires at the end of this season, is offered a new coaching gig or a new deal, it won't matter."

Less sport and more style. That's the winning ticket at the racetrack these days, as the horse racing industry is trying to reinvent itself in an effort to attract new, younger and female fans. It's happening on TV screens with shows emphasizing the people as much as the horses, while the major races themselves are being recast as lifestyle events rather than just competitions. And it's happening on computer and mobile screens, with fans and riders connecting on Facebook and jockeys using Twitter.

No one at NBC Sports can ever say it puts viewer interests ahead of its own business interests. On "NFL Live," both Saturday and Sunday, the network failed to report the biggest NFL story in years -- Fox's outbidding CBS for the league's NFC TV package.For the record, NBC Sports spokesman Ed Markey said the decision not to report the Commentarydeal had everything to do with the fact the network was still in negotiations with the league for the AFC package.This reasoning is mind-boggling. CBS went with the story on its evening newscast Friday when Dan Rather reported the Fox bid. On Saturday, Greg Gumbel also reported the story.

Et cetera CAA, NBC Sports agree to 5-year deals The Colonial Athletic Association has reached five-year agreements with NBC Sports Group that will provide the most extensive and comprehensive exposure of the conference in its history, with coverage on NBC Sports Network and across the group's regional sports networks. The deals, which begin with the 2012-13 season and run through 2016-17, will provide national television coverage of CAA men's basketball and football games on NBC Sports Network, regional television coverage of CAA men's and women's basketball and football through the Comcast SportsNet regional networks and coverage of a variety of other CAA sports through NBCSports.com.

Baltimore takes its TV image seriously - very seriously and at the highest levels. Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake championed last month's Baltimore Grand Prix, in part because she said positive TV coverage of the race would "change the way the world sees Baltimore. " As her spokesman, Ryan O'Doherty, explained: "Many television viewers have a negative view of Baltimore based on TV crime dramas, and the Grand Prix provided a great opportunity for Baltimore to shine on national television and internationally to over 100 countries for several hours.

In the Tiger Woods era, it was hard to find a better Father's Day storyline for the network announcers to ply than that of the young superstar and his dad. Woods' father, Earl, put a golf club in his son's hands when the child was only months old, and the one-time Green Beret remained Tiger's foremost mentor until his death in 2006. The relationship and storyline were so deeply ingrained in the popular imagination that in 2010, Nike used the voice of Earl Woods in an ad asking Tiger whether he had "learned anything" — presumably from his off-course personal troubles.

Less sport and more style. That's the winning ticket at the racetrack these days, as the horse racing industry is trying to reinvent itself in an effort to attract new, younger and female fans. It's happening on TV screens with shows emphasizing the people as much as the horses, while the major races themselves are being recast as lifestyle events rather than just competitions. And it's happening on computer and mobile screens, with fans and riders connecting on Facebook and jockeys using Twitter.

NBC Sports selected the Washington Capitals' home game against the Boston Bruins on April 11 as the network's game of the week, and it will be played at noon. The game is a potential first-round playoff preview, as the top-seeded Capitals would face the eighth-seeded Bruins if the season were to end today.

As head of NBC Sports, Dick Ebersol has - as that motel commercial says - been everywhere, man. But he's spending this weekend in Baltimore, and it's a place as close to his heart as anywhere, thanks to two Maryland families that have touched him deeply in his professional and personal life. Ebersol, chairman of NBC Universal Sports and Olympics, who is in town to serve as executive producer for tomorrow night's Ravens-Washington Redskins telecast, said: "Baltimore has been the source of the high and low end of my emotions this year."

NEW YORK -- Former New York Giants coach Bill Parcells is heading for television, having signed on yesterday as a studio analyst for "The NFL Live," NBC's Sunday pre-game program.His three-year contract is worth $250,000 this season and will escalate to at least $400,000 if he stays through its duration, said people in television familiar with the deal.In addition to appearing on "NFL Live," Parcells may handle game analysis for a few late-season NFL games. He also will preview NFL games along with Will McDonough after NBC's six broadcasts of Notre Dame football games, and contribute to the weekend "Prudential Updates" if necessary.

NBC Sports has gained an unlikely but familiar presence for its broadcast of the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City: Jim McKay, the Baltimore-based commentator known best for leading a dozen Olympic broadcasts on ABC dating back four decades. McKay, 79, said he's excited at the thought of joining NBC's Bob Costas next year to narrate profiles of Olympic athletes and offer commentary on the day's events. But it will be quite a change to see himself on the Peacock Network, he acknowledged.

You silly rabbit, Michaels is for NBC. Al Michaels officially made his move yesterday, when NBC announced he would become the play-by-play voice of the network's new Sunday night NFL package this fall. But after Michaels initially had committed to continue on Monday Night Football as it moved from ABC to ESPN, the all-sports network and the Walt Disney Co. didn't just let him walk away from his contract. No, they kicked some tail. Some cottontail. As part of the deal releasing Michaels, ESPN received: Rights to Friday coverage - for which it paid - of the next four of golf's Ryder Cups, along with extended highlights.

DENVER - A charter jet crashed on takeoff yesterday morning from a small southwest Colorado airport, killing at least two people and injuring NBC Sports chairman Dick Ebersol, his son Charles and an unidentified passenger. The pilot and co-pilot were killed. Another Ebersol son, Teddy, 14, was missing. Police used helicopters to search for him late last night. The seat he had occupied also had not been found. The CL-601 Challenger aircraft crashed at Montrose Regional Airport, just outside the ski resort of Telluride in southwest Colorado.