What was good with them? What was bad.
I have been coming to the British Open since 1975 and have watched a lot of television of the BBC and ABC Sports at this event. Since my demise from ABC in 2003, I have watched nothing but BBC when I come over for the British and I can say that it's a mixed bag. The American press mangles their coverage, which in some cases they should. Their pictures are inferior to those of American networks and even their competition Sky Sports. Still people tend to forget that the good old Beeb as they are called over here is monetarily at a big disadvantage to American networks, the big reasons for some of their problems.
Still that doesn't mean the BBC is terrible, what critics doen't tell you is that the BBC has been at the forefront of a lot of technology that we see in the states right now.. The Beeb was the first to use the LSM machine that enabled golf producers to show tape shots while it was being cut, which American networks stole from Beeb and use them to better format golf. The Beeb was also ahead of the scale on computer generated graphics and use of camera's like putting them on Segaway scooters and walking with the pro's. But their finest points is having good voices like Peter Alliss, Ken Brown and Hazel Irvin, they are some of the best presenters in golf and it's too bad that American viewers can't hear them. It's funny how many people like the BBC, some like Frank Hannigan go out of their way to pay for a internet service that gives BBC golf broadcasts to viewers in America. Now for average British golf viewers they don't mind the Beeb but I have to wonder how much of that is because of Peter Alliss who is very popular over here.
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I have to say that I really enjoyed both network telecasts, and watching the BBC and ABC/TNT side by side I could tell the big difference between the two. Over the years ABC has weaned itself of BBC pictures and it makes the telecast so much better. When I mean they have weaned themselves of BBC pictures it doesn't mean they don't use BBC cameras and feeds, they do, but they have gotten so much better in the editorial decisions, the use of the pictures and the way to get the best from the Beeb and not show the weaknesses of the BBC. To give you an example and I see it all the time, the Beeb is slow in getting to shots, but with a great voice of Peter Alliss a 45 wide shot is filled with his words and they get away with it. But on ABC/TNT you get a faster pace show with a lot more shots and more replays.
First we should look at the TNT telecast, which is produced by ABC/ESPN people. Now it doesn't mean that they just take all the decisions from Chris Ohlmeyer, the ABC producer. TNT has a staff of folks that help Chris make decisions, but they produce their own pieces and bring over a lot of their own announcers. In the past their major flaw was having Bobby Clampett on the shows. For years he would mangle telecasts, Clampett could be the worst announcer in the history of golf TV, but TNT kept putting him up there. It has been rumored that a decade ago Clampett was close to the person that made all of the decisions at TNT and at the time was able to wraggle a ten year contract out of them, which strapped management from making a change. But fortunately they either bought Clampett out or found some way around things and replaced him with Ian Baker-Finch.
The difference of having Baker-Finch was night and day, I think that he had his best performance of his decade long television career this week. Maybe it was because he was returning to the British Open, something that is close to Ian's heart, maybe it was returning to Birkdale no matter he was great to listen to and worked great with Ernie Johnson, who seemed a lot better with Ian.
Now the bad news on all of this, even though it hasn't been confirmed and nobody will talk, next year will be the last for TNT at the British Open. ESPN will not only take over the Thursday and Friday coverage, but they will replace the ABC Saturday and Sunday at St. Andrews.. In another move that was announced last month, Turner has also lost the Presidents Cup to Golf Channel, which for the viewer will be a downgrade. Now they still will do the PGA Championship and the Grand Slam, but with the momentum of ESPN wanting to get the early round coverage of all four majors and the Ryder Cup going to ESPN, TNT could also lose the PGA once that contract is up in a couple of years.
The shame of all this is that TNT should still be televising golf, even if it's a deal with the LPGA, which doesn't look possible. Another shame, the folks at TNT are great to work for and like to spend a dollar or two, why the PGA Tour didn't utilize them more instead of going 100% with Golf Channel is way past my thinking. One thing that I would suggest, the European Tour is not happy at the coverage of their telecasts in which Golf Channel in a cost move to save $5 million dollars a year is making a mockery of those telecasts, the European Tour should try to lure someone like TNT to do those telecasts and we could again get first class treatment of the European Tour. In talking with George O'Grady, who runs the European Tour, he is now aware of the terrible Golf Channel shows and has some meeting planned with Golf Channel executives so hopefully they will fix the problem or hopefully find someone else to do them, TNT would be a great home.
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Thanks goodness Faldo wasn't on the ABC show, he was replace by Tom Watson, who did a credible job but he has to work hard for any future as a broadcaster. You see Watson is a bit shy in jumping in and being a announcer, he needs the help of a Tirico to set him up. Watson gave some of the spark that producers were hoping for like Johnny Miller does, but unfortunely Watson was over shadowed by Azinger who was on top of his game.
What many don't give Azinger credit for was being the back bone of the Azinger/Faldo booth experience. When ABC lost golf, Azinger lost interest in TV but Faldo pursued it and was lucky enough to steal away the CBS job from Lanny Wadkins. Frankly I can only hope that Azinger will be able to steal the Ryder Cup away from Faldo in a couple of months and if the folks at CBS, NBC or even Golf Channel are smart they would put Azinger in the booth were he belongs.
Azinger gave us a lot of great moments and frank talk about things like Harrington winning, Norman's collapse and the storyline of playing golf on links courses. Of course there is no need to talk about Tirico, he is the best in the business and again it's a shame to just see him do early round coverage of the other majors that ESPN does.
As for the telecast, a lot of good production value with actor Gary Oldman doing a lot of the scene set pieces, teases and rejoins from commercial. I also love Tom Rinaldi, he is a top notch interviewer and a pretty good writer on pieces. If the new management at Golf Channel want some fresh people for their telecasts, I would tell them to try and figure out a way to get both Rinaldi, who would improve their post game shows and Terry Gannon, who would be a perfect host to replace Kelly once she is gone from that perch.
As for the four days of golf they were almost perfect, unfortunely they got bogged down on Sunday after play was finished. They seemed out of step trying to fill the ten minutes of dead time between the final putt and presentation of the Claret Jug and this brought on two major mistakes. The first was a terribly wrong leader board that aired more than once that had K.J. Choi in 3rd place four strokes better than his final score was. Now this is totally inexcusable in this day and age of computers. The second major mistake was Tom Watson talking about amateur Chris Wood and saying that his fifth place finish got him into the Masters, that wasn't true since the Masters only invite those in the top-four. This mistake needed to be fixed and wasn't.
So because of these major problems I give them a A- instead of a A+, still the show was great and I will miss not seeing this team together for another year.
