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SportsCenter is a sports news television show shown every day on ESPN since the network was founded on September 7, 1979. Originally a once a day show, SportsCenter is now shown up to twelve times a day, replaying the day's scores and highlights from major sporting events. As a result of the regular airing, it has now been shown more times than any other show in American television, with nearly 30,000 unique episodes.

George Grande anchored the first ever SportsCenter on September 7, 1979. He was the lone host of the first show, which ironically, didn't show a single sports clip. Grande introduced the country to ESPN and SportsCenter that night. He spent ten more years with ESPN and SportsCenter until 1989.

SportsCenter normally airs at 1:00 AM, 2:00 AM, 5:00 AM to 11:00 AM, 6:00 PM, and 11:00 PM (Eastern Time). The morning shows are generally re-airings of the previous night's 1:00 AM show. The show is taped in ESPN's broadcasting station in Bristol, Connecticut.

ESPN Radio also has ESPN Radio SportsCenter with radio highlights airing three times an hour on the ESPN Radio network.

History

SportsCenter aired its 25,000th episode on August 25, 2002, and its 20,000th coincidentally aired on the same day David Wells pitched his perfect game for the New York Yankees against the Minnesota Twins: May 17, 1998. Sometime in 2006, the program will air its 30,000th episode. The program began broadcasting in high definition on June 7, 2004, and on the same day began broadcasting the show from studios inside the network's brand-new Digital Center. In 1994 ESPN began the This is SportsCenter ad campaign to promote their show. During the summer of 2004, ESPN counted down the top 100 sports moments of the past 25 years. Hosted by Chris Berman, ESPN25 consisted of 30-second commercials shown during the 6:00 PM ET SportsCenter each day from May 31 until the #1 moment, the US Olympic Men's Ice Hockey Team's victory over the USSR during the 1980 Winter Olympics, was aired on September 7. In July of 2005, SportsCenter premiered a segment called "50 States in 50 Days", where a different SportsCenter anchor traveled to a different state every day to discover the sports, sports history, and athletes of the state. [http://sports.espn.go.com/chat/sportsnation/fiftyfifty/index After ESPN acquired a share of Canadian sports network TSN, that network's news program SportsDesk was re-branded as SportsCentre (using Canadian spelling) in the summer of 2001.

On April 4, 2006, SportsCenter started showing highlights of Major League Baseball games in progress, which were previously an exclusive to another program, Baseball Tonight. This is seen in the Baseball Tonight Extra segment (see "Segments" section below for more). Prior to that date, highlights of the afforementioned Major League Baseball games weren't shown on SportsCenter until the games went final (as shown on the ticker at the bottom of the screen, known as the "BottomLine").

The show that nearly wasn't

On September 11, 2001, ESPN interrupted regular programming at 11:05 AM Eastern Time to cover the immediate aftermath of the attacks on America through a simulcast of ABC News. The network considered not airing SportsCenter that night, and debated the topic for about an hour. Finally, a half-hour version aired which announced the cancellations of major U.S. sporting events that had been announced up to that time.1

If the program had been cancelled for the day, it would have been the first (and only) day since the network's launch without at least one SportsCenter.

Format

The show begins with the "available on ESPN HD (or available on ESPN2 HD)" animation that comes before all high-definition broadcasts of ESPN or ESPN2 and the appearance of the SportsCenter "BottomLine" ticker (if it is not already there). This is followed by a short SportsCenter animation, and then the anchor will begin to speak. Sometimes the anchor is not seen at all, other times, the show begins with a quick shot of the anchor standing in the studio. The anchor for the show will give an introduction, typically going through some of the major highlights to be covered, as a loop of video clips (with a music track) matching the script is played on screen. This is followed by another montage of video clips without commentary but with the SportsCenter theme, and then another SportsCenter animation loop.

Following this, the camera will usually pan down and zoom in on the anchor desk, where the two anchors for the show are sitting. An on-screen graphic lists the names of the anchors. The anchors will usually introduce themselves and one will introduce the top story or recap. In most cases, the broadcast begins with the "hottest" or "biggest" game recap of the day.

Before going to commercial breaks, on-screen graphics and the anchor preview what will come after the break. An animation will end the segment, and will cut to commercial.

When the show returns, sometimes there will be showcase advertisements for specific sponsors. On-screen graphics will feature the advertisement as the camera pans across the studio in the background.

About halfway through a normal one-hour show, the anchors will reprise the day's top stories in a segment titled either "SportsCenter Reset" or "SportsCenter Express." There is no noticeable difference in the format of either of these segments, other than the names and the graphics.

Towards the end of the typical hour-long broadcast, the Top Ten Plays of the Day (Monday through Thursday), Top Ten Plays of the Week (on Sunday), or the Not Top Ten (Friday) segment is introduced by an anchor. Each play is separated by a animation graphic of the play's respective number. The anchors will usually alternate between plays, with each anchor calling a short recap of the play. Immediately after this segment, additional recap segments may be shown. Otherwise, the final segment of the show, What 2 Watch 4 (see "segments" section below), will plug broadcasts of games or events either later in the day or in the coming days on the ESPN networks.

The show ends with a final shot of the anchors at the desk, who will typically sign off with one reminding viewers that "ESPNEWS is always on" or some other line to that end. Sometimes, there will be extra time at the end of the show due to a lack of events to report or flukes of programming, so the anchors will fill the time with commentary. This time can range anywhere from about 20 seconds to over a minute.

Highlights
Sports contest highlights vary in length, although big games like championships receive extra highlight time.

A SportsCenter anchor will do a voice-over summary of the contest. Anchors are given wide latitude in their particular style, and many employ unique terms, jokes, and individual catchphrases. Regardless, all relevant information of the contest is otherwise conveyed in the voice-over.

Full-screen SportsCenter graphics separate the chronogical periods of the game. For example, a full screen graphic displaying "4th INNING" will segue into the 4th inning highlight of a baseball game.

The highlight can also include quotations from relevant athletes or other sports figures.

Shorter highlights simply end with a small scoreboard on the bottom of the screen displaying the final score and a small section of notable player stats or other relevant information. This scoreboard appears over a video loop, which is often in slow-motion.

A full-length highlight ends with a full screen scoreboard. The teams and scores of the contest are displayed at the top. Each team has a section where individual player stats are displayed. Notes, future broadcasts times, and other information are displayed in smaller sections.

Longer highlights often continue after the scoreboard with other full-screen boards. The content of these screens vary greatly, but most often are numbers or stats of particular interest, or otherwise help to put the contest in a larger context.

SportsCenter BottomLine
The SportsCenter BottomLine ticker appears on the bottom of the screen throughout the broadcast and reports scores and news of the day's sports.

At the far left of the ticker is a progess indicator of the ticker. Above it is the category of the score or news item. Categories vary by season: for example, during baseball season there are NL and AL categories, as well as an MLB category for general baseball news and upcoming game broadcasts on the ESPN networks. On the left, scores first display the teams and the score of the game or contest. On the right the progess is displayed; for example, a baseball score will either say "final" (if the game is over), or the current inning of the game will be displayed. Similarly, in progress basketball, football, and hockey games will display the period and time left on the game clock. After the initial score is displayed, the score graphic will condense to the left which allows more detailed information, specific to the contest, to be displayed. Other notes are often included as well. On occasion, a "Priority Score Alert" will cut into the ticker's loop, showing a score update in an important game. Sometimes it will visually show a score changing or it will highlight the winning team as it announces that an important game has ended (or "gone final").

News items and notes scroll in the ticker from left to right.

Since June 8, 2006, the categories, seen on the far left, now have a gray background.

Special segments

These special editions of SportsCenter have aired recently:

SportsCenter anchors

Current SportsCenter anchors

Former SportsCenter anchors

(D) - deceased

SportsCenter reporters

Current SportsCenter reporters

Former SportsCenter reporters

Segments

  • 30 at 30: Not a true SportsCenter show, but rather a segment in the middle of the hour in which an anchor will read the top headlines accompanied with video clips. This typically occurs during non-SportsCenter broadcasts, such as Major League Baseball games.
  • Fact or Fiction: Usually an analyst(s) will debate whether something is plausible or not. Example: Sammy Sosa will make the Hall of Fame
  • Contender or Pretender: Usually an analyst(s) will debate whether a team can contend for a pennant, division, or championship. Example: The Orioles will be contending for the AL East in September
  • Sunday Conversation: An interview with a newsmaker
  • Budweiser Hot Seat: A figure (sports or non-sports) will be interviewed usually out-of-studio, in which they are asked to take sides on issues, teams, etc
  • Coors Light Cold Hard Facts: A six pack of questions directed to an analyst on a certain sport
  • Old School, Nu Skool: A Sunday segment that features Skip Bayless as Old School, Stephen A. Smith as Nu Skool and Bob Ley as the host. The segment is featured on every Sunday morning edition of SportsCenter.
  • 4 Downs: The segment when professor John Clayton goes head-to-head with the quarterback Sean Salisbury on four different topics once a week during the football season.
  • Ultimate Highlight: A weekly segment that shows a montage of sports highlights from the past week, accompanied by a song from various musical artists or groups, such as Fall Out Boy, Black Eyed Peas, and Papa Roach. This segment is seen on the 11:00 PM ET SportsCenter broadcast on Sunday nights.
  • Top Ten (a.k.a. Top Plays): The 10 best plays of the day (or week) in sports.
  • Not Top Ten: The 10 worst plays of the week in sports (the opposite of the afforementioned "Top Ten"). This segment is seen on Fridays. However, this has been "Not the Usual Top Ten" in recent weeks, due to sponsorship from Mike's Hard Lemonade. In this case, some of the plays could be good as well as bad. In either case, the background music here is much more goofier than the normally upbeat background music in a standard Top Ten.
  • Baseball Tonight Extra: Highlights of Major League Baseball games in progress. They are presented and shown by the evening's host and analyst of Baseball Tonight.
  • Gatorade Cooler Talk: Seen on SportsCenter and during ESPN's telecast of the NBA, this is where reporters of their respective sports are asked questions involving certain news, similar to Coors Light Cold Hard Facts.
  • Take Your Pick: Usually an analyst(s) will pick who will win a postseason game or series, similar to "Fact or Fiction" and "Contender or Pretender."
  • What 2 Watch 4: The final segment of most shows, which plugs broadcasts of games or events either later in the day or in the coming days on the ESPN (or, in some cases, the other) networks.
  • The Vent: The segment which debuted on July 11, 2006, features a sportswriter who reacts to the results of several poll questions on ESPN.com.
  • Spanning the Globe: A reporter or anchor stands in front of a graphic containing a map of the world and narrates segments on different sports issues transpiring throughout the U.S., as well as the rest of the world.

Also of note: Did You Know, a segment at the end of the show that featured obscure trivia, was discontinued sometime late in 2005 or early in 2006. This segment was once spun off into a book, published by Hyperion Books, like ESPN a Disney division. In an apparent nod to the former gimmick, some SportsCenter shows end with a Closing Number, which is essentially the same thing as Did You Know except it always involves a statistic or numerical quirk.

See also

Reference

1Sports Illustrated, Sep. 24, 2001

External links

1970s TV shows in the United States | 1980s TV shows in the United States | 1990s TV shows in the United States | 2000s TV shows in the United States | ESPN network shows | SportsCenter | Syndicated television series

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This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the "SportsCenter".

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