Some Tuesday Night Links

As the Red Sox are getting pummeled by the Yankees in Spring Training, I'll do the links for tonight and close the blog until tomorrow.

Newsday's Neil Best says on Thanksgiving, Giants radio voice Bob Papa will be on TV calling the G-Men vs. Denver on the NFL Network. Neil also mentions that ESPN is looking at former Yankee and Blue Jay Dave Winfield as an analyst. Winfield was a Fox analyst for the first year the network did baseball back in 1996. Neil has noticed that Adam Schefter has gone missing at the NFL Network, the victim of a failed contract negotiation.

CNBC's Darren Rovell says Mississippi State basketball coach Larry Eustachy is not being looked upon kindly by his fellow coaches for rejecting a bonus. Darren discovers that Curt Schilling's bloody sock from the 2005 American League Championship Series is still off the market.

Writing for the New York Times, John Consoli reports that advertisers are bullish on the MLB Network.

The Albany Times Union's Pete Dougherty says MSG Network will re-air ESPN's "The Bronx is Burning" mini-series starting next month. I remember how ESPN hyped it and how fans pretty much rejected it.

Alan Pergament of the Buffalo News says there's not much risk for ESPN picking up the Bills-Patriots as its Monday Night Football season opener.

Keith Groller of the Allentown (PA) Morning Call writes that Billy Packer may not be with CBS anymore, but he's still associated with March Madness.

The Baltimore Sun's Ray Frager says MASN will have a weekly segment with Orioles manager Dave Trembley answering fan's e-mails on its website.

MASN will do the same with Nationals manager Manny Acta.

Jim Williams of the DC Examiner writes that keeping the NFL Sunday Ticket package on DirecTV doesn't help the NFL's cause of putting the NFL Network on big cable.

Paul Stukenborg of the Memphis Commercial Appeal says the Ole Miss-Memphis football season opener will be moved back a day to September 6 to accommodate ESPN.

John Maher of the Austin (TX) American-Statesman says the Big 12 conference has dropped a sponsor amid concerns that the product contains Creatine, a substance that is a cause for concern for the NCAA.

Phil Rosenthal of the Chicago Tribune says Comcast SportsNet is adding an hour encore of its morning show in the evening hours.

Tom Witosky of the Des Moines Register reports that three local sports radio employees were suspended after a private argument between two on-air personalities was aired and an F bomb flew out.

The Canadian Press reports that the PGA Tour is considering a move to mic caddies for television.

To some NCAA Tournament programming guides from across the country.

Ken Schott of the Schenectady Gazette has the schedule for Thursday in New York's Capital Region.

Ray Frager of the Baltimore Sun lists the games on Thursday and Friday for Charm City.

Roger van der Horst of the Raleigh (NC) News & Observer looks at what Raleigh-Durham will see on Thursday and Friday.

How about Cincinnati? John Kiesewetter of the Enquirer has the lineup for Cincinnati and Dayton.

To SoCal and Tom Hoffarth of the Los Angeles Daily News who has what fans will be seeing on the local CBS affiliate there.

With that done, I can move to other subjects.

Steve Zeitchik of the Hollywood Reporter writes about the overwhelming success of March Madness on Demand.

Elsa Keslassy of Variety writes that sports programs led TV ratings worldwide in 2008.

Alex Weprin of Broadcasting & Cable says Spike is filming a new golf-related comedy pilot which could join two other existing sports-related series on the channel.

Mike Reynolds of Multichannel News talks to an industry analyst who says DirecTV will have to increase subscribers to make the $1 billion/year pricetag pay off for NFL Sunday Ticket.

Radio Online says ESPN980 in DC is now making its programming available to cell phones.

The Sports Media Watch says NASCAR on Fox took another huge nosedive in the ratings on Sunday. SMW lists the weekend ratings.

Joe Favorito says Curt Schilling using his blog to announce his retirement shows an example of an athlete controlling his own message.

Maury Brown at the Biz of Baseball has the final attendance figures for the World Baseball Classic. Maury tells us that Audi has positioned itself firmly with the New York Yankees.

To Maury's Biz of Hockey which looks at ESPN's expanded coverage of the NCAA Division I Men's Hockey Tournament.

Steve Lepore of Puck The Media has the real reason why NBC chose to take Stanley Cup Finals Games 1 and 2 this year.

The Big Lead says John Daly's defamation lawsuit against the Florida Times-Union and former writer Mike Freeman, now of CBSSports.com has been thrown out.

Awful Announcing notes that MSNBC's Keith Olbermann now has a blog at MLB.com.

I forgot to link to this yesterday. Bruce Allen of Boston Sports Media Watch wants to find the Worst Boston Sports Columns and he's received many noteworthy nominations.

Well, we have plenty of links to chew on until Wednesday. See you then.