Your Announcers and Open Thread For Hawks-Blues

Honda Drive to the Playoffs, 7:30 PM
Host: Bill Patrick
Analysts: Keith Jones and Brian Engblom

Chicago vs. St. Louis, 8:00 PM
Play by Play: John Forslund
Color: Eddie Olczyk
Reporter: Bob Harwood

NBC Takes Caps/Bruins over Flyers/Rangers in Final Game of the Week

According to the schedule at NHL.com, the April 11th (final day of the season) NBC Game of the Week will be a tilt between the Boston Bruins and Washington Capitals.  Game time is 12 Noon ET.

UPDATE: The NHL confirms it.

Remaining NBC Game of the Week Schedule

April 4, 12:30 PM ET
Detroit vs. Philadelphia

April 11, 12:00 Noon ET
Boston vs. Washington

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NHL Net Interested in Cherry Biopic?

The Don Cherry finished it’s two-night run on Monday, likely to pretty good ratings, and I’ll try to report them later.

However, a lot of people are wondering when it’ll air on American airwaves.  Ken Fang passed along the news that Cherry’s son Tim, an executive producer on the project, might have found a buyer in NHL Network, which airs reruns of Grapes’ 80’s series “Grapevine”.

I personally thought that an NHL TV network wouldn’t bite on the project, rather, that even ESPN would take a shot at the movie.  But I guess I may be proven wrong.

Quit Laughing at Me, VERSUS May Have a Winner With The Daily Line

A few weeks ago, I got into a bit of a Twitter argument (my friend calls Internetagonizing) with Jennifer Sterger.  For those of you who don’t know, she’s a TV personality who hosted the Jets rancid in-game production a couple years back.  She’s also one of the Florida State cowgirls (if you remember them) and, to my knowledge, the first person that I’ve ever conversed with in any way to be featured in the pages of Playboy and Maxim (Kevin Weekes doesn’t count).  Her bio from VERSUS.com is as follows:

Jenn Sterger became an overnight sports celebrity when Brent Musburger picked her out of the crowd at a Florida State University home game and she immediately became known as one of the Florida State Cowgirls. Although she’s been featured in Maxim and Playboy, she’s more than just a pretty face and has worked as a columnist and host for SportsIllustrated.com, the New York Jets and ABC Sports. One of the most popular women in the online sports world, she will utilize her new-media savvy and her sports acumen to serve as the main point of contact for viewers who want to voice their opinion live during the show. Sorry guys, it’s not her personal phone number.

Anyway, I gave it to her about her new show, The Daily Line, looking like another VERSUS stinker original, from the network that brought you the somehow-still-on-the-air Sports Soup and the cancelled Fanarchy.  The network that still hasn’t figured out a way to make nightly hockey talk interesting, and hasn’t really succeeded at much, other than making the in-game production of their NHL telecasts pretty watchable.

Though I’ll give Ms. Sterger a break.  The Daily Line (whose pilot I viewed, and you can to, on VERSUS.com) might be a difficult format to do an hour a day, five days a week.  The promos might be insipid, unfunny and untimely.  However, from the looks of the pilot, the show could absolutely be the network’s first show that’ll last me past the 15 minute mark.

From viewing things, the banter of the show is pretty snappy.  Sterger and co-hosts Liam McHugh, Reese Waters and Rob DeAngelis keep it moving and keep it funny.  I found myself laughing.  I also found the show’s basic gambit, that viewers will be tired of talking heads screaming at you after a couple hours at the Worldwide Leader, succeeding.  The forced arguments were akin to the sports talk you might have with your own friends.  Calm, deliberate… but funny and clearly with a huge interest in sports.

The show also featured a test guest, former Toronto Blue Jays GM JP Riccardi.  I know he’s an ESPN property now, but for sure get more guests like him in the future.  Avoid at all costs the typical athlete interview subjects.  Go for the characters, the Roenicks, the Ochocincos, the… interesting baseball people (these exist, right?) and almost any basketball player.  Get them to trash talk a little, to be funny, and to give some actual insider perspective.

The world hardly needs another sports talk show, and I know viewers will be skeptical.  i sure was just watching a test gig.  But if that show is any prediction of what’s to come, I could certainly see myself enjoying The Daily Line on evening weeknights, especially when I’m looking for something to watch before coverage of the Stanley Cup Playoffs on VERSUS every night.  You win, Ms. Sterger.

Whoever Posted This, You Are Amazing

Morning Music Breakdown

Hey hey, readers.  Today should be an interesting day.  I have a review of VERSUS’ new nightly talk show The Daily Line, as well as a piece on European NHL TV analysts.

In short, a typical day of marginally readable content on Puck the Media.  Do join me.