The sports highlight is extremely predictable by now: an amazing play, sequence or moment is replayed from one or more angles, while a news anchor or announcer recaps what happened. Sometimes the video runs along with its original play-by-play audio, or maybe with the live radio call. But, in the age of social media permeation and mobile video proliferation, this is no longer enough, according to UNITE, a new late-night show that airs on ESPNU. The social media-heavy show has introduced a regular installment called “social highlights,” which leverage just how much video modern fans shoot on their smartphones while at the game. The idea is simple, but pretty powerful. Footage from commercial TV broadcasts and radio audio clips are edited together with video fans get from the stands and share to Twitter or YouTube. The result? Immersive highlights of major sports moments. “We wanted to find a way to find a different side of what a highlight is, something you wouldn’t normally see unless we aggregated the videos and put them with some high quality production,” UNITE producer Yaron Deskalo told Mashable. The example above shows the final outs of Seattle Mariner Felix Hernandez’s perfect game in August. More recent examples include the controversial ending of the Packers-Seahawks NFL game in September and North Carolina State’s last-second touchdown to beat Florida State last weekend. Deskalo produced one similar video while working on an E:60 production for ESPN a couple years ago, which planted the seed for UNITE’s social highlights. Today, however, there are few if any other examples of networks consistently producing installments that combine professionally edited broadcast highlights with fan-sourced video. The social highlights air on UNITE weekly, then go up on YouTube if ESPNU has rights to the broadcast clips used. Some have even made their way on to ESPN and ESPN2. UNITE producers scour YouTube for fan video then incorporate between five and 10 into each highlight after obtaining permission from the amateur shooters. While the resulting clips currently air primarily on a late-night show on a station that few but the most hardcore sports fans regularly watch, it’s not hard to imagine similar highlight packages becoming more mainstream sooner than later. “People are going to to able to film at these games more and more, and if we can find a way to get them to us, we’ll be able to find new ways to tell these stories,” Deskalo says. “We’re not there just yet, but I think in the next couple years we’ll start to see more social video elements in regular highlights.” Would you like to see this trend catch on — or do you prefer the traditional highlight format? Give us your take in the comments. BONUS: Who to Follow on Twitter This NFL Season 32 Must-Follow Twitter Accounts for the NFL Fan @NFL The league’s official account. A no-brainer for any NFL fan. @DeseanJackson10 The Eagles receiver is a hoot to follow because you never know what you’re going to get, […]
Man in the middle: ESPN commentator Jon Champion prepares to call the USA-Azerbaijan soccer match at Candlestick Park in San Francisco on May 27, 2014. Image: Sam Laird, Mashable With any luck, the lasting sound of this summer’s World Cup won’t be the massively commercialized event’s official (and inexplicable) “song” from alleged musician Pitbull. No, a much better soundtrack to have rattling around your head for the next several months would be the measured tones of Jon Champion, ESPN‘s newest commentator, who will make his debut for the American World Cup audience this summer. The only catch? Champion hopes you don’t remember him — at least not that much. “It’s a bit like being a referee,” Champion told Mashable in a phone interview earlier this month. “In a sense, if I get noticed too much then I’m not doing my job — which is to caption the picture and not dominate the proceedings.” Champion says this approach was instilled in him when he got his broadcasting start at the BBC more than 20 years ago. He’s since commentated on soccer for a range of TV and radio programs in the United Kingdom — including ESPN’s UK version — and covered six World Cups. But this June marks his first time calling the biggest event in sports for an American audience. ESPN executives believe that Champion can endear himself to American viewers similar to how another English commentator, Ian Darke, did during the 2010 World Cup. “We were familiar with Jon from his time with ESPN UK, and we have always been impressed with his work and his knowledge of the game,” Jed Drake, an ESPN senior vice president and executive producer, told Mashable via email. “He calls a match in a very sincere, straightforward manner, and he gives you more than just play-by-play. He provides context and perspective, which is similar to Ian. We believe fans will embrace Jon during this World Cup, and he will call some big matches for us.” Champion will call nine group-stage games, as well as several more once the World Cup moves on to its elimination stage. It’s the same sport he’s been covering for years, but Champions says his new audience will require a slightly different approach. “I’m going to have to think about it a bit more, and I welcome that as a broadcaster,” Champion says. “It’s good to challenge yourself as a broadcaster.” Much of that challenge lies in the USA’s booming — but still-fledgling — interest in soccer. Many American fans possess enough passion and knowledge of the game to rival anyone across the pond, but the American audience is also rife with more casual fans who couldn’t pick legendary Italian midfielder Andrea Pirlo out of a police lineup. The trick, according to Champion, will be serving both groups of American fans who will make up ESPN’s massive Stateside audience. “I’ll have to find a balance between explaining enough and not explaining too much,” he says. “It’s up to me […]
ESPN‘s long-running line of “This Is Sportscenter” ads take a whimsical and bizarre angle on the legendary show’s behind-the-scenes productions, imagining scenarios and backstories that, for all we know, could actually be true. They’ve produced some really funny spots over the years. But the latest offering — which purports to reveal that straight-laced NFL analyst John Clayton actually rocks a gnarly ponytail, head-bangs to Slayer and still lives with his mother — may be SportsCenter’s best ad yet. That was the chatter on the social web after the spot instantly started spreading in sports circles upon hitting YouTube Thursday morning — high praise considering the campaign’s hilarious history. So kudos to ESPN on another successful spot. But it may not match this ad from April, which showed why it actually sucks to be Michael Jordan. Read more: http://mashable.com/2012/09/06/sportscenter-john-clayton/
