Like any good twenty-first century sports fan, I avoid following sporting events on the radio whenever humanly possible. Not only would I of course prefer to watch the game in person or on TV (even on, dare I say, standard definition TV . . .), but I think in most cases the online gamecasts on ESPN or MLB's website, for example, are more enjoyable than listening to the radio. Sports radio is filled with scratchy sound, annoying commentary and absolutely terrible commercials. Plus, all I can think about when I hear talk radio is the Family Guy episode featuring Weenie and the Butt.
Not even the awfulness of radio could keep me from following Tuesday night's Princeton basketball game versus Penn, however. With no other media options available (the game wasn't televised here in California, not surprisingly, and the ESPN.com Gametracker is particularly bad for lower-level college basketball games), I called up the free internet radio on the Princeton Athletics website and sat down for two hours of local sports audio. While the announcers were shockingly respectable and the audio quality was solid throughout, the local commercial advertisers were the most absurd and distracting parts of the game.
Among the more "interesting" advertisers that buy air time during local Princeton radio broadcasts are the Robert Wood Johnson Medical Center, the Amtrack Northeast Regional Line, the Princeton Hyatt and of course Princeton Audi, "located on Route 206 near the Princeton airport." Those four commercials were repeated dozens of times throughout the game, with the rest of the ads reserved for public service announcements or ads for other content on this particular Princeton-area radio station. The game was super exciting (the Tigers won by 3 in overtime), but the ridiculously low-budget commercials that aired during every critical timeout turned were all I could think about.
Given how hard it is to follow Tiger hoops from out here, and given how well the team's been doing this season, I'm sure this won't be the last Princeton radio broadcast I suffer through this season. Maybe it's for the best - perhaps I should listen to games on the radio while I still can. Given the low quality and quantity of the station's advertisers, I can't help but think that the end of local sports radio isn't too far off.
1 comment:
To be fair, the advertisements have gotten far better after the University athletic department took over the broadcasts. Back when WPRB was student-run and had exclusive coverage of the games, we sometimes had literally two ads: a promo for Jon Weingart's "Music You Can't Hear on the Radio" and, my personal favorite the Pequod Copy rock ballad. "PE-QUOOOOD -- WHEN YOU MOOOOOOVED -- I DIDN'T KNOW WHAT TO DOOOOOOOOOOO!" Classic.
Go Tigers.
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