Sun, June 8, 2003

Because I'm half of the Internet's top parody sports news site (in quality if not in popularity), I have become swept up in an awareness of sports coverage unparalleled since the Braves' 1995 World Series play. So I had a spark of interest to cause me to tune in to the Belmont Stakes. Televised by NBC, there is a certain style of coverage that you can expect.

Having witnessed some of NBC's coverage of the Olympic Games over the years, I'm extremely familiar with their favorite approach to sports coverage: the story of a competitor rising from humble roots, facing seemingly insurmountable challenges, to become the front-runner. They love a sentimental favorite. It's their favorite thing if the favored freestyle swimmer is deaf with a game leg and her father had killed himself three months before. It gives them plenty of things to play dreamy music over as they show clips in slow motion. In the case of Funny Cide, the horse competing for a chance to win the Triple Crown at Belmont today, his owners are a group of "regular guys" who were lifelong friends and went in together on a small investment to start their stable. Add to that a jockey who has come back after injury and a recent allegation of cheating, and NBC is having a field day.

If my familiarity with Funny Cide's situation comes as some surprise considering I knew nothing about him an hour ago, that's because NBC has repeated the humble circumstances of his struggle to domination about forty times in their pre-race coverage. They've ratcheted up the drama because of the Triple Crown possibility. They're reaching so hard for exciting things to talk about that they actually drew a connection between the jockey on Affirmed (the last Triple Crown winner in 1978) and his younger brother who is part-owner of the breeding company that owns Funny Cide's father. They actually interviewed that guy, like it was some sort of family Triple Crown legacy! And you'd better believe they love the nice round "25" in years since a Triple Crown winner. I heard one commentator mention that Funny Cide's jockey Jose Santos had referred to his 1999 run at Belmont as his best ride ever. Her comment, that he will need to "re-echo" that performance today. It's a particularly fun sport to watch because the actual event takes about six seconds so there's a whole lot of time to fill with pre-coverage.

I always think about how the other competitors must get aggravated by the coverage being so biased toward one contestant. I often wonder whether NBC feels foolish if someone else wins, someone whom they only featured in about one percent of their coverage. (Clearly not. In TV today, more than ever, there's the feeling that as soon as a broadcast is finished, anything that went out over the air is immediately forgotten.) Judging by the fact that their first interview is with Santos who finished third, the story is going to be what they make it, not who wins. It's like CBS interviewing Tiger Woods first after he finishes 17th at the Masters. But today I got to thinking: what happens if the front-runner isn't a Cinderella story? What if, instead of being ridden by a jockey with a rollercoaster career and owned by a group of humble high school friends, Funny Cide was owned by a rich old guy who had owned horses his whole life and had hired the winningest jockey in racing history? Where would NBC play its dopey music? What would they show in slow motion, the guy counting his money? Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe they have a crack staff that works through the night digging up some small underdog moment in the contestant's history. Maybe they'd just make one up.

But they sure seem to love it when a "fallen jockey" and an "unknown trainer" can take a horse with "humble beginnings" and propel him to the top of the "sport of kings." I guess audiences just lap it up.

Meanwhile Jose Santos, Jr. was taking things way too seriously. In an interview, the kid (who can't be older than seven) talked about his years of disappointment during his dad's slump after being crushed by a horse in a race. I imagine he was really broken up; too heartbroken to finish his Shrek Kids' Meal. He's giving the Elian Gonzalez cousin a run for her money in the on-camera histrionics department.

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