Walt Disney Co’s sports network ESPN is buying cricinfo, the world’s largest specialist cricket Web site, as it expands beyond its traditional strengths of American football, basketball, baseball and Nascar.
“We don’t think of ourselves as an American sports television company. We think of ourselves as a large sports and media entertainment company that operates around the world,” Russell Wolff, ESPN International executive vice president and managing director told Reuters.
The Bangalore-based Web site was founded in 1993 and has more than 7 million monthly users.
We nudged into this area of discussion – just a wee bit, this weekend – with my post about Lewis Hamilton’s F1 victory in Canada.
I grew up with the basic set of American sports – I played the Big 3 – and even as a kid I hung out at the local quarter-mile dirt track. But, growing into knowledge that looks beyond parochial and national limits isn’t restricted to intellectual pursuits.
So, I’ve slept alongside the Mulsanne Straight at LeMans, had my introduction to “proper” football at an Auld Firm Derby in Glasgow. Getting your brain around new formations of athletic coordination is no less useful than opening a book by an author you’ve never read before.
Hmmm. Trolling for baseball haters?
Nothing happens outside of the US: just enemy combatants, crappy health care systems and frog-eaters. Boooooooo!
#1 – nope. Still have autographed photos of Ted Williams, Bobby Doerr, Dominick DiMaggio.
It’s good to know what other people obsess about.
Sports is like religion in so many ways. We are influenced which sport to participate in by our parents or peers, adhere to formal rules with moral teachings and defend its value against attacks from supporters of other teams/games. No matter which sport or religion is your favorite, it is hard to criticize honestly without spending time with its most passionate participants. Anybody for a game of korfball?
I would venture that this purchase of cricinfo.com by ESPN is somehow tied to the Cricket Twenty20 World Cup competition coming up in September 2007. Unlike the other long-forms of cricket that take up to 5 days (Test Cricket) or a full 8-hour day (One Day Internation/ODI cricket), the short-form Twenty20 matches are completed in about 3 hours. This seems to be the maximum time limit for the attention span of American sports fans – baseball, American football, basketball, hockey, etc. all wrap-up in the 3-hour timeframe (or less).
As for American’s general lack of knowledge of cricket, this is in large part due to the fact that unless you have DirectTV & its special cricket coverage packages, or unless you know a bunch of Indians, Pakistanis, or Austrailians, the only exposure to cricket in America would be an accedential stumble-upon on the Internet.
Like Eideard, I hope that this move by ESPN will broaden our American recreational horizons & viewing options.
There are other sports besides hockey?
3. That is impressive. My neighbor has an original Ty Cobb, pulled a wall down while remodeling, and it was between walls in an old cigarette pack (Virginia something) mint condition and valued at $7000.00.
By the way NASCAR isn’t a sport….
Seriously…
Does ANYONE understand cricket?
Actually, sport’s DON’T happen outside of the U.S.
In Britain, it’s just Sport. =P
Ask Om.
Totally off topic – Installed Safari for Windows.
Damn it’s nice !
http://www.apple.com/safari
No need to understand cricket !
…well, depending on what statistics you get your hands on, the two largest sports in the world are football (the real kind, where you use your foot to interact with the ball), and cricket.
I guess that’s what happens when the whole of ye olde British empire play the same couple of games 😉
Golly – I didn’t know that Brazil – and Germany – and Italy – and Mexico – well, #14, you get the idea.
#13 – just installed the OS X version (they both are “beta’s, btw). Looks like some of the old CSS problems with this site vs. Safari are solved. Only time will tell.
>I’ve slept alongside the Mulsanne Straight at LeMans
During the race? I’ve driven along it, but of course there was no racing at the time – the circuit is (or was) made of public roads so anyone can have a go, except that I remember a remarkable number of cops in cars and on motorbikes, more than one usually finds on rural French roads.
#15 Just because other countries play it as well does not mean that the OBE member states aren’t a determining factor.
Havin a billion Indians as part of your generic audience tends to skew things a bit in your favour 😉
#19 – it was just a small but important correction, dude. You’re certainly correct about cricket. But, football – nah. It got to be worldwide faster than the Brits could kill indigenous peoples.
#17 – yeah, during the race. Tired enough, with enough wine and partying – always part of LeMans – I probably could have slept in the pits. : )
Yawn. Another sport that espn won’t cover anymore. I used to watch australian football and, once in a while for the entertainment value of watching the fans go freaky, cricket from India, etc.
So they bought the site. say goodnight, gracie.
I love how sports gets people going in just about any country. My best mate is from Scotland and when we get into it about sports he always brings this point up……..**He says we Yanks are an arrogant bunch of bastards in sports….I ask why he says that, and he replies….because you have the ***World Series** in baseball, but you and Japan are the only countries to play it, how can it be a **world series**. He claims it’s just another example of Yank attitude that it’s not important if it’s not American.
Ya know….he has a point.
*Yawn*. If they run it opposite hockey it might get some ratings.