ESPN Classic

I saw the Canadian version were showing an old Liverpool-Everton FA Cup match this week.

Dont recall ever seeing soccer on the US channel.

 

I see it listed on soccertv.com all the time. Damn, who wouldn't want to see FA Cup Finals from 1982?

 

Any idea who might own the rights to old NASL games, if they do, indeed, still exist?

ESPN used to show the NASL, didn't they? ABC showed some Soccer Bowls, I believe. In fact, I think I remember some ABC sideline person asking Rodney Marsh of the Rowdies, who had just come out with like 11 minutes left in the 1979 Soccer Bowl against Vancouver because of a leg wound, if he would be going back in the game. Rodney, IIRC, gently reminded the person that you can't go back in.

Ah, those were the days.

 

During the World Cup ESPN Classic would replay some of the games of the day and I think named the US-Portugal and US-Mexico games Instant Classics. Maybe when the world cup rolls around again we'll see those pop up. I also remember that ESPN Classic used to show the Official World Cup Films from 1958-1986 on Sunday nights after WC 98. Other than that I don't think I've seen anything either.

 

I would be cool to see the old NASL Soccer Bowl's during MLS Cup weekend. Again, I don't know where the tapes would even exist. Yes, ABC did show the NASL games of 'yore.

Showing the official World Cup films were stopped when Fifa's marketing arm went belly-up. Ownership rights of those films had to be ironed out.

Some of the WC2002 games were actually scheduled to be on Classic, although, I do think you're right in that some games were dubbed Instant Classics and quickly re-aired.

 

I don't know about the rights of the tapes, but you'd be surprised how much stuff simply gets destroyed (which would be my bet). Storage is an issue with a lot of this stuff, as most of it has no real use in terms of maintaining a historical record. And even here-like Super Bowl III-there are only bits and pieces from the NBC telecast that remain. And if you watch ESPN Classic on a regular basis, you see that they really don't show many "classics." In part due to rights, but I also think because a lot of great games from the past have been destroyed or are lost in some warehouse.

Before ESPN bought the network, they would sometimes ask viewers to contact them if they owned or had information re: certain games they wanted to show.

(I just went to look for an old link, and according the Museum of TV and Radio, there are no complete tapes the first two Super Bowls, they most likely erased over the tape, which was the practice back in the 60's.)

 

How about any of the U.S. World Cup games (except Poland) as instant classics?

I know old news....

 

I would imagine there are some restrictions on how many times you can air the things, per FIFA, wouldn't you think? I mean, you can't replay an NFL game, the NFL doesn't allow that ever.

I visited the Museum once and watched the pregame show for Super Bowl III, which does still exist. Interesting in that it was only a half-hour, didn't have any pop singing groups in it, and didn't have any live remotes from local bars.

Strangely, Kurt Warner's wife was in it.

 

Not true.

During the 1987 strike, the NFL allowed NBC to replayed the Super Bowl played early that year, Broncos vs Giants.

NFL games are replayed every week on Canadian networks, as well as the French version of TSN: RDS. It's usually during late Sunday nite or Monday wee hours.

My suspicion is that complete tapes of the early Super Bowls, and classics like the Ice Bowl and the 1958 championship game, are simply lost. I mean, if the NFL owns the rights of those games, there is no reason for them not to sell the rights to ESPN Classic. Better yet, by next year, they have their own channel on Directv, that would be the perfect place to replay those games had the tapes still existed.

 

Then why did the NFL say, when Buffalo had that huge comeback game in the playoffs against Houston several years back, that Buffalo's NBC affiliate would not be allowed to replay the game, despite the clamoring of the fans in Buffalo, many of whom had either gone to the game, or neglected to tape it? At the time, the NFL said "NFL games are not to be replayed, ever" (assuming they meant on American television, and since Canadians who see the NFL live usually do so on American affiliates just across the border, no?). And I don't recall the Giants/Broncos game being replayed, though it may have been. Even so, that was fifteen years ago, and I have absolutely no recollection of any NFL game being re-broadcast in anything close to its entirety since then.

They may very well be lost. The farther back you go, the less likely they kept the tapes (and before that, the kinescopes), or that they have survived the years. The NFL has always managed its own product its own way, and if they chose not to dilute the value of an old broadcast by selling it to ESPN Classic for them to do with it what they liked, or if they were waiting for their own outlet (they do have a channel on DirecTV at the moment, I watch it whenever I'm at a friend's house, it has a lot of the NFL Films programs, and some specialty stuff), that doesn't seem out of line.

 

Besides, NBC couldn't have rebroadcast Super Bowl XXI between the Giants and Broncos for one simple reason: it was originally broadcast by CBS.

 

Yeah, he's right. That's when Madden and Summerall worked for CBS, and that was the Giants team that popularized the Gatorade bath.

Late in the game, when it was in hand, the broadcast started to wander to discussion of the Gatorade bath. The Giants had 3 buckets on the bench, so Madden starts telestrating them, and says one is the father bucket, this is the mother bucket, and that's the baby bucket. I'm sure the guy in the truck started yelling at him about mother bucket (think about it, guys), so Madden keeps going on and on about the mother bucket. Funny as hell.

One slip of the tongue from the funniest moment in the history of the world.

 

I don't know why the NFL said that, because that's blatantly false. 1993 was 6 years after 1987, after they replayed the Giants/Broncos Super Bowl.

If you ask me why the NFL lied, I can't tell you. I don't speak for the NFL.

No. Canadians watch the NFL on Global and CH every Sunday. Some Global and CH affliates simply replay the game after midnight. RDS (French) also replays the NFL late Sunday nite/Monday morning.

 

I don't understand this logic. Why couldn't NBC have rebroadcast Super Bowl XXI? The game was originally produced by CBS, but the copyrights of the game belong to the NFL. NFL can sell it to whoever they want for a rebroadcast.

Now, I may have mistaken CBS for NBC on the rebroadcast. It's too long ago. But I think it's NBC because I vaguely remember Bob Costas with some opening lines before showing the game. Of course, I had absolutely no interest in watching the replay.

Of course, this incident got stuck in my memory because in 20+ years of following the NFL, this is the only instance that I recall seeing a rebroadcast of an NFL game on American TV.

The game was shown at the supposed week 3 of the 1987 season. The regulars played the first 2 weeks. Week 3 was the first week of the strike. Week 4 - 6 were the scabs.

 

Which was my point. It doesn't happen on American TV. I should have been more clear on that point. Sorry.

And NBC simply wouldn't broadcast an original CBS production with CBS' announcers and CBS' graphics all over it.

 

After checking back issues of the NY Times....

You were right, rangers. Super Bowl XXI was rebroadcast, on September 27, 1987. CBS' lineup that day had a one-hour edition of The NFL Today (long for the day...remember when network pregame shows were only 30 minutes long?), followed by the rebroadcast of the Super Bowl. Apparently they had Phil Simms on before, during, and after the retrospective (thus beginning his broadcasting career) to talk about the game and the strike.

NBC had an hour-long NFL Live, and then (having paid MLB a little extra for the right to do so) showed the Toronto Blue Jays and Detroit Tigers to most of the country (with the rest getting the Cardinals/Cubs game), after having showed those four teams the day before as part of their regular Saturday Game of the Week coverage.

On Monday night, ABC showed Star Trek III: The Search for Spock instead of Monday Night Football.

Still looking for the article on the Bills-Oilers game, but IIRC, what was said at the time was that the NFL had a strict policy against rebroadcasts of games (which they apparently bent in 1987, perhaps to appease CBS, which had paid $1.06 billion in its last contract, more than the other two networks). Obviously, Canadians get to see them again, I didn't know that. Makes up for all those taxes they pay, I guess.

 

Guess what. I went to the library to take a look at the Sept 27, 1987 LA Times. That's the schedule of the day:

Channel 2 (KCBS)
9:30 a.m. - NFL Today
10:30 a.m. - Super Bowl XXI, N. Y. Giants vs Denver (taped)

Channel 4 (KNBC)
9:30 a.m. - NFL Live
10:30 a.m. - Detroit vs Toronto Baseball
1:00 p.m. - Aspen Festival Tennis (tape)

The funny thing is that the pre-game shows (NFL Live and NFL Today) took up one hour. I mean, how could they spend 1 hour just to talk about the strike?

As of the Oilers/Bills game, did you catch the rehash on ESPN on Christmas Eve (18:30 - 20:00 PST)? that's 90 minutes long. This rehash showed almost all the plays of the game, without the stoppage and the huddles. Lots of footage (plays of most of the drives) were taken from the original NBC telecast. They had Levy, Reich, Reed, Talley, Tasker, Beebee, Pardee, Gilbride, Bubba McDowell, Hayward Jeffries, Spencer Tillman, Bruce Matthews, Al Del Greco commenting on the plays. Better yet, it also showed the perspectives of the Oilers choke the year before (to the Broncos) and the Music City Miracle (the Oilers revenge) 7 years later.

This 90 minute rehash is one of the best NFL Classic I've ever watched. I would enjoy this classic much more than a 3+ hour, whole-game rebroadcast.

 

Scary that we both went to the library to check on that.

I agree, 90 minutes would be terrific for an NFL game. They boil the old USFL telecasts down to two hours and that's still good.

 

There have been several NFL games rebroadcast as insant classics the past few years.Most painfully to me as a Dolphins fan,the Jet MNF comeback game was almost immediately reshown

 

ESPN classic did show the US WC 02 games back during the WC...same for other "big" games.

but nothing since then.

 

Clearly ESPN Classic is a waste. Now they are showing old USFL games.
No wonder Charlie Ergen tried to drop it from Dish Network.

 

They've been showing old USFL games now for more than a year, and they're fun to watch. I loved the USFL.

Apparently they've been showing NFL games as well, and so I stand corrected and apologetic.

The part that gets me, though, is when my digital cable guide says "Classic Baseball" or something is on ESPN Classic and I look and it's like a Division Series game from 1999 or something. Come on.

 

ESPN Classic indeed is a waste. Look at ESPN Classic Canada. At the time of this post, it's showing the 1986 FA Cup final between Liverpool and Everton. In the past 2 weeks, they were the 1983 final and replay between Man U and Brighton. I mean, I watched most of the FA Cup finals in the 60s and 70s on Classic Canada in the past year.

If it's a choice of

- old FA Cup finals,
- old USFL games,
- instant World Cup (2002) classics, i.e. rebroadcast of World Cup matches within a week,

which one do you prefer?