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ESPN Does a Good Thing

Like most of you, I suspect, I watch ESPN 365 days a year, or close to it.  The last two evenings I was treated to Black Magic, a documentary that was, without question, the best television programming the network has put out this year.  It was the best documentary I've seen since the nonpareil Hoop Dreams.  I sat through most of the program, a thorough look at the men who integrated collegiate and professional basketball, with a slack-jawed awe.  This is good, really good, I kept saying to myself.  This is ESPN?

For its many faults, and they are well-chronicled, ESPN went against all its better instincts in airing this documentary.  Looking back, Black Magic was anti-ESPN in almost every way. It featured historic people discussing important things in conversational voices, rather than forgettable people discussing unimportant things at jackhammer volume.  It featured intimate one-on-one interviews with legends of the sport; not once were they asked what size their flat-screen television was or who they were rocking out to on their iPod.  For two evenings, ESPN broadcast a program devoid of ulterior motives and entirely without commercials.  Surely, it was snowing in hell.

The civil, adult tone of Black Magic never faltered, not when Pee Wee Kirkland regaled the audience with the story of his imprisonment (and subsequent 132 point game in a prison league), not when Willis Reed described himself as too stubborn to make a good SNCC protestor ("If someone punches me, I'm going to punch them back"), not when Bob Love reminisced on the day his wife left him shortly after a career-ending injury.  From its passionate retelling of the legendary Big House Gaines to the heartbreaking treatment of Bobby Phills' untimely death, Black Magic rang true in ways the rest of ESPN could only dream of.  I mean, can you imagine what Cold Pizza or First Take or, really, whatever they call it, would say about Pee Wee Kirkland? I can: Michael Vick. I'm still trying to get those six months of my life back.

Over the last two evenings, the volume on my television could be resurrected from the mute graveyard without fear of screaming talking heads arguing about "Bracketology" (Where is the Kansas Board of Education when you need it to put an end to this science?) or "Who's Now" or The National Steroids Epedemic or whatever.  I was treated to a world in which dignified spirits succeeded against a society that was set up for them to fail; a world in which John Chaney was still a leader of young men and not someone whose dirty coaching demanded he be fired; a world in which silent, classy Ben Jobe led Southern University to the first NCAA tournament victory in the history of Historically Black Colleges yet didn't allow himself the job of savoring the win because it came at the expense of a lifelong friend, Georgia Tech's Bobby Cremins.  

For two evenings it was a beautiful, alternate universe, as if constructed by Le Anne Schreiber herself.  Then, the program ended and normal life resumed.  Flipping through the day's mail, I eyed the latest copy of ESPN: The Magazine.  In an instant, the teamwork and the selflessness of Black Magic evaporated.  In its place?  LeBron James posing solo on the magazine's cover, wearing a baseball cap with four letters written on it in what appears to be blinging diamonds.  What four letters graced his cap, you ask?  What other four letters could it have been: ESPN.    

--Ben (Benjamin.Golliver@gmail.com)

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Thank you, Ben
This was wonderful.

--Dave

by Dave on Mar 17, 2008 9:08 PM PDT reply actions   0 recs

Yeah...
I concur, and I am sorry I missed it.

by The Graduate on Mar 17, 2008 9:19 PM PDT up reply actions   0 recs

They even
kept commercials to a minimum. I literally could not stop watching it, even though I had finals to study for. Best thing I have ever seen on ESPN.
Get Greg outta the burbs

by BigCelPhone on Mar 17, 2008 9:24 PM PDT reply actions   0 recs

Check out the
Sweet two page BRoy ad in the mag.

by Sabonis4Ever on Mar 17, 2008 10:47 PM PDT reply actions   0 recs

you nailed it Ben
I am humbled after watching. I am only 23 and its amazing how much I dont know about the players of the olden days.  It was an amazing program by espn, lets hope they keep it up, however doubtful that may be...
Rudy > MJ

by myemic23 on Mar 17, 2008 11:13 PM PDT reply actions   0 recs

Great Post, Ben
Every now and then, a savory glimpse of humanity shows through the iron clad armor of corporate media.

by go52 on Mar 17, 2008 11:27 PM PDT reply actions   0 recs

Nonpareil?
Calm down frog.

by robrun2 on Mar 17, 2008 11:51 PM PDT reply actions   0 recs

I saw the first half
The 2nd half is on my DVR and I'll watch it after work this morning.  You forgot to mention that George Steinbrenner is a douche.  He was already low on my list of people I liked and now I just hate him.
"An expert is someone who knows some of the worst mistakes, which can be made, in a very narrow field." - Niels Bohr

by tominhawaii on Mar 18, 2008 3:41 AM PDT reply actions   0 recs

the only people
that came off worse than steinbrenner were bob pettit and clyde lovellete who went to management to get their coach fired for refusing to bench (black player) cleo hill who was cutting into their scoring averages and then orchestrating hill's release and finally black-balling him from the league by spreading word amongst the owners that he wasn't to be signed...

and people give kobe a bad rap asking for a trade, i couldn't believe my eyes when i watched that... last time i checked pettit is in the hall of fame too.

For more pictures and videos, check out the BlazersEdge Facebook group and www.youtube.com/blazersedgeben

by Ben. on Mar 18, 2008 9:15 AM PDT up reply actions   0 recs

4 letter words
"What other four letters could it have been:"

I assumed it was N-I-K-E.

by Jumbo on Mar 18, 2008 4:21 PM PDT reply actions   0 recs

Nice post, Ben
I also loved that documentary.  I'm old enough (55) to have caught the tail-end of the desegregation of the NBA.  When I started watching in the mid-sixties, every NBA team had a few black players, a few good white players, and a bunch of white stiffs.  I remember assuming that those white stiffs were there to keep racist white fans from bailing.  But I never really knew or understood the history of the NBA's desegregation or of historically black colleges.  

The show was wonderfully educational and illuminating.  I loved the profiles of the great--and sometimes obscure--black players and coaches, painful as it was to see what they had to deal with.  And how about all the funky music?  That alone made the program worth checking out!

"Ime caught the guy in mid-air with a fist and calmly continued his dispatching of oncoming people." -Gabe Muoneke

by hurryup09 on Mar 18, 2008 5:59 PM PDT reply actions   0 recs

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