ZZZZZ … TV SPORTS TALK SHOWS NEED ENERGY INJECTIONS TO SURVIVE

It’s a pity, after my eight years as a mainstay on ESPN’s “Around The Horn,’’ to hear a panelist downplay the importance of emotion — it’s sports talk, right? — amid a substantial ratings drop

     Stooping reluctantly into the sports media sludge, I am taking umbrage today at a cheap shot. It comes from a sleepy Texan, Tim Cowlishaw, who evidently has so little left in his opinion holster that he’s aiming at me. Still a part-time contributor on ESPN’s “Around The Horn,’’ as he was during the eight years in which I appeared on the show nearly every day, Cowlishaw believes my passion during our network-commissioned “competitive banter’’ wasn’t good for the program.

    “He got mad … a lot,’’ said Cowlishaw, goaded by a smirking Dan Patrick on his eponymous show.

     To that, I would say: Stephen A. Smith, the network’s highest-paid front-facing employee whose name isn’t Troy Aikman, is “mad’’ from his morning coffee run to bedtime, assuming he sleeps — and his ratings on “First Take’’ are up 22 percent over last year. Charles Barkley, reigning beast of TV sports talk, gets mad a lot. Bob Costas gets mad. Who doesn’t get mad? It’s sports. Genuine intensity is what attracts eyeballs. Enthusiasm should be stoked.

     The difference being, I agreed to be on a show in which the host scoring our arguments with a joystick — first Max Kellerman, then Tony Reali — thinks he knows more than the rest of us when, quite often, he does not. If Stephen A. and Barkley had to deal with this snark, they’d break Reali in half, then return his overused black leather jacket to The Fonz. Sometimes, I’d intentionally try to get kicked off the show first, maybe to catch a flight to a column assignment or maybe just to flee the frivolity. Yes, I suppose, I was an occasional tanker.

     But I also would say, based on data, that my willingness to show natural emotion and call out the unprepared likes of Woody Paige — really, who on this planet sits stone-faced during a sports debate? — was one undeniable reason why the program’s ratings climbed steadily, quarter after quarter, throughout my run. And I safely can assume it’s a reason why, in the years since I left the show, the daily numbers have dropped from almost 1 million at our peak to the 400,000 range in recent times and lower in previous years. Some erosion comes from media fragmentation — more entertainment options than ever — but the program that follows “ATH’s’’ lead-in, the sacred “Pardon The Interruption,’’ continues to deliver in the 750,000 range when our version of “ATH’’ was nearly even with “PTI’’ at one point. Of course, neither comes close to “Dr. Pimple Popper,’’ and who wouldn’t pay to see Paige pop Reali’s zits (this is something I would say on the show)? That would be more entertaining than the current blah fare, which features too many revolving panelists — 15, 20, 30? — who blandly answer predictable questions rather than zealously debate topics while hijacking what made our half-hour so watchable: continuity, chemistry, flow and, at least from my chair and microphone, a palpable fire that established I cared.

     Not so much about winning the argument, mind you, but the success of the show. When panelists are somnolent, like the 66-year-old Cowlishaw, it explains why  “ATH’’ has fallen out of the national conversational zeitgeist despite an advantageous 5 p.m. ET slot. The focus is on Reali, who has turned the format into a fruitless audition for the “Jeopardy!’’ gig, when few people in America know him beyond millennial and Gen Z sports nerds. And don’t try to tell me about digital impact. Not many are watching “ATH’’ on devices, nor do advertisers emphasize social media followers if they aren’t translating into big TV numbers.

     Call this constructive criticism from one of the few still invested in the show’s survival. I poured my life into the project from ground zero, from our very first meeting, when the roof caught fire at Carnegie Deli in Manhattan. I survived the growing pains and zingers from wannabes in sports media. I survived Kellerman and producer Bill Wolff leaving for Fox Sports and a subsequent trail of tryout hosts. I survived a heart issue. So I don’t want to see “Around The Horn’’ die like other ESPN afternoon shows.

     The sports debate genre, in general, probably has outlived its usefulness. Other than “PTI’’ and “First Take,’’ what truly works in daytime TV sports talk? ESPN, with its expanded NFL partnership and programming billions pouring into virtually every league and organization, is better served by sport-specific studio shows such as “NFL Live’’ and “NBA Today.’’

     As for Fox, the vehicle traffic outside the network’s studios — on Pico Boulevard in Los Angeles, where a billboard for “Undisputed’’ is affixed to a building — far exceeds the audience for the Skip Bayless farce. There is no shortage of emotion, especially when Bayless is cheerleading for his Dallas Cowboys, but his act is so contrived that his views sound phony and forced. The man is 70 years old. He acts like a sports-smitten teenager, and partner Shannon Sharpe is ineffectual. I wish Bayless and Cowlishaw would split their brains in half and swap what they need from one another.

     What “Around The Horn’’ had was a head start: momentum, traction, buzz. Then those quarterly arrows, up for so long, flipped downward. For years.

     I’d say someone needs to get mad.

     Or, at least, wake up.

###

     Jay Mariotti, called “the most impacting Chicago sportswriter of the past quarter-century,’’ writes general sports columns for Substack while appearing on some of the 1,678,498 podcasts and shows in production today. He is an accomplished columnist, TV panelist and talk/podcast host. Living in Los Angeles, he gravitated by osmosis to film projects.