USA Network Thursday Night Baseball | |
---|---|
Genre | Sport |
Developed by | USA Sports |
Directed by | Bob Hiestand John Repczynski |
Starring | See announcers section |
Country of origin | United States |
Original language | English |
Production | |
Executive producers | Kay Koplovitz [1] Jim Zrake [2] |
Producers | Jerry Romano [3] Mark D. Stulberger Jim Zrake |
Running time | 180 minutes (or until game ends) |
Original release | |
Network | USA |
Release | April 26, 1979[4] – September 29, 1983 |
Related | |
Thursday Night Baseball Major League Baseball on NBC |
USA Network Thursday Night Baseball aired Major League Baseball (MLB) games on the USA Network from 1979 to 1983.
In 1979, [5] 22 teams (all but the Atlanta Braves, Houston Astros, New York Mets, and St. Louis Cardinals) participated in a one-year cable deal with United Artists Television and Columbia Pictures Television, then-owners of the USA Network. [6] The deal involved the airing of Thursday night games [7] in markets at least 50 miles (80 km) from a major league park. [8] The deal earned Major League Baseball less than $500,000, but led to a new two-year contract for 40–45 games per season. [9] [10] The program ran through the 1983 season. [11] [12]
With USA's Thursday night coverage, it ended the position of ABC's Monday night broadcasts as the exclusive national, prime time television franchise for Major League Baseball. [13]
The series began April 26, 1979 [14] with a doubleheader: Cleveland at Kansas City [15] (Jim Woods and Bud Harrelson announcing [16] ) followed by Baltimore at California [17] (Monte Moore and Maury Wills announcing [18] ). The second game of the night was typically broadcast from the West Coast. The games were usually blacked-out in the competing teams' cities. [19] [20] [21] Once in a while, when USA aired a repeat of the telecast late at night, local cities were allowed to show the rerun. [22]
From 1980 to 1981, Jim Woods [23] and Nelson Briles (replacing Bud Harrelson) broadcast the early games, while Monte Moore and Wes Parker (replacing Maury Wills) called the late game. [24]
In 1982, doubleheaders did not start until June 17. [25] Prior to the doubleheaders starting, Monte Moore and Wes Parker did the individual game until then. When the doubleheaders finally began, [26] Moore and Parker moved over to the late game for the rest of the year. Meanwhile, Eddie Doucette (replacing Jim Woods) and Nelson Briles were assigned to call the early game. [27]
USA continued with the plan of not starting doubleheaders until June in the final year of the package in 1983. Steve Zabriskie and Al Albert filled in for Eddie Doucette in September 1982 (Steve Grad also occasionally substituted) while Albert replaced Doucette for a game or more in 1983.
USA's coverage became a casualty of the new $1.2 billion TV contract [28] between Major League Baseball, ABC and NBC beginning in 1984 and lasting through 1989. One of the provisions to the new deal was that local telecasts opposite network games had to be eliminated. [29]
One particular game of note was a Los Angeles Dodgers–St. Louis Cardinals game in 1981 (the last game before the strike [30] [31] ). [32] The game in question featured Fernando Valenzuela picking up his eighth consecutive win to start the season. Valenzuela gave up a home run in the ninth to tie the game 1–1, but Pedro Guerrero hit one himself in the bottom of the ninth for the win.
One year later, during a September 16 game between the San Diego Padres and the San Francisco Giants, [33] Darrell Evans went 3-for-5 with four RBI in Giants' 9–3 victory.
Alan Richard Michaels is an American television play-by-play sportscaster for Thursday Night Football on Amazon Prime Video and in an emeritus role for NBC Sports. He has worked on network sports television since 1971, with his most recent work being with NBC Sports after nearly three decades (1976–2006) with ABC Sports. Michaels is known for his many years calling play-by-play of National Football League (NFL) games, including ABC Monday Night Football from 1986 to 2005 and NBC Sunday Night Football from 2006 to 2021. He is also known for famous calls in other sports, including the Miracle on Ice at the 1980 Winter Olympics and the earthquake-interrupted Game 3 of the 1989 World Series.
Major League Baseball (MLB) has been broadcast on American television since the 1950s, with initial broadcasts on the experimental station W2XBS, the predecessor of the modern WNBC in New York. The World Series was televised on a networked basis since 1947, with regular season games broadcast nationally since 1953. Over the forthcoming years, MLB games became major attractions for American television networks, and each of the Big Three networks would air packages of baseball games at various times until the year 2000. Fox would rise to major network status, partially on its acquisition of MLB rights in 1996; Fox has been MLB's primary broadcast television partner ever since.
The television rights to broadcast National Football League (NFL) games are the most lucrative and expensive rights of any sport in the world. Television brought professional football into prominence in the modern era after World War II. Since then, National Football League broadcasts have become among the most-watched programs on American television, and the financial fortunes of entire networks have rested on owning NFL broadcasting rights. This has raised questions about the impartiality of the networks' coverage of games and whether they can criticize the NFL without fear of losing the rights and their income.
National Basketball Association (NBA) games are televised nationally in the United States, as well as on multiple local channels and regional sports networks. Since the 2002–03 season, broadcast channel ABC, and pay TV networks ESPN and TNT have nationally televised games. Throughout most of the regular season, ESPN shows doubleheaders on Wednesday and Friday nights, while TNT shows doubleheaders on Tuesday and Thursday nights. In the second half of the season, ABC shows a single game on Saturday nights and Sunday afternoons. Games are shown almost every night on NBA TV. There are some exceptions to this schedule, including Tip-off Week, Christmas Day, and Martin Luther King Jr. Day. More games may be shown as the end of the regular season approaches, particularly games with playoff significance. During the playoffs, the first round are split between TNT, ESPN, NBA TV, and ABC on mostly weekends the second round are split between ESPN, TNT and ABC on weekends. The conference finals are split between ESPN/ABC and TNT; the two networks alternate which complete series they will carry from year to year. The entire NBA Finals is shown nationally on ABC. The NBA Finals is one of the few sporting events to be shown on a national broadcast network on a weeknight.
The NHL on USA was the de facto title of a television show that broadcast National Hockey League games on the USA Network.
The NBA on USA is the de facto name for the USA Network's National Basketball Association (NBA) television coverage. The program ran from the 1979–80 season through the 1983–84 season.
Monte Moore is an American former radio and television broadcaster for the Kansas City Athletics and Oakland Athletics baseball teams.
Steven Kenneth Zabriskie is an American former television sports announcer who is best known for calling Major League Baseball and college football.
Thursday Night Baseball is the de facto branding used for live game telecasts of Major League Baseball on Thursday nights.
As the national broadcaster of the NBA, CBS aired NBA games from the 1973–74 until the 1989–90 season, during which the early 1980s is notoriously known as the tape delay playoff era.
In 1980, 22 teams took part in a one-year cable deal with UA-Columbia. The deal involved the airing of a Thursday night Game of the Week in markets at least 50 miles (80 km) from a major league park. The deal earned Major League Baseball less than $500,000, but led to a new two-year contract for 40-45 games per season.
By 1969, Major League Baseball had grown to 24 teams and the net local TV revenues had leaped to $20.7 million. This is in sharp contrast to 1950 when local television brought the then 16 Major League clubs a total net income of $2.3 million. Changes baseball underwent during this time, such as expansion franchises and increasing the schedule from 154 games to 162, led to a wider audience for network and local television.
During the 1979–80 and 1980–81 seasons, four more Canadian teams, the Edmonton Oilers, Quebec Nordiques, Winnipeg Jets, and Calgary Flames, joined the NHL. The Oilers and Flames were featured frequently as the two teams were contenders the 1980s; in contrast, as the Nordiques were owned by Carling-O'Keefe, a rival to the show's sponsor Molson and whose English-speaking fanbase was very small, the Nords were rarely broadcast, and never from Quebec City during the regular-season.
PBA on USA is a presentation of professional ten-pin bowling matches from the Professional Bowlers Association Tour formerly produced by the USA cable television in the United States from 1982 to 1984.
USA Sports was the branding used for broadcasts of sporting events by the cable channel USA Network. The network's history with sports dates back to its forerunner, the Madison Square Garden Network, and in the past has included coverage of the major professional leagues, college football, golf and tennis.
USA agreed to the baseball limitations rejected by ESPN and shows a Thursday-night game in cities that do not have a major-league team. In New York City, Manhattan Cable broadcasts USA's programs, but cannot televise the weekly baseball game because the Yankees and Mets declined to grant the waivers necessary under major-league statutes.