 This is the SF Productions podcast network Stay tuned for more programming on a CTV cable 21 And in the center square Tuesday at 6 Wednesdays at 10 Thursdays at 3 at Darren Pamela Ferdin To the place your parents didn't understand the world of 60s and 70s television Welcome to vast wasteland Welcome home and it's a beautiful day for public access I'm marks midbar along with Wilbert Neal and Marty Wiley here on vast wasteland the video journal of 60s and 70s TV and tonight they were talking about TV sports That's right, but first before we get into the big exciting action We need to tell you that we're on Tuesdays at 6 Wednesdays at 10 and Thursdays at 3 p.m Here on a CTV cable 21 Also, if you want to write into us you want to write into box 15 1411 Columbus, Ohio 4 3 2 1 5 right right right there Well TV sports Certainly want to yet another one of these staples otv certainly any more One of the big staples of TV on the weekends. I don't know what the networks would do when for that Whole channel now. That's right Well, they've tried several channels actually I think actually there's a there's a regional like a southeast regional sports channel So people are nuts about sports in fact they just I don't know if it stayed on for very long There was a sports news network. No sports actually being played news about sports 24 hours a day All the scores all the time That's right, but not much else So people are nuts about sports, and it's it's something that It's a mark. It's a mark. That's what it is It's pretty much back on it. It's worldwide now inter intertwined with all of broadcasting now And and when it began It really didn't work very well At the beginning of TV sports just because the technology wasn't there to I mean the first sports It really worked well with stuff like boxing because you know It's this little area and people can't move around an enormous amount You basically just lock down a camera and point it at the ring and that's about it It's pretty simple. I mean if you look at them pretty much what they have like the newsreel Thanks for football. Hey, you got them all running out there at lightning speed That's right, of course then they didn't have all the heavy equipment that they were now so they were able to run But you looked at stuff like baseball baseball in early TV was like a joke Because it was basically it was kind of taking the the metaphor of boxing and just saying well It's just a really big area. We're gonna lock the camera down the entire field Well, they didn't want to be right down there, you know, if they sit down there where they umpire Shortstop are they bald come back? No, they do that right now there now it's like, you know field cam actually this year I read that for either for the all-star game or for something they're gonna have a They're gonna have the like this pencil-sized camera inserted in one of the bases That'll be smart. Yeah base cam Helmet cam For all the good that does It is an interesting concept, I'll give you that but don't let that person get tackled They got to have like blinders and things around cameraman It's like he's like he's the the Red Cross of the football field I am not to be hit. Yeah, don't hit me. Of course on the other hand we have we have Road race, you know like racing. Oh, yeah, where I mean, there's only one reason they put cameras and cars So they can get it, you know First person view of a crash Right, you know because the the regular view of them zipping around the track is not particularly interesting because it's like behind the guy's head and all you see is You know, it's only when there's an accident really that it's really interesting I'm waiting for hole in one cam a little pencil-sized camera inside the hole on the and then when the Actually don't probably put it on the flag, you know bowling ball cam They're probably be like crown cam, you know on the crown there And had to be a wide-angle lens to You guys have books whose idea was to put golf on TV Somebody in Britain With no life because And what is the deal with the with the golf announcers talking so soft like like they're not two miles away We don't We don't want to disturb the little animals I'm watching this on TV even as you are but still I'm being soft and quiet. I don't want to wake my father and mother And of course the biggest example is well For those of you watching at home the four or five people actually watch this program of course if you're not watching at home Well, I guess you wouldn't see this show Somebody's home right that The Olympics is going on now for us and I've been just watching the rest of the world The Olympics you dial in unless your name is Wolbert mark or Marty And I mean when when they rerun this show by golly, it'll be real special because everybody's like well Remember that it's still going on right now. That's right. It's like a time thing But you're saying right well this this whole Olympic thing it just seems like now that when you consider that in 1960 when they first Televised the Olympics it was like for five hours or something and it was all film and it was water cronkite Standing in front of a blackboard and saying well, here's what the medals are right now And now pretty much broadcasting controls the Olympics completely and stars are made like Mark Spitz. That's right Like and nobody heard of Mark Spitz, and then all of a sudden Mark Spitz, I guess is the first first Olympic star Super star. Yeah, they really built up in And you know it was like you heard his name every five minutes. We're watching boxing now, but soon We're gonna go watch Mark Spitz Right now it's the women's gymnastic. Don't you wish Mark Spitz was competing? People like Peggy Fleming or something. Well, but really prior to Mark Spitz that was the first Media superstar created from the Olympics. I guess so and the idea that Peggy Fleming was really close But but really you got to go to 70 and of course Olga Corbett was the same as Mark But I mean now you're watching the Olympics and they're having I you know, I hate to I hate to slam on a network like we don't do that on the air But I didn't think it was possible But apparently NBC is actually showing less minutes of actual sporting a bit per hour Then they actually showed last last four years ago It's like there's there's commercials and commercials, but the worst part is there's all these darn videotape Montages and now there's music videos. They're doing so good at the montage. Yeah But now they're actually having the all the athletes or the or the star athletes You know pose they have all these shots of them in dramatic lighting. It's like wait a minute What's the deal and now there's like the best example this has been the gymnastics that women's gymnastics They're showing the the well what used to be the Eastern Bloc countries Unified they're right the unified as I mean as the evil, you know They are evil, you know, they have like They have like like red behind them and they're glaring at the screen and this is like It's scary And now involuntarily every time I see one of those athletes I go Evil It's scary Well, I suppose they want to use the Olympics to whip up a Fury of American patriotism and all that, you know, we've got to have something but Which Olympics was it where they had the terrorist attack 72 the same the same as Mark Spitz The same as the Mark Spitz Olympics Yeah, that was all the the mutic terrorism Bruce Jenner Olympics Spitz Olympics After that, what are you seven medals was that seven seven seven? I mean, he just did TV spot after TV spot and then he just kind of disappeared from right the public eye And the next time we saw him was years and years later. He was selling Wasn't he on one of those amazing discoveries deals? Well, maybe but I saw him Swimwear in Florida or something like that. He had shaved his mustache off. He just looked totally different It's like one of those where are they now? But we can't get out here without talking about the sports show. Yeah the ABCs wide world of sports The agony of defeat The agony of defeat guy, which is recently I guess they finally went in and changed the agony of feet guy They have a new Well, I think it's like It's like a wrestler or something in the Olympics. It's something like that. It's just the agony of defeat guy Well, he's in the anniversary Yes, we made a saint of fallen skiers or something They actually had a special report in the anniversary of that show talking about what happened to that guy, you know He got hurt bad. He's like a local celebrity in in the town in Austria where you know, you're the agony of defeat guy You can go like on a tour, you know, now we're passing the agony of defeat guy's house If you look you can see him waving from the upstairs window But he wishes he could really do this But they like used to be special because they showed the globetrotters like this that you didn't see right until Saturday morning Well the whole idea before that I mean no one had really tried to mount a show like that that that was just every week We're gonna be all over the world and we're filming stuff and we're videotaping stuff and we're doing stuff live And no one you know everyone else said this is never gonna work You're you're gonna you know, like especially if you're doing live stuff from somewhere else the satellite links gonna go down And you're gonna be done, you know, but it but it seemed to work. In fact, it did work It's probably the only sports show that I really ever watched right because it was on it, you know Kind of that dead time on Saturday And then they usually had something it was out of the ordinary That was the thing that was always it was always trying for those for the other sports, right two more wrestling. Yeah And there was no golf I'm trying to remember his name. Oh rune Arledge the guy who made this whole that whole thing happen And Monday night football he made that whole thing occur cuz because until then you know that the Cuz apparently the NFL first had the idea doing that it wasn't the networks They said we want to go to Monday night and the other two networks turned it down saying we're not giving up our valuable Monday night time Mr. Arledge said oh, this will work But because it has it's not a sporting event. It's an entertainment event So put in Howard The man right there Mr. To pay The vocabulary to put anybody else in the world to shame Well, that's how he got that big No, your honor that says that quite Entertainment sports remember these to I may be still do it. I just don't watch sports much They take the World Series champs and the Super Bowl champs and fly them out to Hawaii Superstar against each other in other sports. Yeah, that was kind of interesting I was that doesn't that happen kind of around the real people amazing animal kind of Like let's put these superstars out here and we'll make them put them in a circus Right around the battle the network stars right around that point Well, I know I probably watched that because Being from Cincinnati area you cheered for the Reds Right, who was the baseball team of the 70s? Oh, yeah So we had to see the boys there on TV because you know, it's like It hold up pictures of them at the TV But that was like I thought you know just like the I I don't know Strangest use of athletes pretty much And they kind of showed I think it was the beginning of the end for him, you know, it's like Okay Like the whole thing behind boxing in my opinion anyway, you know, you mean I just got to fight this guy And I'll get all this money It doesn't matter when I lose I still get a big pile of money Harder if they weren't gonna get nothing Amateur boxes but they're killing each other Literally It should be professional boxing it should be all the money goes to whoever wins, you know, the other guy gets cab fare All the sports like that okay like you got a baseball team Yeah, and it's like okay per game There's this amount of money in the pot, right and the winner takes all right winner take winner takes the that takes the receipts from the doors And then you know, and then those guys would like really run and like really play It's just a big money deal but hey speaking well I was I was thinking of the idea that um, you know sporting events that were on like go in the 60s This was just a big time for that. Oh, yeah, it's um Every every cigarette commercial in the world was right there cigarette and beer commercial and and also shaving shaving things and Shaving lotion was like the first athlete guy. I remember doing a commercial a real jazzy one would be right I'm probably not Seema cream your face. Yep. That's one that really stands out in my mind because it was so They were they were just appealing to the male audience basically they they figured out now that auto racing would basically close up shop If the beer companies pulled out, I Mean they would they simply would not be able to fund the thing No one could afford the insurance of the incredible cost of the cars And of course now we have you know commercials where it's like don't drink and drive brought to you by the Budweiser racing team Yeah Don't drink Yeah, you mean I'm gonna be driving 200 miles an hour and all those other guys are gonna be But you know basically the reason why they have them all sports channels now is so they can avoid embarrassments like the Heidi Bowl Now here's the deal in the Heidi Bowl for those who don't know was this a Super Bowl? Yes It was a playoff it was a playoff game there was this playoff game to those attached to football, right? It was a playoff game in the late late sixties and And so it was on NBC and I don't even remember the two teams But the point was one was a good deal ahead and there was like five minutes left in the game and NBC the executive is like Hey, we paid to see Heidi tonight. We've advertised it show it Right, right, so they started showing it and there was a miraculous comeback by the editing Everybody was not happy Heidi Bowl incident there it was like a real um a real great thing for people who really liked Heidi your Well for like like me who were like what nine years old maybe Folks who were into the arts thing the PBS people I guess it's really oh, yeah Advertisement all weekend. I wanted to see Heidi. Yeah, well, let's see that was as the whole thing But now it's like That's right They'll keep that sporting event on here until midnight and then we'll pick up your program It's raining and they're calling 72 time out, but we're gonna stay with the game Someone drowns or someone personally. I don't particularly like baseball and so I do enjoy baseball in the summer when there's one when there's rain delay theater Always like rip out some bad sitcom or something or Cleveland always ran hogan's heroes for like four hours It'd be like I just throw another person over there. Well, it's still raining here in Cleveland stand-in. So let's go back to hogan's heroes. I I always enjoyed yeah Me I was I was always a movie a movie kind of person. So hey, I'd sit there and I'll say alright a movie Yeah, well 43 was at least then was never that organized. So they always had to do it a half-hour block pull out the hogan's heroes I guess I came from extremely organized area since the Natty always had a baseball team But yeah, we'd get a movie if there was a rain delay But then if they started playing you didn't then you're done, right? It's like you might you might be watching the same movie two or three different rain delays, you know You're still trying to cash the end of it That's what you just thought the name of the movie was rain delay You look at pay-per-view Culminating in this darn Olympic triple-cast thing And I don't know I'm worried I might get sued by the local NBC affiliate if I say something really Derogatory toward it. So I don't want to but it's not a good deal, but anyway Oh You've got like like, you know like rotating vcr Exactly, you know, so you can spend the next four years watching all your footage Well, I suppose if you can afford it then you've probably got And you've got three screens So heck that that nice little part that you got to pay and you know, you can't cancel that do it either if you pay for it If you order it, you've got it. That's right. You can't get all this this fall ABC is gonna take some of their college Saturday college games and put them in pay-per-view Hey, there's an idea See why and and maybe it's because I did not grow up here. I Don't see why college games are on In this market college games around college games are important in this part because it's true in a lot of markets. I Mean I grew up. It was professional sports or it wasn't on television The only exception was we did have a local Channel 9 that had BPA king of TV bowling every Sunday afternoon We're the best of the local bowlers Bolled it off for 50 bucks. Why would you possibly watch bowling on TV? I don't get that because we knew the people personal friends of theirs, but It's just like I mean and they have like a you know a color commentator or play-by-play guy like well Well, what's gonna do on this shot? It's like well, I bet he's gonna you know What's he gonna do he's gonna hit the rest of the pins Well Anthony was like the most I used to watch bowl probably cuz I bold so Oh, well, you know, maybe I could pick up something. Maybe it would rub through the TV 300 you know absorb it Was a professional bowler and it's like and when everybody when all the bowlers were getting mod and cool and wearing flares Oh, yeah, hey Matt Earl had the the marine cut You know and the straight leg pants and and then it's like as the time progressed He was like behind everybody, but then his hair grew and he put on some flares And it was funny if you were a bowling person at all you remember this I think I think the thing that that got bowling watched a lot more was bowling for dollars Every local market at bowling exactly Oh, yeah And then they decided to branch out into other things We'll have the dog races and you go and you go to the store the local the local grocery store And you get your dog race card and if that dog wins you And then there's there was the horse races thing to it and then then they finally said no We can't do that. That's gambling and then they start up the lottery Go figure to help the schools Somebody's not gonna like this Well, what else we got sports wise sports wise, let's see ESPN now you really got a wonder is this really sport Beach volleyball. Yes. Is that really sports? Come on Come on volleyball It's one of the few sports. I would bother watching football. I don't understand basketball They're all tall. What's in the game? Put the baskets up about 20 feet, right? And then it's gonna be a game, you know The Grand Canyon Diving slash basketball kind of yeah, the bungee jumping cliff diving the basketball Oh, yeah, I used to wonder why they didn't get their brains bashed out Well, if they didn't time it exactly right that the tide would be out We never got to see anybody You get surfing on there, you know doing buggy racing all kinds of neat stuff Now another another sport. That's like I don't think I don't know if it would do it as well If there wasn't TV really is hockey. Yeah Well, because it's I don't know it's not hockey season No, it's catching on here because I mean the children we tried to get game. Yeah tickets. Oh, yeah Yeah, you order those tickets in April if you want to go in December, you know, whoa Hockey because he'd like to go watch people beat their brain Well, see that's the big attraction hockey was the attraction of hiding that is basketball and especially baseball and football is there's too many rules and it's not nearly enough physical contact Lots of people fighting Physical contact out roller skates remember big-time wrestling. Yeah And what about what about Roller derby Jammer, yeah, and and they just recently had that roller games on a roller now. That was an odd thing Yeah, it's like a flaming wall and all this and Of course now you've got the the the American gladiators, which is like the whole sports thing rolled into You too can be out here against the American gladiators It's like it's like a game show for sports people basically That's about it. They come to your town. They come to your town You can try out then you can go to Hollywood and we all get some American gladiators Nah, it's kind of like kind of like superstars. You know the old superstars show mixed with pro wrestling kind of But big-time wrestling the wrestling is like it's all like nation national now, right? Oh, yeah, they used to have local people in the Cincinnati area rinks sponsored it Oh, yeah, rinks some department store, which I guess there isn't anymore. I don't know they sponsored big-time wrestling there were two guys in corny hats and plaid church that did the announcing or whatever It was it was a Saturday afternoon My favorite guy was flying Fred Kareem They'd get up on there you'd get up on ropes and just jump off of there fearless furpo in my market that Like flying or fighting furpo whatever anyways looks like we got to get out of this darn place Well by golly that does happen there next time on bass wasteland. It's another big grab bag show So you want to tune in for that? So for all of us here at bass wasteland. We'll see you next time Next time Be there or I guess you're not watching or not