Friday, March 2, 2012

Classic Moments In Sportscasting History

From the 1980 U.S. Olympic Hockey Team's miraculous run to the gold medal, to Kirk Gibson's walk-off homerun in Game 1 of the 1988 World Series, to Michael Jordan's game-winning shot in Game 6 of the 1998 NBA Finals, the classic moments in sports history have captivated and entertained the world for decades. Over the years, the sportscasters covering sports' greatest moments have become legends in their own right--Harry Carey, Bob Costas, Jack Buck...the list goes on and on.

This past week, Craig Smylie, a sportscaster at a local Erie, Pennsylvania TV station, took a big step toward the Sportscasters' Hall of Fame, earning his place among the best is the business. As he filmed a teaser for an upcoming sports report, Smylie messed up his line and then...well, just give it a watch:



Smylie's employer, ABC Jet 24, has been busy removing the clips from YouTube, trying to keep the video from going viral. But let's face it, nothing disappears from the internet--if the embedded video above gets yanked from YouTube, try MetaTube or SportsMashup.

The interesting story behind this clip is that Smylie wasn't actually the one who screwed this up. After watching the clip (or reading the title at the top of the video), you'd think that Smylie failed to realize that he was on live TV.  But that wasn't the case--I heard the background story on the radio as I drove to work this week: Smylie was, in fact, filming a tape-delayed clip when his foul-mouthed outburst occurred, but the station's editor loaded and played the wrong clip during the newscast, prompting the hilarious, awkward pause and stunned reaction from the news anchor at the end of the clip.

It comforts me to know that epic, Hall of Fame-worthy news blunders aren't just limited to the big screen:

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