That was how I took it as well. HBCK can be a bit aggressive about debating his/her (no offense meant just didn’t want to assume) points, but this was not one of those posts - and I tend to agree with this one.
I defended Bilas early on but gave up when his agenda became clear. I still like him as a person and recognize his abilities outside Duke/UNC announcing. He is one of the major reasons I never watch ESPN except for a game I can only watch there- and I rarely watch the whole thing...
Fair point, and yes, HBCK can be aggressive - because one of his occupations is in political media and communications, where the baseline is so nasty, that what I do here doesn't seem to me to be aggressive (most of the time). Sorry if it comes off that way.
And yes, my comments were directed at Jay Bilas and NOT the poster. I think the poster was right that this was a calculated move on Jay's part, and as I thought about that, rather than Jay just subconsciously drifting that way, I got even angrier and lost even more respect for Jay. I simply have no respect for calculated schticks. I have no disrespect for the poster whatsoever.
Last edited by HereBeforeCoachK; 12-05-2019 at 09:38 AM.
This may well be the case. I spend very little time thinking about Bilas, as I watch all the games without sound. However, yesterday I re-enjoyed the game one more time by watching with the sound on, and noted four consecutive cases where Bilas opined that Duke was the beneficiary of a bad call or no call...the kid falling in front of Jones, a Spartan who took multiple bumps from a Duke defender without a call...I finally had to revert to mute mode. Meanwhile he had no issue with pro MSU calls.
I can put up with Bilas. He's not my favorite announcer but I can stand him. As others have posted, he does go overboard in his anti-Duke spew and I don't like his on and on about the corrupt NCAA. However, I do agree with him, the NCAA is corrupt. I also remember Jay coming on DBR and defending himself years ago. At that time he was not anti-Duke like he is now. I met Jay at Bob Harris' Golf Tournament years ago and he just wasn't a very friendly person. (On the other hand, Johnny D was) Later on, I was told by a person close to Duke athletics that "Jay was an ok guy, but he's full of himself". I've never forgotten those words. So, when Jay does a Duke game, sometimes I listen to him and sometimes I hit the mute button. It all depends on how bad he is that particular game. And of course, if I feel he's full of himself that game. Oh, but I always mute Dickie V and Len Elmore. As I would Billy Packer if he was still announcing games.
GoDuke!
It is surely odd behavior...I truly don't think he is anti-Duke per se, but what I assume to be his overcompensation is really over the top as I found out the other night. The mute button still rulz.
Bilas would be nearly perfect if he stuck with pure game analysis without a care about "his audience".
Vitale would be terrific if all of his enthusiasm were focused on the game at hand.
Walton does not care at all about "his audience" which is refreshing, but he has kaleidoscope eyes (or tie dye on the brain or something).
We're lucky to be Duke fans, so I guess we can't have it all.
And his Mt. Rushmore of coaches which has about 20 faces on it by now...and his bald dome index....and even he can make that shot even though he only has one eye......and "Are you kidding me?!! Are you serious?!!......."I had dinner with Lou Carnesecca last night and.....".......
Sage Grouse
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'When I got on the bus for my first road game at Duke, I saw that every player was carrying textbooks or laptops. I coached in the SEC for 25 years, and I had never seen that before, not even once.' - David Cutcliffe to Duke alumni in Washington, DC, June 2013
So the way to get less Bilas is he changes his schtick - which isn’t going to happen for monetary reasons - or we enter a period of sucking at hoops and he will not be calling our games as he part of ESPN’s number one college basketball announcing team? Hmm...
It was hysterical. One night later, nearly the same play or at least a very, very similar near-miss goaltend off the glass, in the same Challenge event. The situation was about as close as you could get to a controlled experiment.
And there was Bilas, on night 1 going on and on and on about the call and on night 2 essentially taking the ho-hum approach "gee, it's surprising they get that wrong so often but oh well".
Bilas is a pretty polarizing subject around here, and I find myself more on the dislike side (as an announcer), but man was it an obvious difference between his call in our game versus last night.
- Chillin