It's fun? Also, I go back to him being a bitter Bucks fan. That said, he really does genuinely despise the NBA and I can absolutely see his point there. Refereeing has made this sport unbearable at times, even for die-hards.
I think he genuinely enjoys tweaking Tanguay and Dickerson and making them squirm.
Which is one of the reasons I seriously enjoy Cedric and Felger. Cedric refuses to let him have the last word and enjoys tweaking him right back. And this comes from a Bruins fan.
That's exactly how I feel. I really think he enjoys busting Greg and Gary's balls. He'll even take on Cedric Maxwell when they appear together on TV.
Well, unfortunately for us all, the Celtics are really the only game in town right now so he won't let it go since the only other thing they could talk about would be a mediocre baseball team whose season is less than 1/2 finished.
Actually Russo is a fan of the Giants. He just happened to despise the Yanquies. Felger is doing to the Celtic fan base exactly what Russo did. Unfortunately there is no Francessa (a die hard Yanqui fan) to balance him out. Mazz just yeses him to death, which sucks.
Awesome post. Agree 100%
This ratings dip for the Sports Hub is probably a good thing in the long run if it forces them to think about changing up the glaring atrocities on their airwaves (Mazz). Felger needs someone more knowledgeable/interested than Mazz to avoid pointless rhetoric being repeated endlessly. The other shows were down as well and could use improvements here or there to some degree (Wallach on T&R, Gresh, maybe a co-host for DA, etc.). We saw what complacency did to EEI and while they're ratings success is probably more a function of the Celtics and people tiring a bit of the Sports Hub acts, there have been some positive changes over there (commercial breaks shortened, D&C not being allowed to talk as much about politics, and, uh, that's all I can think of since I don't really listen to them anymore).
The Baseball Show is actually pretty good. Mazz doesn't shout at anyone and he's miles better than he is with Felger. I listen to it more than EEI's pregame, Mike Adams suck-athon.
On that note, I know that we bitch about Mazz constantly, but I think that in this situation he comes off as kind of a battered spouse sometimes. Whenever he tries to disagree with a point, Felger just argues him down, mocks him and completely ignores what he's saying, so then Mazz stops disagreeing. And I know people talk about replacing Mazz, but I think that after a while the same thing would just happen to the replacement. If you've ever watched SportsTonight, Felger does the same thing to Tanguay to an extent.
That's it. Like other sports mavens Felger is a guy who has a very strong opinion. Unlike other people, nine out of ten times, Felger sticks to it. However, he's not completely inflexible and a few times he will change his tune (remember when he wanted to trade the B's number two pick a few years ago for Kovlachuk?) but you really, really have to work hard to do that. What's Mazz' motivation for changing Felger's mind?
The bolded is why I've never liked Felger. He's a condescending asshole and he's not smart enough to pull it off. You don't have to be brilliant to be a condescending asshole, but you have to be right most of the time. Felger just isn't.
It's been said on this board a zillion times, but this is what I respect most about Felger - when he's wrong, he admits it. He was wrong about Marchand and he was wrong about Gronk, they all tease him for it, and he takes his medicine. Other hosts in this town, both on the Hub and at 'EEI, wouldn't welcome the criticism and aren't self-reflective enough to take the ribbing. Instead they would equivocate and come up with some crap and try to walk back their original stances.
This is used to defend MF a lot, but it is BS...How can he NOT be called out for what he said about Marshmont and Gronk? Why won't he call out Mazz for being wrong about wanting to re-sign Bay?
I was watching on Comcast for this question. I was 100% sure that Mazz was going to ask about Teixeira instead of Lackey. I was shocked when he didn't.
Or go the way of Ordway and either take a position on both sides of the fence or pretend he never said it or pretend that whatever he said that was wrong wasn't what he meant.
Huh? Felger's been a douche forever and even admits it himself, whoever blamed Mazz for that? Please find me one post in this entire thread that even hints that Mazz is to blame for turning Felger into a douche.
Even if Felger has a strong and polarizing personality, that doesn't mean that his co-host should be an annoying know-nothing with opinions and thoughts shallower than the puddles in the parking lot. The content of the show is so superficial for the Sox and Celtics in comparison to their discussions on hockey and football that it's much less interesting. I think that translates into the recent ratings difficulty. It so happens that Mazz is supposed to be the baseball and basketball guy. We know why that should be the case given his long history of covering the Sox and his ability to get Doc and Wyc onto the show, but Mazz seems happy just riding Felger's wave of rhetoric and not really digging deep into any issue beyond the surface.
I think that you are misrepresenting what people say about Mazz. I don't think that anyone here thinks that replacing Mazz will change Felger substantially, if at all, but someone with a backbone or a real opinion would create an interesting conversation. The fact that Mazz can be so much more reasonable on the Baseball Reporters, three minutes after Felger and Mazz, speaks volumes. He doesn't have the intestinal fortitude to challenge Felger on his points so he just yeses him to death when Felger is making one of his points again.
