Washington Football found themselves at the center of a feud between ESPN and coach Chris Petersen. This time the media giant took it one step too far.
This didn’t start as an outright attack on the world-wide leader in sports. Yet somehow that’s where things have turned after Petersen made an honest apology to his own fan base. Yes, that’s how this mess began.
““I just want to say something to our fans,” said Petersen. “We apologize for these late games and I’d also like to reiterate it has nothing to do with us or the administration. We want to play at 1 o’clock.”
Sounds pretty innocuous to me. But that was just the tip of the iceberg. ESPN’s Kirk Herbsteit fired back at Petersen, saying he should be grateful that Washington is even being televised by ESPN in the first place. But let’s stop right there.
It wasn’t Petersen that drew up the contract that landed his games on ESPN. And it’s not like ESPN is playing the role of gracious television provider as they claim. If ESPN didn’t put the Pac-12 on their networks, somebody else would. Fox Sports is continuing to grow their college football selection. Why not them?
ESPN doesn’t have any chips left at the table. They need Washington a lot more than the Huskies need ESPN. As UW continues to win and march towards the College Football Playoff (televised by ESPN) they’ll continue to get national exposure. We live in a day when you can watch Memphis (no offense) on TV every Saturday.
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So whether it’s on ESPN or somebody else, Washington is going to stay on TV. Wanting a better time slot isn’t criminal, so ESPN needs to take a deep breath before they continue a war that wasn’t asked for in the first place. And maybe, they might want to heed Petersen’s advice.
After all, as a paying customer of ESPN that doesn’t live on the west coast, I’d like the chance to watch one of the nation’s best teams play on Saturday rather than Sunday.