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The Shame of Skip Bayless…and His FOX Bosses

“The FS1 personality made reprehensible comments about Dak Prescott’s depression battle, but don’t forget the executives who pay him and industry double-talkers who gave Charles Barkley a pass after similar remarks.”

Jay Mariotti

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Excoriate Skip Bayless. Eviscerate him, emasculate him. Attach him to a tackling dummy and let Dak Prescott take whacks at him, with follow-up body blows from Troy Aikman. Let his brother, the chef Rick Bayless, cover his body in hot chiles and threaten to deep-fry him until he apologizes.

But please know that the problems with this shameful story — Bayless mocking Prescott, the Dallas Cowboys quarterback, for acknowledging his struggles with depression and anxiety — don’t stop at the microphone of the “Undisputed’’ opinion-spewer. Also to be indicted here, strongly, are the executives who employ this cantankerous cuss at Fox Sports 1, and the shallow-minded sports media peers who selectively admonish Bayless while not caring, say, when Charles Barkley makes similarly insensitive remarks about Paul George’s mental health challenges.

To me, last week’s Bayless eruption is what’s wrong with the profession in a single sound bite. He is paid handsomely not for his expertise but for his penchant to draw cheap attention by making outrageous, preposterous comments. FS1 thinks the formula is successful, even when lowly ratings suggest he has been a massive failure for his reported $5 million a year. So the boss who signed off on his 2016 hiring, Fox Sports CEO and executive producer Eric Shanks, continues to trot out Bayless like a baseball manager who won’t give up on a troublesome, washed-up pitcher. Shanks has been innovative in his career — he helped create NFL RedZone and the yellow first-down line on football telecasts — but the Bayless experiment is much like his glowing puck on long-ago hockey productions.

A grotesquely bad idea.

Media executives tend not to acknowledge their mistakes, you see. In this case, one of the Murdochs might notice the Bayless money drain and shank Shanks. Poaching Bayless from ESPN was the brainchild of Jamie Horowitz, who created the “First Take’’ success story in Bristol by pairing Bayless with Stephen A. Smith. But the hopes of then-fledgling FS1, which thought Bayless’ rants would make big noise, devolved into an undisputed ratings dud. The danger now is that he might be so desperate for attention and metrics that he’ll say anything. Should FS1 yank him from the chair before he sinks to even lower lows on the screech meter?

Let’s just make sure we point out, for the sake of accountability and fairness, that he’s not alone in the sin bin. The sports media, especially fanboy types who play favorites, expose their own flaws by trashing Bayless as a horrible human while giving Barkley his usual passes, which suggests their criticism is grounded in petty jealousy more than genuine disgust and nullifies their professional legitimacy.

Here is what Bayless said about Prescott’s depression issues, which surfaced early in the pandemic and worsened when his brother, Jace, committed suicide: “You are commanding an entire franchise. … And they’re all looking to you to be their CEO, to be in charge of the football team. Because of all that, I don’t have sympathy for him going public with `I got depressed’ and `I suffered depression early in COVID to the point that I couldn’t even go work out.’ Look, he’s the quarterback of America’s team. The sport that he plays is dog-eat-dog. It is no compassion, no quarter given on the football field. If you reveal publicly any little weakness, it can affect your team’s ability to believe in you in the toughest spot.”

The take isn’t hot. It’s heartless, repulsive and a fireable offense. But is it any less disgraceful than Barkley’s response when George, the Los Angeles Clippers star, said he was in a “dark place’’ within the restrictive environment of the NBA Bubble? “I don’t think guys making millions of dollars should be worried just because they’re stuck in a place where they can go fishing and play golf and play basketball and make millions of dollars,” the TNT analyst told Dan Patrick. “That’s not a dark place. The thing that happened in Wisconsin (the Jacob Blake shooting), the things happening with this pandemic, all these people losing their jobs — those people are in a dark place. We are the luckiest people in the world to dribble a stupid basketball and make millions of dollars. We’re never in a dark place. I just think we need to be careful what we complain about.”

Any mental health issue should be discussed with delicate compassion by everyone. If Bayless should be fired for his comment, Barkley should be fired for his. Don’t chastise one because he’s a former newspaper columnist who never played big-time sports and pardon the other because he’s an NBA Hall of Famer. Either focus on the verbal crime itself — and not the popularity or likability of who said it — or return to the grade-school sandbox where too many sports media people belong anyway. This isn’t simply about Bayless, per se. It’s about the shocking inability of network commentators, amid the turbulence of 2020, to understand the most fragile basics about depression.

Yet industry people who openly hate Bayless make it only about Bayless, such as Sports Illustrated media writer Jimmy Traina, who returns here for a second time because he lacks intellectual equilibrium. While obliterating Bayless, Traina ignores Barkley because he likes Barkley. If a critic can’t separate his professional work from personal favoritism, he’s shouldn’t be a critic. Such charlatans only let TNT — and parent company AT&T — off the hook without having to answer for Barkley’s numerous low-blow takes.     NBA star Kevin Love has been a robust spokesperson for mental health. He supported George after his recent comments, tweeting, “… post game speaking about being in a `dark place’ and underestimating the effects of mental health, depression, anxiety — is HUGE coming from a player of his caliber. Was always a fan of PG but now even more so.’’

But Love didn’t address Barkley, either, though naturally mentioning Bayless in a set of tweets: “You want to know why now, and always, it’s important for Dak Prescott to share his struggles … it’s because racial lines play a major part in people’s relationship with mental health — “opening up about a mental illness can feel like giving one more weapon to someone you know can use it against you.”…. Skip missed fact that BECAUSE Dak is the quarterback and leader of America’s team — him outwardly expressing this will lead young men and women of every demographic to be less alone and express themselves openly. Mental health issues rob us of achieving our full potential. … Dak helped move a number of people forward today.’’

Why do people attack Bayless and leave Barkley alone? Are they afraid of Chuck’s wrath? Is it the old Cosellian jockocracy at work? Hell, my phone used to ping every time Barkley torched me on “Inside The NBA’’ — not that my commentaries on “Around The Horn’’ ever exceeded a 7 on a scale of 1 (benign) to 10 (felonious). Think I cared about Chuck? The message of the column ALWAYS is more important than the preservation of relationships, kids. That’s why we’re columnists. We own the independent space.

In that vein, I’m not convinced Fox Sports would have issued a quick statement rebuking Bayless if critics and social media hadn’t railed against him. Shanks is attached to the hip of Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, to the point Erin Andrews actually thanked Jones for conducting an interview last week on behalf of Fox (WTF?). Therefore, Shanks was answering to many when he approved this release: “At Fox Sports, we are proud of Dak Prescott for publicly revealing his struggle with depression and mental health. No matter the cause of the struggle, Fox Sports believes Dak showed tremendous courage which is evident in both his leadership on the Dallas Cowboys and in his character off the field. We do not agree with Skip Bayless’ opinion on Undisputed this morning. We have addressed the significance of this matter with Skip and how his insensitive comments were received by people internally at Fox Sports and our audience.”

Not that Shanks ever would suspend him, which would have been an appropriate punishment. There was Bayless the next morning, back on “Undisputed’’ and not exactly remorseful, claiming he wasn’t aware during his commentary that Prescott’s brother had taken his life. Being aware is a primary part of Bayless’ job description, and if he doesn’t study enough to know the particulars about a prominent NFL player, he shouldn’t be in the chair. Saying his comments were “misconstrued by many,’’ he explained, “The only Dak depression I discussed on the show was from an interview he taped with (talk show host) Graham Bensinger. Dak said that depression hit soon after the pandemic hit, right after the quarantine. I said that if Dak needed help for pandemic depression, he should have sought it then.”

He concluded by describing Prescott as “my quarterback,’’ as if Bayless’ status as a Cowboys fan should supersede any and all misconstruing. I remind you that in a few months, this man-child turns 69 years old.

If Bayless wants to discuss one’s “weakness,’’ I know his. He exposed it years ago when we competed in Chicago — I was the Sun-Times columnist, he was at the Tribune. To his credit, he was passionate about his subject material, more than I could say about the city’s other sports columnists during my 17 years there. But when I’d take a stand, he invariably would take the other side. I happen to be right more than I’m wrong — insert laughtrack here — so it caught up to him. Also, I was writing lengthier pieces and he was confined to a narrow hole down the side of a traditional newspaper broadsheet, which led to internal Tribune disagreements and his resignation. From there, he headed to ESPN and his eventual debate pairing with Smith.

So blame me for Bayless’ transformation as a TV monster.

With networks willing to do anything — unethical, immoral — to spike a ratings book, it’s no coincidence Bayless voiced such a low-brow opinion only a week after Smith’s own regrettable opinion on “First Take’’ about “White privilege’’ — his belief that Steve Nash was hired as Brooklyn Nets head coach only because he’s White. Just as Smith won two days of news-cycle attention — and viewers — Bayless got his two days of eyeballs. Their  programs do compete directly, with Smith and Max Kellerman regularly blowing away Bayless and Shannon Sharpe in the numbers game. And it surprises no one that Smith, who still hasn’t apologized to Nash, seized Bayless’ misfire by delivering a powerful commentary about mental health while sympathizing with Prescott. Of course, he did. Would Stephen A. have done so independent of Bayless’ comments? I doubt it.

Such is the slime game of morning daytime sports talk. Years after FS1 trumpeted Bayless, to the outrage of Fox teammate Aikman, the reckless take-artist appears to have singlehandedly ruined a stalled network and stolen a fortune from the Murdochs. This episode ultimately might push FS1 not to renew Bayless, but TNT still loves Barkley, who recently rebuked Smith and frequently rebukes Bayless, all in the name of televised sports gasbaggery that decency and dignity long ago forgot.

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How to Help Your Clients with Low Website Conversions

Don’t assume there isn’t enough traffic; focus on optimizing user engagement once visitors arrive on the site.

Jeff Caves

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Graphic for how to increase website conversions
Credit: WPDesigner.Biz

Are your clients dealing with low website conversions? Whenever a marketing campaign is run, and the goal is to convert website visitors into leads, the temptation is to blame low traffic, amongst other issues, for low form fills or appointments being generated.  Just spend more money, you may think! Sometimes, you must look at at least four other potential issues to tackle poor conversion rates. Here are some actionable steps using the IT services industry to increase website conversions.

IT Solutions specializes in providing products, services, or solutions related to technology, particularly in areas such as software development, hardware sales, IT consulting, cybersecurity, cloud computing, networking, and digital transformations. They faced challenges with their website conversions. Despite driving substantial traffic through Google Ads and other SEO tactics, they struggled to convert website visitors into form fills for appointment requests. A 2% to 5% conversion rate could be considered reasonable. Of course, conversion rates can vary based on various factors, such as the competitiveness of the local market, the quality of the website (and radio stations help most to fix that) and its user experience, the effectiveness of marketing campaigns, and the reputation and offerings of the IT solutions business. Focusing on improving the quality of leads and providing exceptional customer service can be just as crucial as achieving high conversion rates. Don’t blame EVERYTHING on the marketing tactics! 

The Diagnosis

Upon thorough analysis, several critical issues were identified with IT Solutions’ website:

1. High Bounce Rate: Nobody was checking out the business. If 70% or more of website visitors only visit the landing page, that is an issue.  It could be slow loading times, irrelevant content, poor user experience, or unclear calls-to-action that prevent them from wanting to know more about IT Solutions. You can check the bounce rate on the Google Analytics page for the website in the left-hand sidebar, click on “Behavior” to expand the menu, then click on “Site Content,” and finally, click on “Landing Pages.” You’ll see a list of landing pages and their respective bounce rates.

2. Complex Navigation: It was hard to move around the website to find relevant information about IT services, and it was unclear who they were initiating contact with and for what purpose.

3. Unclear Calls-to-Action (CTAs): The website lacked clear and compelling CTAs guiding visitors toward requesting an appointment. Simply stating “click here for an appointment” is like asking for a meeting whenever or without establishing value. Here are 28 CTAs for free.

4. Lengthy Forms: The appointment forms were long, without qualifying information, and requested excessive information upfront, deterring potential leads from completing them.

Action Plan

1. Optimize Landing Pages:

   – Redo high-traffic landing pages with clear messaging and compelling CTAs.

   – Showcase IT Solutions’ services as benefits, making it easier for users to request appointments, thereby increasing user engagement and conversions.

2. Simplify Navigation:

   – Reorganize the menu and add more action-oriented links.

   – Provide additional options for users to access relevant information, such as “Get a free IT Solutions 15-point checkup NOW” and “Take this 5-question survey to diagnose your IT issues,” motivating them to book appointments.

3. Enhance CTAs:

   – Utilize concise and persuasive messaging throughout the website.

   – Encourage visitors to take action, whether requesting a free download about “5 things you can do to solve your IT issues on your own” or “get a free pizza for booking an appointment.”

4. Improve the Form Fill:

   – Add a further line about the number of employees who qualify for incoming leads.

   – Highlight the value of leads based on company size, prioritizing forms with higher potential impact.

Review landing pages, navigation, CTAs, and form experience to address website conversion issues. Don’t assume there isn’t enough traffic; focus on optimizing user engagement once visitors arrive on the site.

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‘NHL on TNT’ Gives Hockey Fans the ‘NBA on TNT’ Treatment

Watching Albert and Olczyk call a hockey game is like watching Picasso paint and da Vinci sculpt. They are masters of their respective crafts.

John Molori

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NHL on TNT studio

Let’s play a little word association, sports media style. If I say TNT, what is your response? Chances are it will be a three-letter abbreviation of your own, namely, NBA. Over the years, TNT has built a reputation as arguably the premiere network to telecast the National Basketball Association.

The NBA on TNT pregame and halftime shows have become the gold standard with stars like Ernie Johnson, Jr., Kenny Smith, Charles Barkley, and Shaquille O’Neal. Still, it’s not just this quartet of roundball royalty that has fortified TNT’s hoops coverage.

The rep was also built on tremendous play-by-play announcers like Bob Neal and Kevin Harlan, color analysts like Doug Collins and Reggie Miller, and courtside reporters like the late Craig Sager and current sideline star Allie LaForce.

Indeed, TNT and the NBA have become synonymous, but I have some news for you. This network is not just about professional basketball. This past week I went off the grid with TNT looking at their in-game and studio coverage of the NHL.

On March 24, the NHL on TNT provided coverage of the Pittsburgh Penguins at Colorado Avalanche matchup. Kenny Albert did play-by-play with Eddie Olczyk on color. Albert is not as noted as his legendary broadcasting father Marv Albert, but he has certainly staked his claim as one of the best in the business – able to cross over to multiple sports with equal aplomb.

Hockey is a strong suit for Albert. His rat-tat-tat, drama-building style draws viewers in and keeps us on the edge of our seats. Similarly, Olczyk is one of the top four or five NHL game analysts in the business. His style is understated, providing calm and clear analysis of key plays. They work really well together.

Albert eschews any kind of hackneyed and trite catch phrases for his goal calls. An emphatic, “He shoots and scores!” is plenty enough.

Hockey is a different beast when it comes to play-by-play. Unlike basketball, baseball, football, or even soccer and tennis, there is a minimum of breaks in the action. With hockey, a play-by-play announcer has to know the names of the players like he or she knows her kids’ names.

To me, it is the hardest sport for play-by-play and equally difficult for a color analyst. In basketball, after a team scores, the play-by-play announcer will keep silent and give the color analyst time to talk until the play crosses center court. In baseball and football, there is ample room for commentary.

Hockey does not offer such space, but Olczyk gets the most out of the minimal amount of time. Watching Albert and Olczyk call a hockey game is like watching Picasso paint and da Vinci sculpt. They are masters of their respective crafts.

Coming back from a break in the game, Albert and Olczyk provided on air commentary and then tossed to ice level reporter Brian Boucher who has grown into a tremendous asset to the TNT broadcasts. Boucher provided real talk about Colorado’s objectives of staying on top of their division and vying for the top seed in the Western Conference.

The Penguins, squarely in a rebuilding year having dumped talent at the NHL trade deadline, surprisingly jumped out to a 2–0 lead in this game, and the TNT between periods studio crew was all over it. The excellent Liam McHugh hosted alongside Colby Armstrong, Anson Carter, and Keith Yandle.

Armstrong was especially entertaining. With Pittsburgh outshooting the Avs 16-4, Armstrong noted that it’s the best he’s seen Pittsburgh play in a long time. His reasoning was that teams get geared up for playing Colorado even if it’s out of fear. Great stuff.

Both teams tallied two goals in the second period giving Pittsburgh a 4-2 lead heading into the final frame. When Colorado’s Nathan MacKinnon set up Jonathan Drouin for a goal to make it 4-3, Albert and Olczyk showed their strengths.

Albert called the pass from MacKinnon and one-timer goal from Drouin, and immediately noted that MacKinnon now had a point in all 34 of Colorado’s home games this season. On the goal replay, Olczyk showed how the play developed pointing out how McKinnon allowed Pittsburgh’s Evgenii Malkin to come in close before making the past to Drouin.

The TNT production team then showed a graphic displaying that McKinnon is now second all-time in longest home points streaks trailing only Wayne Gretzky. This was a sublime sequence of symmetry between talent and technicians like a songwriter, musician, and singer creating beautiful music.

What was supposed to be a blowout win for Colorado had now become a hockey barn burner, and the TNT crew was up to the task. Every goal and key play was followed up with replays from multiple angles showing the genesis of the action.

TNT has certainly taken to the velocity of the hockey broadcast with movement that challenges directors, graphics professionals, and videographers.

When there were breaks in this non-stop action, Olczyk was at his best. No hockey analyst draws on his experience as a player and explains that experience better to viewers. The TNT broadcast also lets Boucher freewheel and join in the flow of discussion without having to be introduced.

TNT does not merely rely on the traditional wide shot of the entire rink. We see close-up shots of each goaltender after a great save and the sweat of players on the bench or in the penalty box.

When McKinnon tied the game at 4-4 with 4:38 left in the third period, we got a series of tremendous crowd shots showing the Colorado fans going absolutely berserk. The sage Albert and Olczyk wisely remained quiet for several seconds, letting the cheers do the talking.

When Drouin scored the game winner at 4:06 of overtime, Albert exercised controlled enthusiasm, raising his voice on the call of the goal, but not becoming the show and overshadowing the play itself. He is definitely in the mold of Dan Kelly, Gary Thorne, and Sean McDonough, announcers who enhance but do not supersede the game.

Putting a cherry on top of this hockey Sunday, TNT showed a graphic that the Avalanche now led the NHL in comeback wins this season with 25 and that they were riding a 9-game winning streak. In analyzing the goal, Olczyk opined that the altitude of playing in Colorado was prevalent as the Penguins seemed to tire as the game progressed – really interesting insight.

In the postgame show, Anson Carter made a great point that the chemistry between Drouin and MacKinnon stems from the fact that they have been playing together going back to junior hockey. McKinnon joined in from the arena for a postgame interview. The analysts asked solid questions and even did a funny MVP chant together as the interview ended.

The NHL on TNT takes no back seat to its elder NBA sister. The broadcast provides viewers with flash, dash, and serious hockey talk from every angle – in studio, from the broadcast booth, and on the ice.

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Kim Mulkey Now Has Everyone Anticipating Washington Post Story

I can’t imagine what headline, under normal circumstances, the Washington Post would have to put on a Kim Mulkey story to make me want to read it.

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photo of LSU women's college basketball coach Kim Mulkey
Credit: Dailymail.co.uk

The Washington Post, you might’ve heard, has a story coming out about controversial LSU women’s basketball coach Kim Mulkey. The reason you might’ve heard is because Kim Mulkey told you. The Tigers coach read a fiery prepared statement just before her team started the Women’s NCAA Tournament. In the statement, Mulkey threatened to sue The Post for defamation before the first word was even published.

Now, I’ve never run a public relations firm but that did not seem like a good idea. The Washington Post story on Mulkey is one of the bigger stories in sports right now and nobody even knows what’s in it. The reason the story, apparently unflattering to Mulkey, is even on anyone’s radar screen is Mulkey herself.

It all started with an innocuous social media post by Sports Illustrated’s Pat Forde right in the middle of the most anticipated two days in sports, the NCAA Tournament Round of 64. On his X account, Forde posted: “Hearing some buzz about a big Washington Post story in the works on LSU women’s hoops coach Kim Mulkey, potentially next week. Wagons being circled, etc.”

You know what generally will go unnoticed at 4:00 on the first Friday of the NCAA Tournament? A post on X about a women’s basketball coach. But don’t tell Mulkey, she saw Forde’s post and decided to fight fire with nuclear weaponry. The result: the average person like me now is really interested in what has Mulkey so incensed. By “average person like me” I mean that I can’t imagine what headline, under normal circumstances, the Washington Post would have to put on a Kim Mulkey story to make me want to read it. Maybe:

“LSU Women’s Coach Discovers Ark of the Covenant”

Or:

“Mulkey Reveals True JFK Assassin(s)”

Perhaps:

“Famed Women’s Basketball Coach Reveals the Mystery Behind Slow Drivers in the Left Lane”

Literally any of those catch my attention more than whatever will likely be the Washington Post headline about Mulkey. But now Mulkey is “Mad as Hell and is not going to take this anymore” so I now have an interest I would never before have had in this story. It has been fascinating to watch the online speculation about the subject of the article and all we really know, as of now, is that it will be written by Kent Babb. This is a dream come true for Babb; he writes an article that is, presumably, not flattering about Kim Mulkey and, before it is even published, she gives the article the greatest commercial anyone could give it. Babb couldn’t have entered into a business agreement with Mulkey and had this turn out better for him.

For those who don’t follow Babb, he is a former NFL reporter who now is an award-winning writer for the Washington Post. In his 14 years with The Post, he has written sports features and authored a couple of books. One of those sports features stories was a deep dive into what he viewed as a large inequity in the level of pay for LSU head football coach Brian Kelly and his LSU players. It is this piece Mulkey described as a “hit piece” and, based on that piece, referred to Babb as a “sleazy reporter.” Babb, and many others, resented the fact his story was labeled as a hit piece. In fact, Babb essentially confirmed he was the author Mulkey was referencing when he shared the original article on X with the comment: “Hit piece?”

Whether a printed piece or a recorded interview, I can’t imagine a better promotion for it than the subject of the interview threatening a libel/slander lawsuit, especially before it is even released. That simply screams “This piece is salacious!!” Also, libel and slander suits get settled all the time, right? Of course they don’t, they seem to never even get filed. That little thing called discovery is a scary thing for most public figures.

The NCAA Tournament has been very entertaining, and I think the Sweet 16 and Elite Eight will be terrific. For only the fifth time ever, the top two seeds have advanced to the third round which sets up for a remarkable weekend. For me, I guess it will now include a Washington Post article, not a sentence I’d normally say.

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