New England sports fans are going to get their fix of Fox this weekend. Whether that’s a good thing usually depends on an individual’s tolerance for the network’s habit of emphasizing story lines and superstars at the expense of subtlety and understatement.
But there’s no doubt it will be the destination station (Channel 25 locally) both tomorrow, when the Red Sox and Yankees meet at 4:10 p.m., and Sunday, when the Patriots make a rare appearance on the network, taking on the Atlanta Falcons at 1 p.m.
Joe Buck, Fox’s lead play-by-play voice for both baseball and football, will not be pulling double duty. He’ll call Patriots-Falcons alongside Troy Aikman, but Josh Lewin will pinch hit on the baseball telecast, with Tim McCarver in his usual analyst role.
While it’s nothing new for the Sox to appear on Fox - this is their seventh appearance this season - it is fairly uncommon for the Patriots. While they played on Fox, which holds the rights to NFC games, twice last year, Buck and Aikman have not called one of their games since Super Bowl XLII.
We caught up with both of Fox’s lead analysts via telephone earlier this week. While Aikman said he’s looking forward to getting an up-close look at the Patriots for the first time since the Giants ruined their plans for a 19-0 season that stunning February night in 2008, McCarver said he has a more specific mission in mind: determining whether his belief that the Sox are the team to beat in the American League is accurate.
“It fairly clear right now - and this is something that could change in a week, 10 days - but it’s fairly clear right now that the Red Sox are playing the best ball in the American League,’’ McCarver said.
McCarver’s praise might surprise Boston fans who give him a certain amount of grief for his supposed favoritism toward the Yankees, in particular his unabashed admiration for Derek Jeter. McCarver has said in the past that he hears the same charge from Yankees fans regarding his alleged appreciation of the Red Sox.
“The Yankees have a terrific lineup,’’ McCarver said. “Jeter is marvelous . . . and A-Rod is a compelling story, a sleeping giant who could finally rear his head in the playoffs.
“But at this moment, I have to give the Red Sox a slight edge in the American League. Josh Beckett is obviously a key guy, and his playoff history is very, very good. They have a lineup that scores plenty of runs, particularly since the Victor Martinez deal, and their pitching depth might be their biggest edge.
“This is an excellent team.’’
Whether Aikman draws a similar conclusion about the Patriots may depend upon one factor: the performance of Tom Brady, who was unusually scatter-armed in the loss to the Jets last Sunday.
Aikman, the legendary Dallas quarterback who, like Brady, owns three Super Bowl rings, sympathizes with what Brady is going through as he tries to shake off the rust after his yearlong injury hiatus.
“I know a lot has been made about Tom’s situation up there, and I understand,’’ said Aikman. “To me, it comes down to one thing: He’s still rusty within the pocket, still feeling his way around. That’s not unusual. It still takes a little time to come back from where he’s coming back from.
“Some have said that after an injury like that, you’re only fully comfortable again in your second full year back. I’m not sure I put stock in that, but some do.
“Another part of it is that Tom has raised the bar so high. You could take a picture of every quarterback in the league every Sunday throwing off his back foot at one time or another. But Tom is being held to his own extremely high standards.
“It raises your eyebrows when he makes a bad throw or a mistake, because you’re just not used to seeing it. Plus, at this time of year, two games into the season, everything is exaggerated.’’
Judging by McCarver and Aikman’s informed takes on New England’s teams, perhaps this time the exaggerations will cease once the Fox telecasts begin.
ESPNBoston.com, which became the second of ESPN’s planned network of city-specific sites to launch Sept. 14, is using Kraft Sports Group as its local advertising sales agent for the site. SportsBusiness Daily was the first to report news of the partnership on Thursday.
Kraft Sports Group is a holding company founded by Patriots owner Robert Kraft in 1998, four years after he purchased the NFL franchise. Along with the Patriots, Kraft owns the Revolution of Major League Soccer as well as Gillette Stadium, the venue for both teams’ home games.
Given that a significant amount of ESPNBoston.com’s coverage is dedicated to the Patriots, and a smaller amount to the Revolution, the partnership is beginning on dubious journalistic ground.
ESPN’s general strategy with its localized websites is to launch in cities where it already owns and operates an ESPN Radio station, then have the station’s staff coordinate ad sales for the website. Such was the case when ESPN Chicago launched in April.
But for the time being, ESPN does not have a radio outlet in Boston. WAMG-AM 890, a weak-signaled and neglected ESPN affiliate, went off the air Sept. 15. ESPN is expected to take over the WEEI-AM 850 frequency in a matter of months, with WEEI moving to FM. But without a current station to pick up the advertising duties, ESPN struck the deal with Kraft Sports Group.
While the ESPN mother ship has not been reluctant to criticize the franchise - it was relentless in its reporting and speculating during the “SpyGate’’ controversy of 2007 - the situation bears monitoring to see whether ESPNBoston.com’s curious new bedfellow has an effect on its reporting of potentially unflattering Patriots news.
Chad Finn can be reached at finn@globe.com.
Correction: Because of a reporting error, a media column in the Sept. 25 Sports section said the Patriots had not appeared on Fox network television since the Super Bowl against the New York Giants. The Patriots appeared on Fox twice in the 2008 season.
