Sports Media Weekly No. 119- Rob Stone, Fox Soccer

http://sportsmediajournal.com/ Ken Fang of Fangs Bites and I have mixed emotions over this week’s edition of Sports Media Weekly. We begin the program looking back at the life of former NFL Films President Steve Sabol, who passed away yesterday at the age of 69 after losing his battle with brain cancer. Ken and I look back at how Sabol shaped the view of the NFL for many of us growing up in the ’70′s and ’80′s. We then shift to a story in Sports Business Journal on an impending deal to keep Major League Baseball coverage on Fox and Turner through 2021. We wrap-up our news segment talking about the extension of the contract between the NFL and Dial Global for radio coverage of the league and how neither one of us feel the poor job of the replacement referees will make the league move any faster in coming up with a new deal with the NFL referees’ union. Our guest this week is Rob Stone, formerly of ESPN and now of Fox Soccer. We spend our time with Rob talking about the growing interest in the sport here in the United States, specifically for the English Premier League and MLS. The excitement for the Premier League was never more evident than last May when Fox Soccer had coverage of nearly every final game of the season as teams fought for the title and a chance to avoid relegation.