May 6, 1995: This was one of the best days of my life, although I wouldn't know it for over a year. Because this was the day that Classic Sports Network debuted.
New York City established WUHF on Channel 31 as an experiment to determine the viability of UHF broadcasts within an urban environment. Some of the early programming on WUHF included simulcasts of New York's existing commercial VHF stations; educational films produced by the Television Film Unit, established in 1949, of WNYC, which since 1924 had broadcast on 820 AM, and since 1943 at 93.9 FM, as the City's municipal radio station; college-level distance education telecourses; and, reportedly, a nightly rundown of the New York Police Department's "wanted" criminals list.
The experiment was carried out through the installation of UHF receivers in several hundred test homes, public schools and businesses, with reception monitored by FCC and City engineers. This was successful, and on November 5, 1962, the call letters of New York's Channel 31 were changed to WNYC, to match those of the radio stations.
But in 1995, Mayor Rudy Giuliani, seeing the growth of cable television, and noting that WNYC, both AM and FM, were still successful, decided to sell the station. On June 30, 1996, WNYC-Channel 31 was sold to ITT-Dow Jones. It was replaced by WBIS, showing what was then named Classic Sports Network. Within days, while "flipping channels," I discovered it by accident. I didn't have cable TV at the time, so the picture was fuzzy. But what it showed was a feast for the sports fan's heart.
Classic Sports Network was run by Steve Greenberg, son of Baseball Hall-of-Famer Han Greenberg. I was worried that, given a Baby Boom target audience, it would be one long tribute to Mickey Mantle, the 1969 New York Mets, Joe Namath, the early 1970s New York Knicks, and Muhammad Ali. Indeed, when it debuted on May 6, 1995, it did so with a 15-hour documentary: Muhammad Ali: His Life and Times, hosted by sportswriter Dick Schaap.
And there was a lot of content around Mantle, Namath, the '69 Mets and the Willis Reed and Walt "Clyde" Frazier 1970s Knicks. This included a block of programming centered around "The Miracle of '69," including the '70 Knicks title with Namath leading the Jets to the great upset victory in Super Bowl III and the Mets' run to, and performance in, the 1969 World Series.
But they also showed a lot of special things, including World Series highlight films that hadn't been widely seen in years, and weren't yet available on video; legendary prizefights, including some on The Main Event, a half-hour show hosted by Rocky Marciano, with the 1950s Heavyweight Champion hosting, interviewing guests, and narrating the fights, lasting 14 episodes in 1961; the entire library of the TV shows Greatest Sports Legends and Curt Gowdy's 1974-77 PBS show The Way It Was. They also made a deal with NFL Films to broadcast a lot of vintage stuff. I videotaped as much of it as I could, and those tapes took up a lot of space.
In 1997, ESPN decided it didn't want the competition, but it did want the content: They bought Classic Sports Network from Steve Greenberg and his investors, and rebranded it as ESPN Classic. They kept the logo of an athlete with fists raised, known as "Vic" for "Victory," inside a letter C.
But the beginning of the end was already there, even before the beginning. (Yes, I know: That sounds like a Yogi Berra line.) The Golf Channel began broadcasting on January 17, 1995, nearly 4 months before Classic Sport Network. Speed, a network devoted to auto racing, debuted at the end of that year. The NBA Network was launched in 1999, the NFL Network and The Tennis Channel in 2003, the NHL Network in 2007, the MLB Network in 2009.
By the 2010s, due to the increasing number of sport-, league-, and college conference-specific networks that had assumed rights to the archival and live content that was historically aired by ESPN Classic, a larger amount of programming was devoted to archive content whose rights were owned by ESPN outright, reruns of recent events from ESPN's networks, as well as ESPN original documentaries and overflow coverage of events from other ESPN networks. And much of the footage was also now available on YouTube, so a fan wanting to see a specific broadcast no longer had to wait for ESPN to show it.
So ESPN folded ESPN Classic on December 31, 2021. It's funny: I didn't know it was "born" at the time that it was, and I didn't know that it "died" at the time that it did. But I'm still glad it was "alive."
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May 6, 1995 was a Friday. Football was out of season. There was 1 game in the NBA Playoffs that day: The San Antonio Spurs beat the Los Angeles Lakers, 110-94 at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas. David Robinson scored 33 points.
The Stanley Cup Playoffs began, with 2 games. The New York Rangers lost to the Quebec Nordiques, 5-4 at the Colisée
de Québec. And the Washington Capitals beat the Pittsburgh Penguins, 5-4 at the Civic Arena in Pittsburgh.
And these games were played in Major League Baseball:
* The New York Yankees lost to the Milwaukee Brewers, 5-2 at Yankee Stadium. Ricky Bones outpitched Jimmy Key. Greg Vaughn hit a home run for the Brew Crew. Jim Leyritz, playing 1st base in place of the idle Don Mattingly, hit one for the Bronx Bombers. Wade Boggs went 3-for-4. But the rest of the Yankees combined only got 4 hits.
* The New York Mets lost to the Cincinnati Reds, 13-11 at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati. This was a game that could have been shown on Classic Sports: The Mets led 11-2 going into the bottom of the 8th inning, but the Reds scored 6 in the 8th and 3 in the 9th to win it. The winning runs came on a home run by Hal Morris. Deion Sanders, Ron Gant and Jerome Walton also homered for this later edition of the Big Red Machine. For the Mets, Rico Brogna and Edgardo Alfonzo each had 3 hits including a home run.
* The Florida Marlins beat the Montreal Expos, 10-3 at the Olympic Stadium in Montreal.
* The Toronto Blue Jays beat the Baltimore Orioles, 7-3 at Camden Yards in Baltimore. Cal Ripken went 1-for-5.
* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Atlanta Braves, 3-1 at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium.
* The Chicago Cubs beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 13-5 at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh.
* The Minnesota Twins beat the Cleveland Indians, 5-2 at Jacobs Field (now Progressive Field) in Cleveland.
* The Boston Red Sox beat the Detroit Tigers, 5-3 at Tiger Stadium in Detroit.
* The Chicago White Sox beat the Kansas City Royals, 7-4 at the new Comiskey Park (now Rate Field) in Chicago.
* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Houston Astros, 7-5 at Busch Memorial Stadium in St. Louis.
* The Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Colorado Rockies, 17-11 at Coors Field in Denver. This was also a game that could have been shown on Classic Sports. Being in "the Mile High City," Coors Field, like the facility it had just replaced as the Rockies' home, Mile High Stadium, was a hitter's haven. Tom Candiotti started for Los Angeles, and Juan Acevedo for Colorado, and both only lasted 2 innings.
For the Dodgers: Mike Piazza went 3-for-6 with a home run and 3 RBIs; Mitch Webster entered the game as a pinch-hitter, and went 1-for-3 with a home run and 2 RBI; Henry Rodríguez went 4-for-6 with 2 RBI, and Gary Ingram pinch-hit for him, and went 2-for-3 with a walk and an RBI; and Eric Karros went 3-for-5 with a walk and 3 RBIs.
For the Rockies: Dante Bichette went 4-for-5 with a home run and 3 RBIs; Roberto Mejía went 1-for-4 with a solo homer; Jorge Brito went 2-for-4 with 3 RBIs; Larry Walker, Walt Weiss and Jason Bates also had 2 hits each; and, pinch-hitting for pitchers, John Vander Wal hit a 3-run homer; and Mike Kingery hit a solo homer.
* The San Francisco Giants beat the San Diego Padres, 13-6 at Jack Murphy Stadium in San Diego. Glenallen Hill went 2-for-3 with a solo home run and 2 walks. Jeff Reed went 4-for-4 with a walk and 2 RBIs. Royce Clayton went 2-for-5 with 3 RBIs. Barry Bonds went 2-for-4 with a walk and 2 RBIs. For the Padres, Ken Caminiti went 3-for-5 with a solo homer, and Tony Gwynn went 1-for-5 with an RBI.
* The California Angels beat the Seattle Mariners, 7-5 at Anaheim Stadium (now Angel Stadium of Anaheim). Ken Griffey Jr., Edgar Martínez and Luis Sojo homered for the M's. J.T. Snow and Greg Myers did so for the Halos.
* And the Texas Rangers beat the Oakland Athletics, 4-2 at the Oakland Coliseum. Rickey Henderson was with the A's at the time, but did not play in this game.
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