Photo by: Ashley Alonzo
For many diehard sports fans, watching their team’s games is not enough. Whether it is college athletics or professional teams, the offseason and the time in between games is borderline torturous. A new free medium emerges for fans to fill their sports appetite: the Podcast. Most podcasts are free, downloadable on iTunes and provide a great way to catch up on sports during a morning commute, a long walk to class or a cross-country flight. Below are my top-three podcasts targeting baseball, college basketball and daily top sports stories.
- For MLB fans the "Baseball Tonight with Buster Olney" is a stellar listen. Longtime sideline reporter for ESPN, Buster Olney, records in-depth baseball discussions five days a week during the MLB season with a variety of experts, players and fellow analysts within the game. The regular season podcast is a two-part series. The first part covers the previous day’s game action, highlights and recaps. While the second part usually runs an hour long and discusses a variety of topics such as hot-stove trade rumors. "Baseball Tonight with Buster Olney" is currently in the offseason mode thus new episodes only come out about twice a month. Episodes are available free on the ESPN app or iTunes.
- As for those who cannot wait until March Madness, here are a couple options to listen to while preparing to fill out tournament brackets. First, ESPN college basketball analyst Andy Katz and former Virginia Tech head basketball coach Seth Greenberg host a weekly college basketball podcast, "Courtside with Katz & Coach G," which can be found for free on the ESPN app or iTunes.
- CBS and Sports Illustrated college basketball analyst Seth Davis recently started his own podcast, "The Seth Davis Podcast," (also available free on iTunes). This podcast does not strictly adhere to college basketball only as Davis often interviews people involved in other sports and walks of life. However, this hour-long podcast is a very intuitive and informative listen for the overall sports fan.
- "Pardon the Interruption" is a daily half-hour afternoon TV show on ESPN available in podcast form. Columnists Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon provide a lively back-and-forth conversation and debate on the day’s top sports stories. The discussion is only 20 minutes and it is also available for free subscription on iTunes and on the ESPN app.