Where To Watch The NBA Draft (Now With 100 Percent Less Stephen A. Smith)
By Ryan
I’ll readily admit that the NBA Draft is not something I typically take a great deal of interest in. This year, I am exceptionally disinterested because 1) This draft class is horrible, and 2) There will be no Stephen A. Smith on ESPN’s draft coverage. Over the past few drafts, we’ve thoroughly enjoyed the Stephen A. Smith Heckling Society of Gentlemen and the work they’ve done at the NBA Draft. The SASHSG will be back this year, but it appears as though it will be their final appearance:
Details of ESPN’s NBA Draft coverage (and last year’s awesome tribute to Cheez Doodles) after the jump:
The U.S. Open Championship golf tournament from the Black Course at Bethpage State in Farmingdale, N.Y., tees off Thursday, June 18, at 10am ET on ESPN. Tiger Woods, who won last year’s U.S. Open in an 18-hole playoff thriller against Rocco Mediate, returns to the site of his 2002 U.S. Open win.
FOX Sports’ MLB and NFL play-by-play announcer Joe Buck gets to leave the confines of the broadcast booth and stretch his legs as host of a new sports talk show this month. Joe Buck Live premieres June 15 at 9pm ET on HBO (HD), and will air quarterly.
The NBA Finals tip off Thursday, June 4 at 9pm ET on ABC, with Dwight Howard and the Orlando Magic taking on Kobe Bryant and the L.A. Lakers. It’s not the Kobe vs. LeBron series we were all expecting, and it’s likely a lot of viewers will dismiss it. Nobody even seems to care about this matchup — they’re all still fixating on LeBron’s media and handshake snub. Obviously, the “Can Kobe win one without Shaq?” storyline will dominate. There’s also debate about ESPN/ABC analyst Jeff Van Gundy being on the broadcasts with his brother Stan being the Magic’s head coach. But if those are the only things that can generate any interest, then … yawn.
The NHL has plenty of TV issues they need to deal with. Maybe they should start with this one: Set a date for the Stanley Cup Finals and stick to it. It’s not hard. We’ve known for months that the NBA Finals begin June 4, and they have the same playoff format as the NHL. It’s likely that the NHL fears getting hammered in the ratings by the NBA, and they want to get in as many games as possible before the NBA Finals tip off.
For the third year in a row, we’ll be doing our live blog of the Scripps National Spelling Bee Finals. My colleague johnnysweeptheleg (renowned for his blogging of Lost and The Office on this site) and I have a good time covering this event, and there’s always some good-natured ribbing of the bee 
Good news: HBO is returning another season of Hard Knocks in August. Bad news: It’s going to be about the Cincinnati Bengals. Good news: It can double as a season of COPS.
The NASCAR All-Star Race is an event that gets tinkered with so often, fans might need