Keith Olbermann ESPN Return May Mend His Image, But for How Long?

Keith Olbermann ESPN return may go a long way to fix his damaged image. Keith Olbermann was fired from ESPN sixteen years ago and it was nasty. So nasty that Keith Olbermann could have made his own “worst people in the world” list.

But now Keith Olbermann returns to ESPN and everyone is smiling. Keith Olbermann’s new show “Olbermann” will premiere on Monday on ESPN2, the spinoff channel that Keith Olbermann helped launch in 1993.

Keith Olbermann’s ESPN return will also see his “The Worst Person in the World” segment, that Olbermann introduced on “Countdown” in 2006. Keith Olbermann most recently named “The Worst Person in the World” on Current TV in 2012.

“Olbermann” will be broadcast daily at 11 p.m. Eastern time. Keith Olbermann’s ESPN return also makrs his return to sports journalism after he spent over 10 years commenting on news and politics.
Keith Olbermann said he’s been enjoying the new digs, “There has been no friction at all. No one has said to me, ‘We let you back in, now sit back and shut up.’ Instead they’ve said, ‘We’ve let you back in, now tell us everything you want and why.’ ”

Jamie Horowitz, ESPN’s vice president for original programming and production, said Keith Olbermann has been “incredibly responsive” to ideas and suggestions. “Because of his past TV series, there had been some reticence by the staff to tell him to try certain things. But he’s been accountable and willing to do things. Even if I want to change a word in his script, he’s said, ‘O.K., Jamie, I’ll change it.’ ”

Has Keith Olbermann turned over a new leaf? Olbermann is well known for despising certain parts of his profession, like management decisions, technical capabilities and journalistic vision. Olbermann wasn’t only pissed off at ESPN, threw down at Fox, MSNBC and, most recently, Current TV.

Horowitz said “The format plays to why people like Keith. Strong commentary, insights and his unique gift for communicating.”

Keith Olbermann will start each show at the anchor desk for 10 to 15 minutes going through sports news. Olbermann said “Essentially, it will be an attempt to provide context and information and perspective that looks forward to the next day’s interpretations.”

He will then got to the videotape for daily highlights, “Just because I like doing highlights.” He willthen move on to a segment called “This Week in Keith History” where he will make fun of himself “SportsCenter” clips from 1992 to 1997.

He’s only seen five clips of “Keith History” in rehearsals and Keith Olbermann said he only recalled two of them. He said “Reactions I’ve shown are disgust and amazement and I’ve had the bad taste to laugh at my old jokes.”

Keith Olberman’s “The Worst Person in the World,” segment will take a lighter tone. Olbermann says it will be “more gentle and sarcastic.”

Olbermann won’t just book guests because they are in the news, but because he wants to talk to them. He said “The first guest booked for this show was completely my doing. He will be appearing the last week in September and his name is Richard Lewis. We met at a Lakers game 20 years ago.”

Mark Cuban, the owner of the Dallas Mavericks; David Epstein, a writer for Sports Illustrated; John McEnroe, the former tennis champ; Peyton Manning, quarterback for the Denver Broncos; and Russell Wilson, quarterback for the Seattle Seahawks will all be on the show the first week.

And what about what he’s leaving behind? Olbermann says “No, I won’t miss politics. My understanding of my own emotions relative to politics was really clarified in the past year. I was invited on ‘This Week With George Stephanopoulos.’ I did it twice, and they invited me on many more times. We talked about doing it on a regular basis, but I found myself coming up with really bad excuses to not do it, like my dog needs my attention. I finally figured out I just didn’t like the subject matter anymore. If you cover politics for eight years without interruption like I did, you need a change. After all, we retire our presidents after eight years. Why you should make anybody cover our political system beyond that is a mystery to me. It was pretty much burned out of me. People who see me now say I look about five years younger than I did at Current.”

Tags
world news
Keith Olbermann
ESPN
return
Join the Discussion

Latest Photo Gallery

Real Time Analytics