Saturday afternoon saw the Jimmy Kimmel Los Angeles Bowl broadcast on ABC, pitting the 7-5 Washington State Cougars against the 9-4 Fresno State Bulldogs. And Kimmel, as the sponsor of the bowl game (for the second year in a row), has received some discussion. And while this game (which Fresno State won 29-6) didn’t have camel vomit, it did have its controversy, a Kimmel-centric one.
Many resented the broadcaster’s decision to switch to split screen for a significant amount of time. That split screen included Kimmel (seen above pregame for the Washington State march) and his team with traditional hosts Joe Tessitore and Greg McElroy. And it was preserved even through touches.
But the split screen continued through many other plays;
For fans of the schools involved, there was likely some anxiety over the Kimmel-centered split screen here, and some of it was on display Saturday on Twitter. But there may also be a non-zero percentage of people tuning in to this broadcast who don’t really care about any of the teams who were there because of this trophy in Kimmel’s name and the various hijinks of last year. And for them there is some merit in this decision.
This year’s Jimmy Kimmel LA Bowl broadcast didn’t have as many detailed moments as last year’s edition. But it had a lot of Kimmel. And that’s included in the long split-screen at key moments in the game. This isn’t the first controversy surrounding booth interviews, and it won’t be the last. But here it is interesting to see the contradictions.
[Ben Koo on Clippit; photo from Jayne Kamin-Oncea/USA Today Sports]
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