The Media Learning Curve: Assisted newsworthiness

== The entire College World Series, starting with Saturday's Cal State Fullerton-Arkansas opener, airs on ESPN and ESPN2 over the next week. The broadcasters include Mike Patrick and Sean McDonough on play-by-play, with Orel Hershiser and Robin Ventura and analysts and Erin Andrews and Kyle Peterson as reporters.

== Bill Macatee and Ian Baker-Finch are in the 18th hole tower for CBS' coverage of the PGA's St. Jude Classic (Saturday and Sunday, noon to 3 p.m.), which includes the return of Phil Michelson and John Daly's first tournament of the season.

== Ian Eagle, Dwight Stones, Carol Lewis and Ato Boldon call the NCAA track and field championships from the University of Arkansas for CBS and CBS College Sports. The later has five hours today (4 to 7 p.m.) with the men's and women's 100 meter finals as the highlight. KCBS Channel 2 has Saturday's live coverage (10 a.m. to noon) that includes the men's and women's 200, 400 and 800 finals.

== The MLB Network has a reality series called "The Pen," debuting on Sunday at 5 p.m., that runs six weeks following the Philadelphia Phillies' bullpen with behind-the-scenes access starting from this past spring training and going through the All-Star break (last episode: July 26). Former Phillies pitcher and MLB Net analyst Mitch Williams narrates as the series begins with pitchers Brad Lidge, Ryan Madson, J.C. Romero, Scott Eyre, Clay Condrey, Chad Durbin, Gary Majewski, Jack Taschner, J.A. Happ, Chan Ho Park and bullpen coach Mick Billmeyer interacting on all that involves trying to defend a World Series title. "As a reality-based series The Pen is the ultimate look into the lives of these players, both on and off the field," said Tony Petitti, President and CEO of MLB Network. "So much of what we know about relief pitchers is based on statistics and saves, and a series like The Pen gives a level of familiarity to each player."

== Jim Lampley, Max Kellerman and Emanuel Steward call Saturday's Miguel Cotto-Joshua Clottey welterweight title bout on HBO (7:35 p.m.). Larry Merchant and Lennox Lewis are off, preparing to be inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame on Sunday.

== The Golf Channel will continue to keep Christina Kim miked up as she plays today in the second round of the LPGA Championship, following the highlight audio reel she put together in round one (linked here).

AND THE CLOSING ARGUMENT:

== From Rob Dibble, during his Sirius XM Radio Channel 210 "The Show," on Manny Ramirez's comments that: 'Whatever happened, that's in the past. I don't want to be a distraction to this team. I didn't kill nobody. I didn't rape nobody. That's it."

Says Dibs: "It kind of shows the arrogance of the modern day athlete that you would compare doing wrong to a murderer or rapist. It's unfortunate that it gets to that level because that's not the point. Do you understand what the point is? You took yourself down, your reputation down, a few notches. You've taken down the Dodger organization, that believed in you, a few notches. Now with that comment you just totally destroyed any kind of respectability you would have when you step back out on the field. People are just going to remember you now for that stupid comment. ... You have to understand that you did something really bad, and it may not have been criminal or you didn't get charged in a criminal case, but you shouldn't compare the privilege of playing major league baseball and trying to work around the rules in a despicable fashion with rape and murder. You're just trying to escape the obvious, which is, you screwed up."