Friday, January 13, 2012

Wonder What Happened to Keith Olbermann? Exactly What You Expected to Happen With Keith Olbermann

Rational Expectations Have a Way of Being Rational

The broadcast career of Keith Olbermann has been study of what happens when intelligence and common sense run into ego and ambition.  Mr. Olbermann is a self made broadcaster and a highly intelligent person who used his background and experience in sports broadcasting to leverage himself into a prime time celebrity.  His thoughtful and intelligent commentary and programming skills made him the star of MSNBC, and his mentoring of people like Rachael Maddow brought even more talent to the network.  But . . .

Mr. Olbermann did excellent on-air work for CNN, Fox, ESPN, and MSNBC, but that never stopped him from burning bridges faster than they could be built. It rarely ended well in spite of his skills.

So what happened?  Well, apparently with good reason Mr. Olbermann has been known to be difficult to work with.  The quote about him was that when he left a job he didn’t just burn bridges behind him, he napalmed them.  Of course, it usually take two parties to destroy a relationship as thoroughly as Mr. Olbermann and MSNBC did, and the network is not free from blame.

In any event, Mr. Olbermann went on to join Current TV (who?, exactly).  His deal with Current TV was a rich one for Mr. Olbermann, designed to promote both Mr. Olbermann and the network into major league status.  It hasn’t worked out quite that well.

The impasse has been remarkable to behold, even if few people are watching. Mr. Olbermann, who is reportedly being paid $50 million over the course of a five-year contract, had more than a million viewers when he left at MSNBC at the start of last year, but in the most recent ratings period, he was reaching just 200,000 people a night at Current TV, according to Nielsen. He’s been very disappointed in those numbers, and the fact that the channel has hired talent and built out capacity on the West Coast without his input. After a summer of production problems that never seemed to be resolved, a power failure darkened his studio last month. He responded by sitting in the dark.

So now both sides have lawyers, never a good sign in any relationship, and Mr. Olbermann’s future in television is not looking great.  After all when you cannot succeed in a cable channel that most people don’t even get, a channel that the people who do have it don’t know they have it and a channel where the people who do know they have it don’t watch it, well where do you go?

By creating drama in yet another high-profile assignment, Mr. Olbermann could be running out of options, but don’t bet the house on that, given how desperate cable channels are for anyone who can generate ratings, never mind the rough edges.

Current news reporting needs Mr. Olbermann, heck even MSNBC needs Keith Olbermann.  Their current lineup has only the very good Ms. Maddow on board, and the idea that Rev. Al Sharpton and Ed Schultz are replacing Mr. Olbermann is like Tom Cruise replacing Al Pacino in a Shakespearian role. 

The message to Mr. Olbermann from this site is this.  Think about Edward R. Morrow.  Do what he would do, which is get on the air, do the job and leave the studio. You are very good, Mr. Olbermann at what you do, stick to it.

6 comments:

  1. Olbermann is very competent. It is a real disappointment when he does not show up. The lame excuse that one is just filling in for O does not suffice. Current should give us an explanation or many viewers will search for another news reader, my self included

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  2. Olbermann is very competent. It is a real disappointment when he does not show up. The lame excuse that one is just filling in for O does not suffice. Current should give us an explanation or many viewers will search for another news reader, my self included

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  3. Olberman is much better in his own mind than he is in reality.

    When those two worlds collide, Olberman cannot understand the simple fact that he is replaceable.

    When he gets fired (coming up soon at CurrentTV) he always tries to keep his illusion alive by saying he left, and was not fired.

    Bye Keith, you were fun to look at a few years ago, but your act is old and tired and you are over.

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  4. I had been waiting for Keith to start his broadcast on Current TV. It looked like it was going to work but then came the hints of something is wrong. No matter what anyone says, Keith is effective in his craft. I know for a fact the far Right and far Left cringe every time he speaks. I know he more effective than any MSNBC broadcaster or even FOX for which he used to work for. I guess I am a fan of Keith and would like to see him back.

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  5. Agreed. If Mr. Olbermann would just go back to doing his thing on TV the world would be a better place.

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  6. Olbermann had a great chance at MSNBC. But I suspected long that he is also uncorrectable, critique-resistant. His Countdown (which is essentially all I saw of the network's stuff, not being the owner of a TV) had some solid material on it. But the "Worst Person" segment was dismal, sophomoric nonsense... He should have stuck to the somewhat professorial style, done good research, serious criticism, but not go for the ad hominem bilge.

    Money always gets to people's heads. Even the best...

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