UPDATE 6/22/12 6:53 PM: “ABC World News with Diane Sawyer” featured a portion of this video in tonight’s newscast, though Sawyer called Johnson “Mark Jackson”…
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Just about everyone in Northeast Ohio knows by now that Akron native and former Cleveland Cavaliers star LeBron James finally got his “ring”…as an NBA champion, his Miami Heat closing out the NBA Finals series with the Oklahoma City Thunder last night.
Note, of course, that both teams have weather related nicknames…nicknames that could be easily used to describe the area weather conditions recently.
And Scripps ABC affiliate WEWS/5 “NewsChannel 5” meteorologist Mark Johnson was off to the races on the much-delayed edition of last night’s “NewsChannel 5 at 11″…in a video that has started to “go viral”, with about 5,000 hits so far on ESPN’s YouTube channel…
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vMsRIKKv1w&w=420&h=315]
If this sounds familiar, go back to 2009, when the hometown Cavaliers (with LeBron) were playing the Orlando Magic in the Eastern Conference Finals.
The game wasn’t on WEWS, but you knew the result if you were watching that evening’s “NewsChannel 5 at 11″…
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGG3HICQEi8&w=560&h=315]
The screaming sportscaster in this video, of course, was former WEWS sports reporter/anchor Terry Brooks…and that ESPN video ended up with just over 50,000 hits.
Maybe we’re stretching the phrase “viral video” here. These hit counts have been nowhere near what a certain formerly homeless ex-Columbus radio personality got for his YouTube video.
But these kinds of “moments” are actively being used by TV stations on social media sites as promotions…and that’s exactly what the folks at 3001 Euclid did today…
This clip made World News with Diane Sawyer last night. ABC NEWS’ Website erroneously calls Mark Johnson Mark Jackson. In all fairness, it’s an honest mistake, seeing as how Mark Jackson is a former ESPN/ABC NBA commentator. Jackson is the head coach of the Golden State Warriors.
That was pretty funny! The best part of living in Northeast Ohio is we’re allowed to be upset about sports in public.