Blogs With Balls Radio, Episode 25

This week’s Blogs With Balls Show on the JoeSportsFan Radio Network is now available.

Download Episode 25 here, or subscribe via iTunes.



We kick the show off this week with a very pointed voicemail we received from the incomparable Softball Guy, who was not all that thrilled with our guest selection this week: Matt Sebek from our podcasting partners JoeSportsFan.com.

An Exclusive, Emotional Interview with Softball Guy from JoeSportsFan.com on Vimeo.

Long before partnering up on the Internets waves, JoeSportsFan was a everyday read for HHR.

Matt's experience as an online programmer has helped take the site's brand to a new level of online media that includes blogging, and the incorporation of both audio and video.


About a month ago, JSF launched JoeSportsFanSTL.com which focuses on sports in the site's home town of St. Louis, and puts out a weekly Basketball Jones-esq video segment covering the latest hot topics surrounding the city's teams and athletes in the offbeat tone JSF fans have come to know and love.

Ep. 3: The One with Derrick Chievous from JoeSportsFan.com on Vimeo.

The city-centric, or "hyper-local," approach to online sports coverage is one we have been keeping a close eye on leading up to BwB3 in light of national companies like ESPN and Comcast, and regional ones like NESN and SNY going full force into blogging and multimedia/online platforms. We talk about how this could affect team and city-based sites, including the new JSF STL.

The guys that run the site have also dabbled in AM radio, and Matt talks about the advantages to working online as opposed to the terrestrial waves.

For any aspiring podcasters, and those bloggers looking to attempt video, this week is a must listen, as Matt let's you know from his experience what steps you can take to make your show(s) better and differentiate them from the field that is rapidly saturating.

This week's sites of interest:

• JoeSportsFan
• JoeSportsFanSTL
• The JoeSportsFan Show (iTunes)
• The St. Louis JoeSportsFan Show (iTunes)
• Sebek Media
• @JoeSportsFan
• @MattSebek
• @thesoftballguy
• The Basketball Jones
• The Jones on Vimeo
• BwB on The 700 Level/Comcast deal

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ESPN Airs Footage From Blogs With Balls 1.0?

After filming about 3 panels and interviewing a handful of speakers, ESPN's Outside the Lines posted the following 1/2 second scene from Blogs With Balls 1.0 in New York City on an OTL video about Athletes and Twitter.

Hopefully by titling it with "Preview" more will be shown sometime soon. The OTL site has it listed under "Upcoming Stories."

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Blogs with Balls 1.0: The Highlight Reel

Kyle Bunch: It’s officially been over a month since Blogs with Balls 1.0 went down at Stout in New York City. Seeing as details about Blogs with Balls 2.0 in Vegas are starting to trickle out, now seemed like as good of time as any to bust out the highlight reel from 1.0. Enjoy:

Blogs With Balls 1.0 Highlights from BLOGS WITH BALLS on Vimeo.

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Blogs with Balls 1.0 is in the Books

A thorough breakdown of Blogs with Balls will be up soon, but for now feel free to check out what people are saying right now about the event.

We have lots of pictures and videos to come, but this one is one of my favorites, if only because it went from being an idea of ours late Wednesday to being shot and edited by Thursday night.

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Have You Gotten Your BlogsWithBalls Tickets Yet?

BwB Organizers Join Panelist Matt Sebek on the JoeSportsFan Podcast

This week, HHR was featured on the Joe Sports Fan Podcast to talk about common misconceptions about the event and bloggers in general with host (and BwB panelist) Matt Sebek.

Speaking of podcasting, check out Ep. 161 of Spurscast for great San Antonio offseason talk and the hosts (and BwB attendees) Michael and Jeff give their thoughts and plans for the June 13th event (around the 75:00 min. mark).

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Have You Gotten Your BlogsWithBalls Tickets Yet?

HHR Featured in BallHype Profile Series

HHR was recently featured as part of the BallHype Profile Series.

You can check it out here:

BallHype Profile on "Hugging Harold Reynolds"

Hype it up if you like it!

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Have You Gotten Your BlogsWithBalls Tickets Yet?

Rich Eisen Goes On the DL

Dan Levy's daily podcast is the standard-bearer for online sports shows. In addition to an overall quality product, his top-notch guests are second-to-none.

Today, Dan talks with the NFL Network's Rich Eisen about, among other things, NFLN's recent partnership with Comcast, Jon Gurden's hiring at MNF, Brian Baldinger's grossly deformed pinkie, and, um, Bea Arthur.

You can listen to the show here.

On the DL: Rich Eisen Brings His Wit and Intelligence To Talk NFL Network and Bea Arthur On the DL

To listen to Dan talk about the tricks of the podcast trade, get your tickets today to Blogs With Balls.

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Have You Gotten Your BlogsWithBalls Tickets Yet?

FreeDarko Collaborates with adidas

Blogs With Balls panelist Bethlehem Shoals, known as “Nathaniel Friedman” to stuffier editors, is the founder, chief contributor and editor-in-chief of FreeDarko.com, whose Macrophenomenal Pro Basketball Almanac was published last fall by Bloomsbury, USA.

This week, Shoals, with FD artist Jacob Weinstein, teamed up with adidas “on two fully animated videos highlighting the inner-workings of Dwight [Howard] and Derrick [Rose].”

Reads an adidas press release: “FreeDarko’s uncanny analysis of both Dwight and Derrick spotlights their roles as the ultimate Commander and Creator, leading their teams and the performance revolution of the game. ”

The videos, like Macrophenomenal Pro Basketball Almanac, are a thing of beauty. But more specifically, the collaboration is a testament to the idea of companies working with online influencers to reach targeted markets in creative new ways and mediums.

Dwight Howard: The Detailed Mechanics of a Commander



Derrick Rose: The Inner Workings of a Creator

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Have You Gotten Your BlogsWithBalls Tickets Yet?

Blogs With Balls News

HHR and RxSN are pleased to announce that Gary Vaynerchuk will be the featured speaker at Blogs With Balls, the all-day sports and new media summit taking place in New York City on June 13th.



Gary has captured attention with his pioneering, multi-faceted approach to personal branding and business. After primarily utilizing traditional advertising techniques to build his family’s local retail wine business into a national industry leader, Gary rapidly leveraged social media tools such as Twitter and Facebook to promote Wine Library TV, his video blog about wine. Gary has always had an early to market approach launching Wine Library's retail website in 1997 and Wine Library TV in February of 2006. Gary's success has led to a 7-figure book deal, several national TV appearances, and a flurry of speaking engagements around the world, including notable tech and business summits such as South By Southwest, Big Omaha, Web 2.0 Expo, FOWA, Strategic Profits and BlogWorld Expo.

Along with his brother AJ, Gary recently launched VaynerMedia, with a client portfolio that includes Fortune 500 companies, entrepreneurs, celebrities and athletes.

Here's a taste of what you can expect from Gary regarding personal branding, business development and leveraging social media:



For more information on Gary Vaynerchuk, please visit:
garyvaynerchuk.com
tv.winelibrary.com
vaynermedia.com
twitter.com/garyvee

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BwB Panelist Dan Levy Interviews TNT's Ernie Johnson On the DL

Ernie Johnson from TNT joins Blogs With Balls panelist Dan Levy on today's On The DL Podcast to talk about his relationship with Turner, his relationship with Charles Barkley and his relationship with God. And so much more.

Dan will be featured on the June 13 event's Leveraging Social Media panel to discuss, among other things, ways that social and creative media tools are being used to connect with audiences like yours.



You can listen to the On The DL Podcast Here.

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Have You Gotten Your BlogsWithBalls Tickets Yet?

BwB Panelist/#followfriday Founder @micah on CNN.com

In addition to your favorite sports bloggers and marketing professionals, technology gurus such as blogger and Lijit executive Micah Baldin will be on hand at the June 13 Blogs With Balls event to expound knowledge on attendees.



Micah was featured live today on CNN.com to talk about Twitter's new policy that will restrict @responses. You can follow him on Twitter @micah.



Micah is VP and Chief Evangelist for Lijit Networks, a Boulder, CO startup, provides publishers a robust search and stats tool. Lijit is Micah’s sixth startup, (having sold his last startup, Current Wisdom, in the beginning of 2007). A frequent speaker, you can read more about Micah’s philosophy of success through failure at his blog, Learn To Duck.

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Have You Gotten Your BlogsWithBalls Tickets Yet?

Register for BwB & Win Chance to Meet Scottie Pippen, Watch Midgets Fight Mascots

Our friends at Gunaxin will be hosting a Pre-Party for a screening of the film "Midgets vs. Mascots" to be held at the Tribeca Film Festival, which will feature Michael Jordan mascot Scottie Pippen and free beer and tequilla. The event will be held on April 26th at the Village Pourhouse in New York City.

For all you New York-area readers who haven't yet registered for BlogsWithBalls (what's wrong with you?), we have a special deal. Register for the conference by tomorrow, and your name will be entered in a drawing to win 2 tickets to the Gunaxin party and screening.

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Have You Gotten Your BlogsWithBalls Tickets Yet?

BlogsWithBalls: Blogger Shows Up Kobe Bryant

Kobe Bryant caused quite a buzz with the YouTube video of him hopping a speeding Aston Martin. While the authenticity of that video couldn’t be confirmed, we can guarantee with absolute certainty that the below film 100% real.

John from RedsArmy, Lucas from HHR, Bassett from TheJetsBlog and Beryllium Pictures show you how to register for BlogsWithBalls NYC.

You trust your boy?

BlogsWithBalls on Vimeo

BlogsWithBalls YouTube Channel

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Have You Gotten Your BlogsWithBalls Tickets Yet?

BlogWithBalls NYC09 Tickets Now Available

PRE-SALE TICKETS ARE NOW AVAILABLE!

Blogs With Balls is a series of regional social sports blogger and new media gatherings featuring speakers and panelists specifically focused on sports fans, writers, sites, teams, athletes and companies; and their ability to maximize new media outlets for promotion and advancement.

Our first event, Blogs with Balls 1.0, is set to take place on June 13, 2009 in New York City.

We’re pleased to announce that pre-sale tickets have officially gone on sale as of today, Friday, March 20.

To get your hands on a Blogs with Balls gold pass for the discounted rate of $49 (plus a very small — under $2 — service fee), simply head over to blogswithballs.eventbrite.com.

There are a limited number of discounted pre-sale tickets, so act fast!

 – 

SCHEDULED TO APPEAR

The current list of confirmed speakers/panelists includes:

* Jim Bankoff, SB Nation
* Nat Berman, Uncoached
* Adam Best, FanSided.com, Arrowhead Addict
* Sarah Braesch, BlogHer, Social Media Consultant
* A.J. Daulerio, Deadspin
* Jim DeLorenzo, Octagon
* Jason Gurney, Co-Founder, BallHype.com
* Dan Levy, On the DL Podcast
* Jarret Myer, Co-Founder, Uproxx Media
* John Ness, NBC Local
* Jeff Pearlman, Author, SI.com Columnist
* Julia Roy, Undercurrent.com, JuliaRoy.com
* Matt Sebek, JoeSportsFan.com
* Dan Shanoff, DanShanoff.com
* Andrew Simon, WhoDeyRevolution.com
* Sarah Spain, Mouthpiece Sports
* Ryan Spoon, InGameNow.com
* Dan Steinberg, The Washington Post’s D.C. Sports Bog
* Richard Ting, R/GA, Flytip
* Jimmy Traina, Senior Producer, SI.com
* Michael Tunison, KissingSuzyKolber.com
* Matt Ufford, WithLeather.com
* Pete Vlastelica, CEO, Yardbarker.com
* Greg Wyshynski, Editor, Yahoo! Sports’ Puck Daddy

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For more information, be sure to visit blogswithballs.com.

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BlogWithBalls NYC09 Info

As many of our readers have heard, in conjunction with RXSW, we are planning a sports and new media "conference" for June 13 in NYC.

The event will to bring together speakers, panelists and sports fans, and will be specifically focused on sports enthusiasts, writers, sites, teams, athletes and companies; and their ability to maximize new media outlets for promotion and advancement.

Today, BlogsWithBalls.com went live and includes a preliminary list of (confirmed) noteworthy speakers/presenters including the following:

• A.J. Daulerio, Deadspin.com
• Matt Sebek, JoeSportsFan.com
• Dan Shanoff, DanShanoff.com
• Andrew Simon, WhoDeyRevolution.com
• Ryan Spoon, InGameNow.com
• Jimmy Traina, SI.com's Extra Mustard
• Mike Tunison, KissingSuzyKolber.com
• Matt Ufford, WithLeather.com

Many more details will be presented in the next few days and weeks.

You can also follow @BlogsWithBalls on Twitter and join its Facebook Page.

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