Dr. Frank Luntz is one of the more odious characters in American public life today. He's the man who turned "global warming" into "climate change" and also tried to redefine the adjective "Orwellian" to make it seem positive.
He also has a minor history in sports. You may remember him from the last National Hockey League lockout, where he tried to conduct surveys with fans to find a way to get them on the side of the owners. Before, you know, that information leaked.
Luntz is an author, political consultant, and a frequent Fox News Channel contributor. He is now moving over to another part of the company. As of Thursday, Luntz is now Fox Sports Live's "exclusive sports communications analyst."
What exactly does a person with that job title do? Well, let's allow Fox to explain it:
"Dr. Luntz’s contributions to FOX Sports 1, primarily during FOX SPORTS LIVE, the channel’s nightly program providing news, highlights and commentary, are essentially two-fold. He is available either live in-studio or via remote location to provide analysis on breaking news, press conferences and current events pertaining to sports. Separately, Dr. Luntz hosts a segment called Sound Off, which features taped focus group discussions featuring audience members that cover a range of sports topics. Offering viewers independent analysis on important sports issues, Sound Off also gives fans an opportunity to be heard on the day’s most controversial sports topics."
Luntz made his Fox Sports Live debut on Thursday. The show has not made the segment — which aired in the episode's final 15 minutes — avaiable as of this writing, even though they're usually quick to get pieces they're proud of online. 7 other clips are available from last night's show, but Luntz's focus group segment was so bad it's been quickly swept under the rug.
You can understand why they may have been reticent to do so. It was essentially Dr. Luntz in front of a room of normal people sitting around discussing whether or not they would draft Michael Sam. Because… that's something I want normal people's opinions on?
Shockingly (SHOCKINGLY, I SAY!), the discussion devolved into chaos to the point where you couldn't hear a single member of the 20-some-person panel. Not a single coherent point was made. It was mostly just random people regurgitating the media's talking points on Sam's media attention being "a distraction." It was terrible television, worse than even the most mind-numbing SportsCenter debates of recent years.
It's not the best start to the tenure of someone FS1 is obviously hoping to get a lot from. You have to give Fox Sports 1 credit. They will do just about anything to give me the opinion of someone who is not an expert on a particular sport. Who knows how long Luntz's segment will last on Fox Sports Live, but hopefully the FS1 cafeteria looks like this after a few weeks.
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