Has The Clock Run Out for The Ticker?

Maybe the march of information across the bottom of the TV screen has outlived its usefulness.

We were watching the latest episode of Rich Eisen’s fabulous “The Was SportsCenter” podcast series when he and longtime ESPN anchor Linda Cohn recalled a talent meeting from way back in the day. At this particular gathering of all the studio anchors, it was announced that the network would start running a new sports “ticker” at the bottom of the screen during all programming, including SportsCenter.

Now this was back in the pre-internet days, and part of the appeal of watching SportsCenter for its many fans was actually learning who won and lost in any given sport, on any given evening. To that end, SportsCenter anchors prided themselves on setting up the inevitable highlights with a carefully crafted storyline that usually didn’t give away the game’s ending. The final score was revealed in the graphic that immediately followed the highlights. (This had been the format of ESPN’s nightly flagship show since it had debuted with the network’s launch in 1979.)

According to Eisen and Cohn’s recollections, the news announcing that “the ticker” would be airing during editions of SportsCenter was not greeted with much enthusiasm by those who appeared at the anchor desk. Many of them believed that this ticker would “give away” the story of games long before they would be shown during SportsCenter telecasts.

(We would note that there was an equal lack of enthusiasm some years earlier when the network debuted the ticker’s predecessor, known internally as “the 28/58 updates,” which was the airing of sports scores at the bottom of the screen, twice each hour at :28 and :58 minutes past each hour. We happen to know this because we were part of its launch during our time in the 1980s working at the “World Wide Leader.”)

Tickers had become common on 24-hour news channels at the time. CNN had featured one since the 1992 Gulf War. So, ESPN decided to make them a persistent feature of the sports network’s programming. A reminder to the younger members of our audience that we are talking about a time before everyone was getting scores and then video highlights delivered instantly to the phones in their pockets.

Rich Eisen recounted how he went into a manager’s office at ESPN to say he thought putting this ticker thing on was a bad idea, especially if it was going to air during SportsCenter editions. He was apparently given a few minutes to present his case, only to be told that the ticker was a “done deal” and more or less to show himself out. (He would be told he could show himself out of the network a few years later, when he would join the new NFL Network as its first on-air hire.)

We’ve been thinking about this story ever since hearing it with this question in mind: In an age of always-available information at the tap of a finger, via countless devices, have TV’s on-screen “tickers” outlived their usefulness?

That question could be followed by perhaps the even larger one: Is there too much crap on the television screen, especially during newscasts (yes, even sports-centric ones)? Morning news seems to be primetime for tickers, displaying everything from news to last night’s sports scores to the morning commute times. The ultimate display of this visual excess can be found every day on Bloomberg Television. It is that network’s attempt to emulate the company’s ubiquitous Bloomberg Terminal that sits on the desk of every financial trader, much like the old ticker-tape machines once did.

The timing of this query isn’t just from listening to Eisen’s conversation with his colleague, Cohn. No, we have been pondering the question for a few days since watching the various explanations of why they called it a “ticker-tape parade” in New York City, during the celebration of the city’s latest heroes, the Knicks as NBA Champions.

In case you don’t know the history, at the beginning of the 1900s, Wall Street financial types received stock quotes telegraphed from the floor of the stock exchange via a mechanical device that punched out the information on a long ribbon of paper. This was known as a “ticker-tape.” Each day produced a significant quantity of the stuff, and at some point, for some celebration in the streets of Lower Manhattan, somebody had the bright idea to throw it out the windows, raining down on those being honored.

Technology replaced the ticker-tape machines with electronic displays by the 1960s, and so for the occasional parades in the “canyon of heros” for everyone from the astronauts to the Yankees after winning a World Series, the paper tape would be replaced with shredded bits of paper.

We’d argue that the ticker displays on television newscasts should follow their paper tape predecessors and become relics of the past.

Given the amount of information that is now displayed during a typical TV newscast, including the multiple instances of on-screen branding that typically appear, what does a line (or two) of text marching across the bottom of the screen tell you that the newscast isn’t going to tell you — or that you didn’t already know about from the incessant pinging of your smartphone throughout the day? It isn’t like the on-screen ticker is that well curated in many instances.

Maybe we should concede here that tickers can have a place during breaking news or severe weather situations. A ticker (or “crawl,” as some newsrooms prefer to call them) is a definite plus, if only to deliver crucial information continuously throughout the event.

But we’ve seen too many tickers labeled “Breaking News” featuring outdated or overblown headlines.

We’d go so far as to say that one of the best possible use cases for the long-promised “NextGenTV” digital television format (aka ATSC 3.0) would be to allow viewers to see a newscast with or without tickers displayed on the screen non-stop. This idea doesn’t really have to wait, it could be done right now utilizing a “dot-two,” or other numbered “digital subchannel” from any local TV station.

Of course, that would require the bandwidth currently occupied by one of the countless recycled television filled channels called MeTV, RetroTV, COZI TV, etc., Or the occasional home shopping channels that are still in business.

Honestly, we don’t expect this idea to take off anytime soon. Ditching the ticker seems like a bridge too far in 2026. Especially as some local stations actually make money from their ticker presentations, usually by attaching the logo of one of the countless personal injury law firms. Or some other local business.

Like lemmings to the sea, the headlines will likely keep marching across the bottom of the screen.

Before we sign off for today, congratulations to the aforementioned Linda Cohn on the announcement of her retirement from ESPN this week. She’ll do her final shows this Friday, June 26th, after being recognized as anchoring more SportsCenter shows than anyone else. The tally is over 5,500 in her nearly 34 years with the network. In a business that was predominantly male for so many years, it’s nice to see a woman sign off holding that record.

Wonder if it will earn a spot on that night’s ticker?

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