ESPN.com started with Big Country’s broken backboard

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4ZQYF2hNgM

Well, this is something I certainly did not know. The first thing (post? bit of media?) ever on ESPN.com was a “postage stamp” video of Big Country breaking the backboard at the Final Four in 1995. That’s how the site debuted.

ESPN senior writer Steve Wulf told the story like this:

The website now called ESPN.com debuted with an actual slam dunk: video from Bryant Reeves’ glass-shattering reverse jam during Oklahoma State’s Friday practice before the 1995 Final Four in Seattle.

Like “Big Country,” the video was a little crude, and unlike him, very little (think postage stamp) and very short (eight seconds).

Of all people who would kick off one of the most progressive digital media outlets on the planet today, it was Big Freaking Country who started the revolution.

He was interviewed for the piece (which you should read) on ESPN.

“Oh yeah, I look at ESPN.com,” says Reeves. “I have two sons, 17 and 15, who are on it all the time, so it’s my way of keeping up with them. They both filled out brackets on the site.”

Two of the nine billion pageviews the site got last year.[1. Reference: PFB gets about 5 million a year.] And it all started with a bunch of shattered glass in one of OSU’s two Final Four runs under Eddie Sutton.