With Hazel Mae slated to exit NESN at the end of the month, we might be seeing a whole lot more of Kathryn Tappen on the network.
According to her official web site, Tappen has wanted to be a newscaster since the eighth grade. She has an athletic background, having competed in cross country and track and field for Rutgers University.
She broke onto the New England media scene in 2005 at NBC Channel 10 in Providence, Rhode Island, where she was the weekend sports anchor and sports reporter for the station.
In August 2006, she moved over to NESN, where she is the Boston Bruins studio host and serves as a weekend anchor and reporter for SportsDesk.
David Laurila did one of his RedSoxNation.net interviews with Tappen a while back.
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Popularity: 30% [?]
I think she’s raised the level of her game throughout her time at NESN and have high hopes she will continue to rise. With Hazel leaving I think she’ll be the lead to take the reigns and hopefully bring NESN to a higher level in programing and reporting as I have been mostly disappointed considering a TV big timer like Werner is around.
Let me think about this one……………
beautiful and hosts Bruins broadcasts.
“Approve!”“Approve!”“Approve!”“Approve!”“Approve!”“Approve!”“Approve!”“Approve!”“Approve!”“Approve!”“Approve!”“Approve!”“Approve!”“Approve!”“Approve!”“Approve!”“Approve!”
She’s make a perfect TV wife.
She has her own website? Why?
At least she doesn’t use trite and just awful cliches when she’s doing the highlights, like Hazel does.
Approve based on just that fact alone.
Hotter and not nearly as annoying as Hazel Mae.
This is the only industry I know of where the men have an ‘It’s all about ME’ attitude while the women don’t.
Ten thumbs up!!!!!
Something’s up and I dont think its my thumb.
Approve because of my white male guilt over holding minorities back.
approve, easy on the eyes, not as annoying as Cagulada,and who cares about mistakes, it’s about Nation-Building!!!!
A nice-looking woman who knows what she’s talking about and doesn’t use insipid terms like “earnies.” Approve!
Highly APPROVE! Does a good job and is very easy on the eyes.
Hmmm . . . 11 disapproval votes. Glad to see we’re getting the gay male votes out!
She has improved significantly since she began at NESN and is a lot less sleazy looking than H.Mae. She is one of my favorite sports babes.
Hasn’t done anything to justify a disapprove.
Also very pretty.
Approve. Seems like she’s more of a Tina C. or Jayme P. than a Hazel.
How long before Hazel appears on cinemax after 11pm?
Should be more professional like Meter and Pete the Meat! Thats how you do a sportsflash!
Liberal loonies letting womens cover sports with your affirmative action. Sports are for guys!
The best that NESN has to offer. Straightforward, to the point, knows exactly what she is doing. And oh yeah, she’s also beautiful. While Hazel Mae was annoying as hell because she always tried to be a SportsCenter anchor and wanted to hang “with the boys” with her seemingly superior sports knowledge, Tappen isn’t trying too hard. She’s a natural. Tappen’s value is also increased because of Heidi Watney’s very amateaur skills. Watney is beautiful as well, but sounds a lot like a cable access, local sports reporter. Makes NESN’s “nationwide search” team for the coveted Red Sox field reporter position look bad. Tappen just knows what she’s doing and she’s good at it.
Conducts herself as well as Tina C. did, and is similarly likeable. Oh yeah, and she is smokin’ hot. This works for me on many levels.
Approve!
Are you people crazy???
K.T. is awful! She can not pronounce 1/2 of the hockey players and when Milbury goes into a rant and I remember one where he and Nifty disagreed, Kathryn looked like she was a deer in headlights.
Hazel is/was head and shoulders above K.T.
People still watch Bruins games? The Revolution have a larger TV audience than the Bruins.
How does one “pronounce a hockey player”?
the only one she needs to pronounce is the one she’s engaged to.
More ignorant people that know nothing about the Bruins chime in. They really do need to get her off Bruins games though, hopefully with Hazel leaving they actually get someone who knows hockey.
Highly Approve!!!
Seems like an easy job - look good and don’t annoy. Tappen doesn’t try too hard and is obviously intelligent. I enjoy tv more when she’s on.
But I approve mostly because I’m a liberal and feel guilty about how oppressed women have been over the centuries…
Smokin’
HOT!
I was greatly disappointed when Eric Frede was removed from hosting the Bruins pre and post-game shows on NESN, and replaced with Kathryn. Frede did an excellent job, and initially I felt the move was simply using an attractive blonde to draw more ratings.
Her start doing the Bruins telecasts was rough and the opening road trip of last season was truly cringe-worthy. She offered terrible and often pointless commentary, and was clearly not comfortable reacting to the producers in her ear and whatever the “expert” whether it be Milbury, Pederson, Middelton or Kluzak were saying at the same time, causing for awkward pauses and rough transitions.
However as the season progressed she grew more at ease with her role, and her commentary turned from droll to insightful, skillfully guiding the pre-game, post game and in between period segments.
It was refreshing to see her progress as the season progressed, and while she’s not a reason I feel like I have to watch the non-game Bruins coverage, I’m not compelled anymore to switch channels or get up and go to the bathroom when she’s on.
Corpsie-
Kathryn? Insightful? When? The analysts were still teaching her the game on air during the playoffs!
She’s engaged to an AHL player and still brings nothing to hockey discussions!
She’s not just smokin’ either.
I recall recently when she made the point that subjective science, as a pattern of an objective science, is based on the dialectical triad of language, logic and philosophy, which, as she explained is the language of dialectics. She was quite convinced that the first level of language is its grammar (obviously), but whose basis constitutes lexemes (or so she maintains) and lexas (relation-words). And I think she was right. She continued in saying that the dialectical factor sets (logical parts of speech) were merely the basis of dialectical logic and logical morphology and that they formed the second level of the language of dialectics. And lets face it, she is spot when she says that in the first approximation, any face of a state or a phenomenon of nature has at least two sides of comparison. All to true.
Jack Edwards was, like, duhhh!
Liberal loony! oh lets look at both sides of the comparison .. there is no reason to look at their side BECAUSE THERE side is WRONG!!! She’s driving a Lexeme then she’s not opressed! Thats a luxury car!!
I am sorry to here about her dialetics, dialetes is a bad disease but it’s controllable with insulen.
Wait, she’s a scientologist who follows Dianetics?
When she arrived at Channel 10 I thought she was awful and wasn’t going anywhere as she clearly had no idea what she was talking about. Mispronounced names, flubbed highlights, offered no editorial comments…goes to show what NESN is interested in. (I remember a friend couldn’t believe NESN even hired her!).
I don’t find her offensive but to me the lights are on but nobody is home. Personality wise she has little to offer. If she’s going to be the “new face of NESN” good luck with that one.
Have to give her an approve though very weak on pre and post game Bruins coverage maybe intimitated by Milbury
and Kluzak.She’s a dish.
Attractive, competent, agenda-free. I suppose that means she’ll get buried in a town where ugly, incompetent, agenda-ridden hacks rise to the top. Approve.
nice to look at, but does anybody REALLY LISTEN to these “studio hosts”?….If I watch “SportsDesk” at all it just to get a score and some highlights, whatever the “host” is saying goes in one ear and out the other. Gave her an approve, but they could prop up CPR dummy in the chair for all I care….just show me the score and the highlights!
Emphatically Disapprove!
1-A total moron when it comes to talking hockey.
She’s engaged to a journeyman AHL hockey player Jay Leach-you think she’d know the hockey terminology and how players like to joke around.
2-She has no adlibbing ability on camera. When the analysts ask her about the game-Tappen freezes because its not scripted. She has big trouble thinking quickly.
3-No sense of humor on camera. None. Only if its her joke that she wrote down with (laugh) after that.
You can tell she gets pissed when the analysts ask her anything because it flusters her.
4-Her hair is constantly in her face on profile shots.
Hello?
5-She has no personality-none on camera. She sits-smiles and talks like a ventriloquists dummy.
6-Her On Camera Make-Up? Orange face-white neck. Do better job applying your make-up. It looks like a Halloween mask.
7- She’s brutally skinny. Anorexic skinny.
Kathryn seriously. Review your tapes, learn and improve.
EAT SOMETHING KATHRYN!
Approve All The Way!!!
Brett I am so sorry that life molded you into such a putz. Your a perfect example of “you can’t please everybody”.
I’ll second that….jeeze Brett, she’s not THAT skinny at all….something is going on there, Brett doth protest too much….
Bob you’re way to obsessed with her looks to understand the whole broadcasting package.
If a Playboy playmate sat there and read everything off a teleprompter like Kathryn does-you’d say give her an Emmy Award.
Yeah its tough living with a half a brain and a having to wear a hockey helmet 24/7 huh BoSoxBob?
Um..sure, approve. I don’t watch stupid NESN pregame shows.
She has definitley improved and find her a talent on “the rise”. But I must say……I miss the overall talents of Eric Frede. He was someone you could depend on and you knew he knew his stuff. Lets hope they reconsider & bring him back. Another pretty face would be insulting to us all!
Has a desirable 80/20 hip-waist ratio … long, sleek legs and diamond chisled calves … Upper body could use some enhancement and she could use 7-10 pounds in overall body weight … A textbook hottie who should age well … Don’t be fooled by her girl-next-door persona — she stabbed Hazel in the back and pushed her out the door … will not tolerate the even prettier Heidi much longer … Was forced to ward off numerous advances by smitten middle age Bruins Alumni all season … This is why average-looking chicks (Hazel, Tina, Jaiyme) and ugly men (Frede, Rodgers, Perlow, Arnold) get gassed at NESN. African Americans? Sorry, you need not apply at the NESN plantation … McGrail’s harem is for hot, white, blond and compliant chicks. Soon they’ll find a hottie to bounce “Forehead” Caron and NESN’s “Master Race” will be in place.
Davey-
I agree. Tappen is a selfish PHONEY! I watched her doing the NESN hockey stuff at the Garden.
Just before camera’s roll Tappen is the biggest spoiled diva in the business.
Camera On: She’s got that sweet-innocent dopey smile on with her wooden delivery.
Camera Off: A rude snobby bitch.
The NESN gig fame went straight to her head. When people approach her she’s the Ice Queen. Like its a chore to meet her fans.
She’s also a huge airhead.
What happened Brett; did Kathryn give you the Heisman when you asked her for an autograph?
I’m tired of politically-correct, ultra-liberal NESN going out of its way to hire incompetent females at the behest of very competent guys (Eric Frede, e.g.).
We all know why Katheryn Tappen was hired — because she’s a pretty blonde. Otherwise, she is completely devoid of talent and fits right into the NESN/Globe act of hiring women just because they’re women (i.e., Cervasio, the new blonde, Benjamin, Springer, MacMullen … OK, MacMullen was good, but the others are simply awful).
BIG DISAPPROVE. GET ‘ER GONE!
Approve
They upgraded her wardrobe from grandma to professional about a year ago and it helped quite a bit. Now she just needs to dress a little more sexy and she’d go national. She’s hiding some amazing sweater kittens in that shirt that she needs to flaunt a little more without going over the top.
K-Tap has a pretty nice front porch, but she reminds me a little of Ben Watson. Looks great getting off the bus, but just doesn’t get it done on the field.
Did you say Kathryn Tappen? Ohhhhhh DROOOL DROOOOOL!
You should hire people that grow up Bruins fans. Kat is from New York.
Saw Kathryn on NESN but had never formed an opinion of her outside of she was seemed to know what she was talking about. Attended a benefit dance yesterday for an 8-year-old Rochester, NH, hockey player recently diagnosed with leukemia. Kathryn was there to support fund raising for the kid’s recovery. She was clearly there for the kid, and spoke about the many items donated for auction from many professional players(unscripted)including the Bruins, Boston Red Sox, Red Wings, Patriots, etc., and UNH Hockey. In my book anyone who spends their valuable time supporting kids and charities, gets an A++.