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August 29, 2005
Just one more year...
Cold, Hard Football Facts.com:
The Troika Tracker
For those of you, like me, who can't believe Theismann lost to Woody Paige.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 01:00 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
The Bracket
Thanks, again, to Bill.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:48 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
The Championship
1. Stuart Scott
Defeated Scott Van Pelt, 123-8
Defeated John Kruk, 111-35
Defeated Jim Gray, 78-32
Defeated Joe Morgan, 85-51
Defeated Tony Reali, 107-23
Closing Statements:
"Scott is pretty much ESPN's mascot and represents everything that is wrong with the network's direction. The ultimate triumph of style over substance. He deserves his place in the Final." -- Adam
"Every new anchor on Sportscenter wants to be him, and that's damning enough to get him to the next round." -- Mike O.
"Stuart Scott is the devil. It offends me as someone with a journalism degree that he is considered part of the media." -- David
"As if to highlight every level of suck he can achieve his co-host/bitch for this Sunday was the excellent Fred Hickman. I should point out that Stuyeah has interrupted at least half of Hickman's segments (which shows that he really does think he's funny and interesting) ...constantly yelling AND I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT THE FUCK HE IS SAYING. Chewbacca is more understandable. Sad and pathetic thing is, its fake. Every word that comes out of his fake "ghetto" ass is fake. Fake. Phoney. Poser." -- Bill T.
"I hate the playa and I hate the game." -- Eric J.
"Stu! The only time I enjoyed him on Sportscenter was when he looked uncomfortable for the whole Sportscenter after Duke won the NCAA title in 01. Booyah!" -- mjp
"He's a wanna-be. He made one comment that got a chuckle (this was years and years ago)and now all he tries to do is make never ending jokes that only make you uncomfortable and want to crush his skull in." -- Todd
"Chris Berman opened the floodgates for the personality first, sports second mentality of ESPN personnel, but Stuart Scott made his life's goal to find out exactly where the nth degree was, and brought along disciples like Statboy with him. For the ruination of a network, Stuart, we who are about to change the channel salute you." -- Chris
"The only way he'd look good is if ESPN went to a three man desk and his partners were SAS and Bayless. Of course, if that ever happened I'd have to blow up the ESPN studio secure in the knowledge that no jury in the world would ever convict me after watching five minutes of these guys." -- Andy
"Here's the thing with Stu...his shtick never made any sense. I know a lot of old, cranky white guys who get all red in the face whenever they hear about Pookie and Ray-Ray. They hate Stuart Scott. I also know a lot of people like myself who, while Caucasian, are not crankly old racists. We just think Scott's act is tired and lame and has as much street cred as David Alan Grier's newsman in "I'm Gonna Get You Sucka". We hate Stuart Scott. I don't have my ear to the ground in predominantly black neighborhoods, but if I recognize the lameness of his act, I can't imagine Scott appeals to anyone there.
"So, what are we left with? Scott appeals to old, stupid white guys who want to believe they are hip. So he says some stupid bullshit about "The Lord said you gotta rise up!" and "Cool as the other side of the pillow" and those old doofuses nod their heads and think of how hip they are for being in touch with urban America. mark Shapiro is that old white doofus.
"For crimes against sports and television, and for making me have to listen to cranky old white racists bitching about black sportscasters (ignoring the Fred Hickmans of the world in the process), Stuart Scott wins this one." -- Mike
"I'll be honest, for most of my Sportscenter watching days I never realized that Scott was trying to speak in "street" slang. Call me naive, but I thought his phrases were just weird jokes that didn't really make sense. That was annoying enough, but one day a couple years ago, not coincidentally right before swearing off the show altogether, something clicked and I recognized his shtick for what it's attempting to be... God almighty that is awful. Just awful. He nearly singlehandedly made the show that got me watching ESPN in the first place utterly unwatchable. He is wretched. Perhaps not quite into Stephen A./Bayless territory, but definitely worthy of a Final Four bid. To the Finals with you, Scott. May someone with actual "street" cred beat the hell out of you in an ally for your tired poserness on the way there." -- Pat
"Stuart Scott - and anyone that refers to him as a "Sportscaster" or "Journalist" should be given the Clockwork Orange treatment and have their eyes taped open and forced to listen to this sophomoric vitriol that is an offense to humanity. Remember the three "S"'s -
Stuart Scott Sucks. Badly." -- BillH
"The Typhoid Mary of ESPN. He came onto the scene, infected all his fellow SportsCenter anchors with faux attitude and soon wiped out all traces of competence at the Worldwide Sports Leader. And now, the living envy the dead. Or at least, _I_ envy the dead when I have to suffer through Scott narrating a Royals-A's highlight.
"Boo-yeah? Boo-no." -- Phil
"I vote for Stu because he continually mentions me on Sportscenter. Hopefully my cool side will smother him one night so I don't have to hear the outdated reference again.
"Thank you
"Stuart Scott's Pillow" -- Bob
"At one point in my life, I liked Stuart Scott. Then I graduated from high school. Mr. Scott, you're history." -- Craig Barker
"Battling insomnia, I was laying in bed the other night pondering "The Road To Bristol". Sad, but true. Anyway, in the midst of tossing and turning I started pondering the temperature of my pillow. It was then I figured out why Stuey is such a complete tool. The other side of your pillow really isn't that cool.
"Yes, it might be relatively cooler than the side your head is using, but in the pantheon of cool things, pillows really don't qualify. Like if you were on the old "$25,000 Pyramid" game show and the category was "Things That Are Cool," you'd have to be pretty lame to say "the other side of your pillow" as one of your clues." -- Miles Cannon
"His gimmick was cute when he first started. But then espn decided to hire people based on catch phrases. I understand he wasnt the first to do it, but he certainly "perfected" it. Honestly, it wouldn't be so bad if catch phrases weren't used in every single god forsaken highlight not just on espn, but on any sport highlight. This is more stuart scott's fault than anyone else." -- Rob
Versus
2. Skip Bayless
Destroyed Kirk Herbstreit 110-8
Obliterated Chris Fowler 110-2
Annihilated Larry Bowa, 90-6
Defeated Jay Mariotti, 69-21
Defeated Stephen A. Smith, 102-100
"ESPN found a man who makes you root for Woody Paige on First & Ten and SAS on Old School/Nu Skool. That's all that needs to be said." -- mike
"I want to root for the Old School in these debates - I think many of us do. The problem is - Skip Bayless is just so god-awfully bad at this. He's wrong - a lot. He makes that awful lemon-face whenever SAS makes any sort of point. He interrupts to make a point that usually hurts his argument. Skippy does everything he can - to lose. SAS can't match it.
"Look at who else Skippy makes looks good:
"Woody Paige (this is one hell of an accomplishment right there)
"Jay Crawford (and it shows how deep the ESPN "talent" pool is that he isn't in this tourney)
"Jim Rome (Skip Bayless subs for him on his radio show - and makes Rome sound like Jim McKay by comparison).
"Any columnist at ESPN.com - even Dan Shanoff - Mr. Daily Quickie
"And those are just the direct comparisons. " -- djcolts
"He is, without a doubt, the most hateful person in all of national sports broadcasting. Unlike some, who just show blatant biases towards a team or person (I'm looking at you Dick Vitale), Bayless has never met an athlete or team whom he couldn't tear down. ESPN's newest special should be Skip in gladiator-style combat versus lions, only with Skip handcuffed and beaten first. This would beat the Super Bowl." -- Andy
"Andy - I have to disagree with the gladiator idea, because lions would do the job far far too quickly. I propose rabid rats instead. Only not too many of them. This thing has to last long enough for Janet's boob to pop out, after all." -- Tim
"Stephen A. Smith is a loud, screeching, irritating moron. Bayless is a loud, screeching, irritating moron who is also THE EMBODIMENT OF ALL THAT IS EVIL." -- Adam
"If he tried to defend the Nazis for their actions in the Holocaust, I'd probably say, 'Yeah, that's about right for this guy.'" -- CJ
"So bad that even 30 seconds of looking at anything he says or writes causes my brain to short-circuit in protest. His column yesterday about weed and alcohol almost made me cry, it was so stupid." -- Jenny
"No one likes Bayless, not even his own mother." -- Smitty
"I hate Skip Bayless. I hate his weird ugly face. I hate his ridiculous tan. I hate the cadence in his voice. I hate the way his head bobs around and his eyes bug open when he talks. I hate his writing. I hate his moronic opinions on everything, that can be so stupid they make you wonder if his feeble mind is even capable of the slightest bit of the thought process found in a normal human. I hate that he is an arrogant a-hole about his idiotic opinions. I hate that he's on a show where he makes Woody effing Paige seem like the voice of reason. I hate that he is ever an any other show for any reason or any amount of time.
"There is no way to properly describe the hatred that I have for Skip Bayless. It is an intense, seething emotion that cannot be quantified and cannot be replicated with any other personality. There is no one whose presense elicits the aura of wretched, vile, contemptible scum like Skip Bayless. (That's a vote for Bayless)." -- Sam
"Bayless is an equal-opportunity Reaper, beckoning all but the most strong-willed peoples with his skeletal finger, slowly but efficiently filling hearts with hatred and disdain until they unwittingly find themselves face to face with Charon. And without a coin." -- TheBentKangaroo
"Just the epitome of all the sportswriters who just don't seem to like sports, always look for the negative, try to tear EVERYONE down, and make my sports fan experience that much more frustrating. Hopefully some day Sarah Michelle Gellar will show up at ESPN and whack his head off with a big-ass sword." -- Devin McCullen
"The most sour individual I've ever heard or read. He finds a new twist or angle to remove all the joy and pleasure from every sporting event that occurs. He is the antithesis of every reason to watch sports in the first place, and this fool has a prime spot at 'The WorldWide Leader.'" -- Dryden
"As has already been said by many others, Bayless just seems to be an angry, bitter little man. Nothing is too good for him to try to tear down. His columns are spiteful for no apparent reason other than no one else has taken that particular side in an argument." -- BDouglas
"When I first started reading Bayless's columns, I tried emailing him legitimate questions about his work (ex. he wrote an article about the greatest athlete ever without even mentioning Babe Didrikson - who writes about all-around athletes, mentions Jim Thorpe, and not Didrikson? Someone who knows NOTHING about sports and sports history, that's who).
"When I got no responses, I tried bashing him. No dice. I've since stopped trying to reason, since ESPN probably has several staff dedicated to deleting Skip's email, fellating his ego, and turning off his tanning bed. Ok, maybe they need to hire another person to cover that tanning bed." -- Will
"He seems to genuinely hate his job. Unfortunately, his job is to talk to me. I don't usually go around hoping that bad things happen to people, but I really do hope he gets fired." -- Sansho1
"I've known 'fans' like Bayless all my life. He is so intent on feeling smug and superior that he can't ever say the conventional thing, or support the home team, even if that is the correct view. He has to be contrarian; it's pathological; not being so is easy, lazy and wrong. And years and years of such negativity have sucked whatever joy he might have once felt following sports. In fact, voting for him is almost a pity vote: he'd probably feel better no longer having to be that person." -- Brad
"In his column yesterday about the evils of liquor (which actually made me turn to the bottle for relief), Skip let it slip that his addictions include weight-lifting and running. He apparently left out 'consuming human souls.'" -- Phil
"Skip Bayless eats babies." -- mtvcdm
"I had a dream the other night where I was asking Jay Mariotti if Bayless was really that bad and he just ... shivered. I swear. Also, he was married to that chick from Farscape and we were all on a reality hiking race show or something. Yes I have weird dreams." -- Sharon
"Bayless eats your soul through his columns and appearances and general existance. He must be stopped, for all our sakes. He is so evil that every time you read one of his columns, God kills a kitten." -- Pat
"The most vile, negative, hateful, bitter, spiteful little turd that has ever graced the airwaves." -- Mike G.
"In the last round, there was a joke that he would find a way to disparage the Miracle on Ice. Well, it is a joke no more. A quote from an actual article he wrote about hockey (a sport he hates--yes, I'm also shocked he hates it):
"'It wouldn't have mattered if the United States and Soviets had been playing charades that night. The point was that a bunch of no-hope college kids from America shocked a pro juggernaut from our Cold War rival.'
"Yes, if the US college kids had beaten the mighty Soviets in charades, or Tiddly Winks, or Hungry Hungry Hippos, I'm sure it would have had the exact same impact. I can see Kurt Russell starring in a movie as a scrappy Othello player, beating the evil empire. What a jackass. This is why everyone hates you." -- Chris
"Mariotti, Paige, LeBatard, they're all accolytes of the Skip Bayless school of journalism. Skip is the first columnist to openly loathe the sports he covers, and many have followed since." -- Chris [A different one.]
"One thing that struck me was that even SAS was rendered mute against Bayless. Smith got all quiet and reserve like he was a puppy who just had an accident on the floor when arguing with Skippy.
"Bayless is the devil, even SAS knows." -- Dewey
"So hateful that seeing his image raises my blood pressure." -- Fed up with ESPN
"Bayless spends every minute of every day hating everything. That's all he does. He goes out of his way to get people to disagree with him." -- J. Rauch
"Bayless hates everything and everyone. He sucks the oxygen out of any fun that sport has to offer. The only reason Rome lets him host on radio is that Rome looks great in comparison." -- JimBoHanna
"The road to hell maybe paved with good intentions, but the roads in hell are probably paved with the pained voice of Skip Bayless, repeating in endless loop why it's the Eagles fault TO behaves the way he does. That and asbestos." -- Clarke
Finally... You can't pick and choose: Cult of Basebaal, Complete
Voting is now closed. Results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:12 AM | Comments (196) | TrackBack
August 28, 2005
More from the red carpet
MELISSA RIVERS: Well, mom, let's start with Stu Scott's choice of clothing...what's up with the too bright, loud shirts and the 5 button suits? Yikes! And then, there's the lazy eye thing... ooooohh (shivers). Just horrible. As for Skip Bayless, even worse; first, the GI Joe, plastic Ken Doll haircut...just awful...and those suits. Not for a white man! This whole thing is just a sham, if you ask me.
SAGER: Well, we really didn't...
MELISSA: Oh, screw you...mom let's go and judge some other outfits.
SAGER: Ok, let's send it back over to you, Jim.
JIM GRAY: I'm here with the Vice President of the United States, Dick Cheney, as well as Senior Advisor Karl Rove. Let's start with you, Mr. Vice President.
DICK CHENEY: Well, Jim, we are here to enjoy, an All American match-up between two great Americans and have a night off from work.
KARL ROVE: Well, that's not quite all...Jim, actually we are trailing Penn, Moore & Garofalo with some help of some deep cover operatives...
[Cheney suddenly clutches his chest, gasping for air]
CHENEY: Karl, no...no NAMES...please....stop....
[Cheney falls to the ground and the paramedics run over]
ROVE: Gosh, that's too bad...I hope Dick feels better. Anyway, Jim, I just want to thank Jeff Wilson of Aames, Iowa and Thomas Stevens of Glendale, California for their wonderful work tonight in helping Cheney and I trail those crazy terrorist-hugging liberals.
GRAY: Great job keeping some secrets there, Rove. Wait to protect your agents.
ROVE: Fine then, Gray, why don't you call them...here's their cell numbers and email addresses!
GRAY: On that note, let's send it back over to Craig Sager. Craig?
SAGER: I am here with NFL Pro Bowlers and top notch wide receivers, Terrell Owens and Randy Moss. Terrell, let's start with you.
TERRELL OWENS: Well, Craig...I love me some me and hate you some you. Anyway, I am here to pull for my boy Skippy.
SAGER: Your boy?
OWENS: Yeah, man...he wrote an article ripping McNabb and talking about how fat Andy Reid is...man, I love me some Bayless, baby!
SAGER: T.O., let's talk about your agent, Drew Rosenhaus...the igniter in all this. Where's Drew tonight?
[Suddenly, several people are thrown from the stands as Rosenhaus comes bounding out of the stands screaming and ranting]
DREW ROSENHAUS: Yo, yo Craig...we love the Eagles...T.O. has said the whole time he just wants to get paid, and that he doesn't care where that happens. He has a standard playing fee of $20 million a year and we expect the Eagles to honor his first contract by tearing it up and writing him a new one. That's ALL we asked, ok?
SAGER: Sure, Drew. Let's switch over to randy Moss, now an Oakland Raider... Randy, what do you think abnout tonight's match-up? Randy...? What's that burning smell?
[Sager looks down to see Moss sitting on the ground Indian style smoking a bong with Matthew McGonaughey]
SAGER: I guess that answers my next question about how much weed you are smoking.
MOSS: Yo, man...Matthew and I are really hungry. Can you get us some Dorito's and ding dongs? That would be great.
ROSENHAUS: [Hands Randy Moss a bag of dorito's and 50 bucks.] Hey Randy...Drew Rosenhaus here...I hope your agent is really doing his job for you and getting you the best kind of weed. Also, how does your agent live with himself considerring how underpaid you are? What's up with that? Why is Al just raping you by only having you be the SECOND highest paid wide receiver? How would you like to be #1?
[Owens glares at Drew]
MOSS: I just want to go to sleep, man...I am tired.
SAGER: Well, this is breaking down quickly...Jim, back over to you!
GRAY: I am here, surprisingly, with Paris Hilton, Nicole Richie, Hillary Duff & Lindsay Lohan. Paris, let's start with you...I thought you & Nicole hated one another?
PARIS HILTON: [Petting her dog] Jim, we don't hate each other. Hell, we just had sex in the limo, silly Jimmy. Besides, we are here to promote "The Simple Life 3". It's hott.
NICOLE RICHIE: Actually, Jimmy, we hate each other but it's cool...we like heard there was gonna be a party and wanted to meet some boys, of course!
GRAY: How about you, Lindsay...I know you and Hillary Duff really hate one another. Why are you here together?
LINDSAY LOHAN: Like I am sooo not here with Hillary! I mean, look how successful I am...Herbie, my SNL appearances...I don't need this trashy knock off. Paris invited her for some reason. What a slut.
GRAY: Hillary, a reprisal?
HILLARY DUFF: Wow...that's quite a statement coming from Lindsay, considering she was talking about how she wanted to come to Bristol tonight and blow both Skippy Bayless and you, Jimmy.
GRAY: Lindsay, is this true? Do you want to blow me?
LOHAN: Uh...NO...that was Mary-Kate & Ashley who said they wanted to blow Jimmy.
(all of a sudden, Mary-Kate and Ashley OIsen come bounding out of the stands).
MARY-KATE AND ASHLEY OLSEN: (in unison) Lindsay, you ho bag...you are such a slut and a liar! (Ashley)...and by the way, Lindsay...Mary-Kate blew Wilmer the oither night at Brad Pitt's party!!! Ha.
GRAY: Uh...Craig, let's send it back to you...things have really broken down here. I believe you have the last interview of the night?
SAGER: Yes, Jim...before we get started with tonight's match-up, we wanted to catch up with now former ESPN uber-Producer, Mark Shapiro and Washington redskins diminutive Owner, Daniel Snyder. Mark, talk about the decision to leave ESPN...did it have anything to do w/ the absolute hatred of ESPN fans in general as expressed through this tournament or the utter failure of your out of the bnox shjows like "Quite Frankly" and "Rome is Itching"?
MARK SHAPIRO, FORMER ESPN UBER-PRODUCER: Craig, I am so excited about tonight's match between Skip Bayless and my personal hero, Stuart scott. This is the culmination, tonight of all of my hard work and I am grateful to see these two class acts go at it as my last act and in my last days as the VP or Programming at ESPN.
SAGER: Daniel, what played into your decision into hiring Mark Shapiro considering what a lightning rod of controversy he is?
DANIEL SNYDER, WASHINGTON REDSKINS OWNER: Well, Craig, we are looking for some more outside the box ideas to help make the Redskins as successful and well known as ESPN. For example, among some of Mark's ideas is a reality talk show for Lavar Arrington, a talent contest hosted by Patrick Ramsey and Chris Samuels, plus a road trip show hosted by our newest Skin, Santana Moss. We are very excited about what Mark brings to the Redskins. Plus, I just helped end America's long national nightmare.
SAGER: Well, Daniel, we're all grateful to you for that. Thank you both and maybe you both be struck by lightning or captured by North Korean nationals. Verne, Bob, back to you for the START of our finals match-up tonight... The 2 seeded Skip Bayless battling the 1 seed, Stuart Scott.
-- Alex R.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 03:49 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
August 27, 2005
On the red carpet...
VERNE LUNDQUIST: "Welcome to the brand new ESPNZone/Bristol Sports Arena here in dull, godforsaken Bristol, Connecticut for the site of the first ever "The Road from Bristol" championship! I'm Verne Lundquist along with Bob Costas, and Bob, this is a a surreal night...ESPN will say goodbye tonight to not just one sports offender, but two, as Mark Shapiro officially announces his decision tonight to join the front office of Daniel Snyder and the Washington Redskins in Washington, D.C."
VERNE LUNDQUIST: "Thanks Bob, that was almost as long winded as I expected. Right now, Bob, we go to our sideline reporters tonight...Jim Gray & Craig Sager...who will be talking to the various celebrities of sports, stage, and screen in attendence for tonight's big game. Jim?
JIM GRAY: "Thanks Verne, Bob... I am here with Los Angeles Lakers guard Kobe Bryant and his head coach Phil Jackson to get their take on tonight's match. Kobe, let's OF COURSE start with you!
KOBE BRYANT: Actually Jim, I just came over to ask if you'd stop calling me on my cell phone. You left 23 messages the other night and Vanessa got really upset. I appreciate the support but this has to stop.
PHIL JACKSON: Jim, perhaps if you came with me on a spiritual retreat to the Mojave Desert that I am planning to take with Ricky Williams and Shirley Maclaine next week, where we will dance around in robes chanting the theme from "The Golden Girls". This might lead to an enlightening of your soul and perhaps, less obssession with my star player... interested?
GRAY: Can we talk about the match up tonight?
PHIL JACKSON: Jimmy, here's my number... Ricky, Shirley and I leave on Tuesday around 3:00 pm. We will be in the Black Hummer. Pack lightly.
GRAY: Craig, over to you.
CRAIG SAGER: Thanks Jim... I am here with Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner, who are both rooting on Skip Bayless. Bennifer II... any comments?
AFFLECK: Bennifer II? What the hell is that, Sager? And what's up with the red suit jacket... you do realize you're like 80 and people think you're a dork, right? Tell him, J-Lo.
[Garner glares at Ben]
AFFLECK: uh...did I say J-Lo?... I mean... J-Garn... so confusing, the same name and all... hey, I see Matt Damon and Kevin Smith... let's go honey and say hi!!!
SAGER: Back over to Jim!
GRAY: I am now joined Hollywood activists Michael Moore, Sean Penn & Janene Garofalo. How are all of you doing?
SEAN PENN: Jim...I am disturbed by this situation tonight and Michael and Janene have agreed to join me in peaceful protest and maybe also a little hard drinking later, right guys? [smiles] -- [back to serious] Anyway, I am disturbed that these two jokers... Mac & Alex would create a whole tournament around hating people. There's not enough love in this world... for example... have any of us hugged a terrorist lately? Well, Janene, Michael & I have started a foundation called "Hug a Terrorist Foundation" which lives by the basic principle that if we all reach out and hug a terrorist, they will put down their weapons and stop killing us. We are here tonight to spread this message. Jim, would you like a t-shirt and to make a $2 donation in the name of love?
GRAY: Can I make a donation in the name of Kobe Bryant? By the way, do you have an opinion on who will win?
MICHAEL MOORE: TONIGHT IS A SHAM, JIM GRAY! THERE HAS BEEN STUFFING OF BALLOT BOXES FOR SKIP BAYLESS FROM THE STATE OF FLORIDA AND I AM PERSONALLY HERE TO OVERSEE THAT STUART SCOTT HAS A FAIR CHANCE TO WIN!
GAROFOLO: Right on, Mikey!
GRAY: Uh, back to you, Craig.
SAGER: I am here with former Washington Bullets center, Gheorge Muresan. Gheorge, tell us how you're feeling?
MURESAN: I loooooooveeeeee thiiiiisssssssssss gggggaaaaaaammmmmmeeeeee.
SAGER: That was beautiful, Gheorge. Jim?
GRAY: I'm here with the King of Pop himself, Michael Jackson, and his former friend Macauley Culkin. First, Michael, since the jury was clearly a fan of "Billie Jean" and that being the reason you got off scot-free, do you feel bad about what you did to those families? And who do you like in the match-up.
MICHAEL JACKSON: Well, Jim, I just want to say how much I love EVERYONE, especially the children, and I thank God every day I am free. The jury also really liked, "Bad" from what I was told. In tonight's magtch-up, I really like Skip Bayless because he's more evil then me.
GRAY: Macauley, you are now grown up so why do you have interest in hanging out with Michael and what possible interest could he actually have in you?
MACAULEY CULKIN: (slaps hands on his cheeks) AHHHHHHHHH!!!!!! What the hell am I doing still hanging out with this creep? Actually make it TWO creeps since you're standing here Gray...anyway, Stuart Scott is a friend of mine so I am rooting him on to keep his job. Go Bayless.
GRAY: Craig...your turn in this freakfest.
SAGER: Before we go to break, I am here with Joan and Melissa Rivers to delve more into the style and looks of the two participants. Hello Joan and Melissa!
JOAN RIVERS: Oy vey...what's up with the red suit jacket? It's like one of Cher's veins exploded or something. You look HORRIBLE. And what's up with the Ken Doll hair? My God!
Now onto the guys we're here to see...Skip Bayless also needs to do something with his. What's up with all the Ken doll haircuts around here? And stop blowing out your chest there, Pederman. Please...what do you have to be so proud about? I mean, nobody likes you, they think you're the devil and your writing sucks. And 'Cold Pizza'-bleh (fake spits twice). May you burn from a thousand suns.
And Stuart Scott... My GAWD, what is wrong with your eye? I feel like you are permanently looking down my dress. Hollywood doesn't want to see with that thing. Hey... I think George Romero is still casting for 'Land of the Dead'.
SAGER: Melissa...what do you think?
-- Alex R.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 12:28 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
August 26, 2005
Here's the plan
Alex and I are working on some preview material we'll post this weekend. Monday, I'll post the voting entry for the finals. We'll close the polls on Friday.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 02:50 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Results: National Semifinals (Game Two)
Bayless 102, Smith 100
Wow. The absolute game of the tournament. I'm not certain about the final totals; there may be some "undervotes" where I scored a vote as a null where it should have been for one or the other. But I'm certain that this was a close win for Bayless by 2-5 votes.
Someone mentioned Farscape, which reminds me where else I've seen Bayless:
Posted by Mac Thomason at 10:34 AM | Comments (30) | TrackBack
August 25, 2005
Results: National Semifinals (Game One)
Scott 107, Reali 23
While a war rages on in the other semi, Stuart Scott easily handled lower seeded Stat Boy in a matchup that was never close. Will the rest do him good against the winner of the Smith/Bayless duel? Well, since this isn't that sort of tournament, probably not.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:22 AM | Comments (17) | TrackBack
August 23, 2005
Stephen A. Smith vs. Skip Bayless
1. Stephen A. Smith, Champion, Los Angeles Lakers Regional
Defeated Hank Goldberg 78-3
Defeated Paul Maguire 115-26
Defeated Jim Rome, 81-40
Defeated Michael Irvin, 83-15
Versus
2. Skip Bayless, Champion, Duke Blue Devils Regional
Destroyed Kirk Herbstreit 110-8
Obliterated Chris Fowler 110-2
Annihilated Larry Bowa, 90-6
Defeated Jay Mariotti, 69-21
Voting is now closed. Results coming after I compile all these votes.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 12:16 PM | Comments (254) | TrackBack
SportsCentury And Beyond: Skip Bayless
CHRIS FOWLER: I'm Chris Fowler, and welcome to SportsCentury. Of the many, many untelegenic sportswriters ESPN has brought into our homes over the years, few if any have garnered as much attention as Skip Bayless. Words used to describe him include "plastic", "venomous", "rancid", and "satanic". Clearly, Skip Bayless arouses strong feelings. But who, exactly, is Skip Bayless?
JENNY: He should quit the sportswriting business and go to Hollywood to play antagonistic roles in TV movies based on Stephen King novels. He wouldn't need makeup or coaching, and then he'd be confined to channels like Spike and USA, which I never watch anyway.
SKIP BAYLESS: Why are you looking into my background? Who are you working for?
PAT: Judging from what I've seen, heard, and read, Skip Bayless is one of the few people in the world that I truly, genuinely hate. He sucks the soul out of anything remotely enjoyable in the world of sports, and seems to honestly think he's somehow better than we mindless cattle who enjoy and admire things like Lance Armstrong's Tour victories and Steve Young's career.
FOWLER: There are many mysteries in Skip Bayless' life. How old is he? Where was he born? "Skip" can't possibly be his real first name, can it? His biography claims that he was born in Oklahoma and his parents ran a barbecue restaurant in Dallas, but is this really so? All of his birth records were destroyed in a series of mysterious fires.
RICK BAYLESS, "BROTHER": I don't... actually have any memories of growing up with Skip. I know he's my brother, but I don't remember anything about it... It's... strange.
MARGARET BRUNSON, FORMER SIXTH-GRADE SCHOOLTEACHER: I was happy once. Then, one day, there was this child in my class. I knew he had always been there, but...
FOWLER: Small and wizened for his age, the mysterious 13-year-old had no friends, but he liked it that way.
MTVCDM: If I die and go to hell, there will be but one TV. There will be but one sports channel on that TV. And on that one sports channel, Skip Bayless will be screeching, 24 hours a day, for all eternity. And I will ask the demons to cover my ears with some horrific substance to drown him out.
NEWTON: Bayless is soul draining. He makes you want to punch children, just to hear something else other than his whiny, ear splinting voice.
JACK CASEY, CLASSMATE: I didn't really like him, but I always tried to be nice. So I went up to him, being friendly, and yelled at me and said I was obviously on drugs. Okay, I was on ritalin.
SKIP: Jack Casey is a hypocrite and should be shunned by all of humanity.
FOWLER: Skip moved onto high school. Soon afterwards, his elementary school was destroyed in a mysterious fire. He took a job at the school paper.
WILL: Skip Bayless writes and speaks for one purpose only: to amuse himself. It amuses him because he knows that by making statements that make no sense, he can get rises out of other people, from Woody Paige all the way to yours truly.
LARRY ENG, EDITOR: I didn't really want him. He scared me. But he scared everyone. He scared the advisor into making me let him on the staff. I never edited his stuff, I just stuck it in without reading it.
FOWLER: This was a mistake. After his third column, calling for the lynching of the school volleyball team, was published, three students were hospitalized. Larry Eng was sent to juvenile detention, the paper was shut down, the advisor was fired, and yet somehow Skip escaped with no punishment.
ANDY: I think that the only reason Skippy is on so often is to make everyone else look better. While there are many dislikable windbags on ESPN right now, I'd be satisfied with gagging and firing most of them. The problem with Skip is that I'd prefer to see his windpipe crushed and his hands immobilized in concrete to prevent him from ever writing or talking about sports ever again. Perhaps this makes me a bad person, but not only is Skip the type of guy to always discuss the worst about sports, he also brings out the worst in all of the people unfortunate enough to read/hear his stuff.
BRIAN PATTERSON, PRINCIPAL: He convinced me that he was an innocent victim of forces that were out to get him. The same forces that were out to get me. It seems strange, now.
FOWLER: When we return, Skip Bayless becomes a Commodore.
[COMMERCIALS]
FOWLER: When Skip graduated from high school, which soon after burned down in a mysterious fire, he was offered a full scholarship to Vanderbilt University.
SKIP: I was the recipient of the prestigious Fred Russell-Grantland Rice scholarship for sportswriting.
SMITTY: In order to do a good Skip Bayless you have to picture what Grantland Rice or Rick Reilly would say and take away all sense and reason.
NEIL CHESTER, PROFESSOR: It was odd, because it was clear from the beginning that he hated sports and athletes. Well, he hated everything and everyone, but sports especially.
MR. JUCHE: To call Skip Bayless El Diablo is like saying that oxygen is a minor part of the breathing process. It doesn't even come close to adequatedly describing the situation. The human mind has yet to come up with the appropriate words to describe how much I loathe this man. Whenever I see that perpetually scowling scowling creature, it takes all my strength to keep my body from breaking down at the molecular level. He looks like he wants to eat Woody Paige's soul.
JOHN BLOOM, CLASSMATE: I was a year behind Skip; I got the scholarship the next year. All the people at the journalism school were terrified that I might be "like Bayless". I wasn't sure until I read his work.
SKIP: Vandy's sports teams stunk, and I wrote about it, that's all.
BILL PACE, VANDERBILT FOOTBALL HEAD COACH, 1967-72: I was 22-38. Now, that's at Vanderbilt, so it's actually pretty good. Skip Bayless wrote a column claiming that I was a child molester and got me chased out of town.
FOWLER: After raising a mob that burned down the football coach's house, Skip moved on to attacking the basketball, baseball, and track and field coaches.
JAN VAN BREDA KOLFF, CAPTAIN, VANDERBILT BASKETBALL 1973-74: We went 23-5 and won the SEC. Skip Bayless wrote a column saying that we weren't as good as the Knicks.
SKIP: Is he saying that they were as good as the Knicks, now?
CHRIS: He is the '98 Yankees of smarmy writers who hate everything.
BLOOM: I asked him why he wrote about sports if he hated them so much. He... I don't remember much after that.
FOWLER: Skip graduated with honors, though all of his work at Vandy was later destroyed in a mysterious fire. When we return, he begins his professional career.
[COMMERCIALS]
FOWLER: Skip began his sportswriting career with the Miami Herald. His first work was a column claiming that Don Shula had lost it and should be fired.
DON SHULA, HEAD COACH MIAMI DOLPHINS 1970-95: We were 11-3 that year.
SKIP: Yes, but they were 14-0 just two seasons before. He was clearly over the hill.
GREG: Sports through the years, courtesy of Damn Skippy....
"Willie Mays' catch in the 1954 World Series? It stunk! He was clearly out of position before the pitch - a clear sign that he was a loafer who didn't take his defensive assignments seriously. He should've been booed and benched, not glorified and deified."
"John Paxson's NBA Championship-winning jumper? Just proof that Michael Jordan didn't have the balls to take the big shot at crunch time. Michael Jordan ranks #25 on my list of all-time Chicago Bulls, just behind Dennis Hopson and Eric Piatkowski."
FOWLER: After Miami, he moved to Los Angeles, where he's widely credited with increasing Los Angelenos' indifference to sports.
ANTONIO VILLAGROSA, L.A. MAYOR: I am convinced that if it were not for Skip Bayless, we'd still have a football team.
DAN: You know what I would watch? Skip Bayless being mauled by rabid hyenas.
FOWLER: He then returned to Dallas, to write for the Dallas Times-Herald. He soon clashed with local legend Tom Landry.
SKIP: Landry couldn't take the heat is all.
DANNY WHITE, DALLAS COWBOYS QB, 1976-1988: Once, the offensive line had to protect Coach Landry from a mob. I talked to some of the people later, and they said they didn't even remember doing it or how they got there.
FOWLER: In 1991, the Times-Herald ceased publication but Skip moved to the Dallas Morning News.
BILL CARPENTER, EDITOR: We were bought out by the company that owned the Morning News, but Skip really didn't have to burn the building down.
SKIP: It was a Viking funeral.
FOWLER: Skip continued his feud with Landry. He also began a feud with a future local sports legend.
LANCE ARMSTRONG: I was just riding my bike, training, and every day this horrifying spectre would find where I was riding that day and throw things at me as I went by. Once, he threw a live cat.
BRYAN: Skip Bayless seems to be the originator of every stupid sports pundit meme that goes around. I'm convinced he's the source who inspired everyone's "Lance Armstrong is not a great athlete, he's a great endurance athlete" tripe.
FOWLER: Eventually, he moved to Chicago, where he claimed that Michael Jordan was a pansy. He then worked for the San Jose Mercury News where he regularly wrote that Barry Bonds is not only on steroids but is actually a cyborg. When we return, Skip's ramblings come to the attention of ESPN.
[COMMERCIALS]
FOWLER: In its early days, the ESPN program "The Sports Reporters" was sometimes shrill but often entertaining and informative. All that changed when Skip Bayless entered the picture.
CHRIS: I remember in the early '90's when I was in high school and ESPN was fairly enjoyable. I liked watching the Sports Reporters with Dick Schaap. Even though I didn't agree with a lot of the people he had on his show I liked everyone, Mike Lupica, Tony Kornheiser, Bill Conlin, Mitch Albom, Michael Wilbon, William Rhoden, Bob Ryan and so on. It was generally not a shoutfest but a decent discussion of sports with the occasional schtick by Ryan or Kornheiser. One day this all changed, that was the day that this little evil man from some paper in Dallas came on the show and completely slobbered all over Jimmy Johnson and Jerry Jones's nuts while also insulting them.
JEREMY SCHAAP, ESPN: Dad didn't want Bayless on, but the producers did. Well, I say "want", but really he scared them into it.
FOWLER: Somehow, Skip's presence changed "The Sports Reporters". The other panelists began to change as well. Tony Kornheiser stopped paying attention to sports at all. William C. Rhoden talked even slower and made everything about race. Bill Conlin got fatter. Ralph Wiley went insane. Mike Lupica just got more like Mike Lupica.
MIKE LUPICA: Skip convinced me that the public loved me and wanted more of me. There would have been no "Mike Lupica Show" had he not given me confidence.
FOWLER: Somehow convinced that the new direction of "The Sports Reporters" was the way to go, the producers of ESPN approached Skip with a show idea. However, there was no one yet willing to partner with him on a daily basis, so instead "Pardon The Interruption" went on the air with Kornheiser teaming with Michael Wilbon.
MATT: Bayless is the utlimate immovable object, the cliched sports-columnist-as-provacateur whose appearances all over ESPN will be exceeded only by the mass bewilderment among network execs as to the reasons why the Fall of Bristol came so suddenly.
TONY REALI: There was a test done, actually, with him teaming with Lupica. I cried myself to sleep that night. Well, I do that every night, but more than usual.
FOWLER: Soon, there were sportswriters willing, even eager, to work with Skip.
STEPHEN A. SMITH: Skip Bayless is my role model!
WOODY PAIGE: I LOVE SKIP BAYLESS. IF IT WASN'T FOR HIM UNSIGHTLY PEOPLE, LIKE ME, WHO YELL AT EVERYBODY, WOULDN'T HAVE GOTTEN OUR FAIR SHAKE!
FOWLER: When ESPN2 launched a new morning show, "Cold Pizza", it was decided that Skip would take part.
SHARON: What horrible, terrible things did America do to deserve him on our televisions every day? I wouldn't want to punch him because I'm afraid my hand would disintegrate from contact with his face. He's like a radioactive demon, spewing poison through our screens. Satan himself cowers in terror every time a new Skip Bayless column is published.
MARK SHAPIRO, FORMER VP OF PROGRAMMING, ESPN CORPORATE: I figured that listening to Skip Bayless in the morning would wake anyone up!
DELRANDALL: I'm pretty sure you could fund a program to eliminate world hunger forever by offering to let people kick Bayless in the nuts for a dollar each. Why is he still on the air? How much peyote do they eat during those meetings where they decide not to fire this unholy fucktard?
FOWLER: Bayless finally had a true counterpart in Woody Paige. Soon, the two were given their own show, "1st And 10".
MICHAEL POWELL, FORMER HEAD, FCC: When we were considering regulating cable television broadcasts, "1st And 10" was always the first example anyone gave.
SMITTY: On "First and Ten," when Skip has to go three-and-out, wouldn't it be great if they brought in Mr.T to punt Skip?
DJCOLTS: He has a sour lemon-face when he talks. He makes Woody Paige look sympathetic on Cold Pizza. He makes Stephen A. Smith look reasonable in Old School/Nu Skool because he's wrong so often and so obnoxious in his pathetic, whiny arguments (this is a HOF accomplishment in terms of this bracket - no one else can do that - and I'll expand on this in the next round when the real championship will be decided). He makes Dan Shanoff of Daily Quickie fame look like a Pultizer Prize winner compared to his ridiculously lousy columns.
CULT OF BASEBAAL: PRUNE OF E-VIL!
CLAP, CLAP, CLAPCLAPCLAP
PRUNE OF E-VIL!
CLAP, CLAP, CLAPCLAPCLAP
FOWLER: What does the future hold for Skip Bayless? Will his skull pop out of his skin? Will he bring about Armageddon? Will the ESPN facilities in New York burn down mysteriously? Only time will tell. For SportsCentury, I'm Chris Fowler.
-- Mac T.
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance between this work and any events or persons, living or dead, save for the purposes of parody, is coincidental.
Don't vote in this entry. Voting for Smith vs. Bayless starts Tuesday.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 12:02 PM | Comments (10) | TrackBack
August 22, 2005
Even Yahoo knows
Plug in "Skip Bayless", as one person did to reach here and:
Click for a better view.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 05:31 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
SportsCentury And Beyond: Stephen A. Smith
[SportsCentury theme]
CHRIS FOWLER: Hello, I'm Chris Fowler. Not too long ago, few outside Philadelphia had ever heard of Stephen A. Smith. Now, he's a ubiquitous presence on our televisions, our radios, and our lives. Many ask: Who is Stephen A. Smith? What's his problem? Why is he yelling at us?
MATT: ESPN and the media at large have given Smith an amount of influence that far outweighs his ability. His yelling and carrying on is not journalism or even entertainment; it's proof that he needs to be fitted for paper slippers.
FOWLER: Stephen Anthony Smith was born in New York in 1968. From the beginning, the most important organ in his body was his mouth.
FELICIA SMITH, MOTHER: Stephen was always small for his age. I guess it's partially my fault, but he was so busy yelling and screaming all the time that he couldn't shut up long enough to eat.
STEPHEN A. SMITH: These days I don't even bother to eat. I get all of my nutrition through an IV!
DAVID: I swear this guy's on steroids. He's screaming 24/7 and he's always so tensed up and I swear I have never seen this guy laugh or crack a smile. He's on the juice no doubt about it.
FOWLER: Stephen grew up in a nurturing environment in Queens. However, his effusive nature got the better of him.
JANET: One day, I don't know how, he got up on the roof. He was pretending to be Walt Frazier and he tried a crossover move and fell off.
FOWLER: Luckily, no bones were broken, as he hit his head, the hardest part of his body. However, there were consequences.
STEPHEN: Ever since that day I haven't been able to control the volume of my voice!
PHIL: Even if he vowed to never speak another word above a whisper again in his miserable life -- from my keyboard to God's ears, I hope -- I'd still have to vote for Stephen A. Smith for popularizing the newest dance craze that's sweeping the nation -- the Jackass Shuffle.
FOWLER: In classes, Stephen was such a disruptive presence that special measures had to be taken.
ANNE ROGERS, HIGH SCHOOL TEACHER: We all knew that Stephen had some sort of problem with his mouth, but it wasn't fair to the other students. Finally, we locked him in an empty room and taught him through an audio feed. A one-way audio feed.
STEPHEN: I was still loud enough that the teachers were able to hear all of my questions and answers! Ha ha ha!
FOWLER: Stephen took to basketball from an early age. But basketball didn't take to Stephen.
ANTOINE COLES, HIGH SCHOOL TEAMMATE: Man, I know you expect some talking on the court. But Steve just wouldn't shut up at all, and it's really hard to play when your teammate is yelling in your ear the whole time. We finally got coach to bench him.
MIKE WALLACE, COACH: Man, that was a mistake. "Put me in coach, put me in, put me in." Finally I put him in and left him in, I couldn't take sitting next to him any more.
FOWLER: Playing all 32 minutes a game, Stephen soon developed a jump shot but also the knowledge that he could get anything he wanted if he was loud enough. When we return, Stephen goes south.
[COMMERCIALS]
FOWLER: As a joke, his high school coach recommended Stephen to legendary coach Clarence "Big House" Gaines at Winston-Salem State.
GAINES: I'll get him for that someday.
FOWLER: Stephen was an adequate player but Gaines thought him more trouble than he was worth. To the relief of the entire team, Stephen eventually blew out his knee, ending his career.
STEPHEN: I wanted to rehab but the doctors all said that it wasn't worth it. I later found out that all of my teammates paid them to say that!
FOWLER: Searching for a new direction, Stephen soon had an insight.
STEPHEN: I thought, "Everybody says I know how to talk. I'll do television!"
MIKE O.: In a better world, Smith would be lucky to host a radio show in Hicksville, Ohio.
FOWLER: However, television jobs are hard to come by. Stephen needed an in. Soon, a professor would give him an idea.
WALTER BARMAN, WRITING PROFESSOR: I told him that he was a born sportswriter... I meant that as an insult.
FOWLER: Stephen didn't take it that way. Soon, he was working for the Winston-Salem Journal.
KEVIN GRIMES, JOURNAL SPORTS EDITOR: This guy limps into my office, starts yelling, and won't leave until I give him a job. So I called security. But he kept coming back in and eventually it was easier to pay him than to get a restraining order. I had him cover soccer, because it was the lowest sport on the totem pole.
STEPHEN: I know nothing about soccer!
FOWLER: While people didn't like Stephen's work that much, his "attitude" soon got him recognition. He moved to other papers in the southeast, then eventually to the New York Daily News. In 1994, the Philadelphia Inquirer hired him to cover Temple football, which soon angered Temple's most famous alumnus.
BILL COSBY, TEMPLE, 1971: These young sportswriters today with the suits and the yelling and the going on television...
FOWLER: Cosby's repeated letters to the editor did not receive the desired result. Simply to annoy Cosby, the editors promoted Stephen and gave him a more prominent role. When a spot for a columnist opened up, Stephen was ready to pounce, badgering his editor into giving him the job.
JIM JENKS, INQUIRER SPORTS EDITOR: He's a columnist because he has the loudest voice.
CHRIS: Even his column in The Philadelphia Inquirer is loud. And pointless. You can practically hear the inanity screaming at you from the mailbox.
FOWLER: When we return, television beckons.
[COMMERCIALS]
FOWLER: In 1999, Stephen was reportedly hired by a sports network called "CNN/SI", though no record of this network now exists.
AZNEMESIS: God, if only cnnsi had survived, maybe he'd still be in exile there, and David Aldridge would be giving us intelligent NBA commentary on ESPN.
NEWTON: Somebody should have been shot for placing him on TV.
FOWLER: In 2000, he moved to Fox Sports.
TOM ARNOLD, FOX SPORTS, 2001-04: I wanted to have him on "The Best Damn Sports Show Period" because I'm really into irony. I wanted to know if I could make the show as bad as possible while giving it that name. I think I succeeded. And I know a lot of people find Steve annoying, but I found him refreshing. Of course, I used to be married to Roseanne.
FOWLER: An even bigger break would come in summer of 2003.
MARK SHAPIRO, FORMER EXEC VP, ESPN: I was doing some blow in the bathroom at the Espys with Tom Arnold, and his cell phone goes off. Even from across the room, I could hear that voice loud and clear, and I knew I had to hire its owner.
ADAM: Why in the hell is Stephen A. on TV? Because he's a mediocre writer who yells a lot and throws out outrageous ideas to hide his lack of knowledge? What the hell ESPN?
FOWLER: Stephen was hired by ESPN as an NBA analyst, as the network took over NBA coverage under a new contract.
SHAPIRO: My theory is that you should hire people whom the viewers would notice. You can get really good people, I guess, but they're rare and expensive, so I concentrate on hiring annoying people.
STEPHEN: I wasn't sure what ESPN wanted, but Shapiro told me to just be myself. [cries] Nobody ever said that to me before!
FOWLER: Stephen achieved Shapiro's desired result. Everywhere, NBA fans were complaining about ESPN's coverage, and Stephen in particular. Shapiro knew he had what he wanted.
SHAPIRO: Stephen was so annoying that everyone was talking about our coverage. I knew I couldn't sit still, and I had to make an aggressive move.
SHARON: It boggles the mind to think that ESPN higher-ups could listen to him speak for 5 minutes and decide that we need MORE of this guy.
FOWLER: Shapiro wanted to expand Stephen's presence on the network. To do that, someone had to go. He chose ESPN's longtime and well-respected basketball reporter David Aldridge.
SHAPIRO: Sure, he was good, but he wasn't in my face!
PAT: ESPN's NBA coverage was pretty bad before Smith came on, but to replace the only competent commentator with.....that? He also plays the race card and mocks European players' names in the same rant. What a bastard.
DAVID ALDRIDGE, TNT: Mark my words, I will have my revenge.
FOWLER: Smith also began taking part in the famous "Old School/Nu Skool" segments on SportsCenter with Skip Bayless.
SKIP BAYLESS, PANDEMONIUM: Sure, he beats me on a regular basis, but could he beat Lincoln or Douglas? No way.
STEPHEN: I'm just louder!
J. RAUCH: I had the misfortune of turning on the ALLTERRELLOWENSALLTHETIME-Center on Sunday morning right when these two were going to discuss the most talked about story in sports. I thought my head was going to explode.
MATT: Among the endless parade of eardrum-battering shriekers ESPN inflicts upon us, he's right there with Paige as the most obnoxious.
FOWLER: When we return, Stephen talks frankly.
[COMMERCIALS]
FOWLER: After another year of NBA coverage, Shapiro wanted to make Smith even more of a presence on the network. The solution: Stephen's own show, daily, on ESPN2.
CULT OF BASEBALL: The reach of Screamin' A has been spreading more insidiously than the post-war communist plot to sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids.
ANDY: For some inexplicable reason SAS is now one of the main head's of ESPN's evil hydra (Scott, Berman, Vitale, SAS) that is intent of dragging down a network that actually used to give you highlights. ATH and it's brethren are avoidable, particularly if you work during the day, but between those 4 guys there is no escape at night and at big sporting events.
SHAPIRO: At first, I wanted to make it two hours a day, but I was talked down to one. If I'd stayed on, it would have gone to ninety minutes next year.
FOWLER: At first, many thought "Quite Frankly with Stephen A. Smith" must be a joke.
JMONEY: ESPN gave that hunchbacked, Tourette's afflicted, mutant toad his own show? Come on.
FOWLER: But soon, promos were running. This show was actually going to air!
STEPHEN: I knew that I had to say something controversial in the promos, so I said that the New England Patriots are a good team!
TOM BRADY, QB, NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS: Really, Stephen A. Smith thinks we're good? Wow, thank him for me. The three Super Bowl titles in the last four years really weren't enough.
DJCOLTS: I really hate Stephen A.'s promos for Quite Frankly - especially that idiotic little dance he does and the lack of content in them (Gee, the Patriots are good? No Way! Gee, the Lakers aren't going to win the title next year even with Phil Jackson back? No Way! Thanks, Mr. Obvious!).
FOWLER: Also added to the campaign was a glimpse of Smith's dancing skills.
STEPHEN: I am a demon on the dance floor. And that video isn't enhanced at all! I can walk in slow motion!
TODD: I love the part in SAS commercial when he pretends to point to the billboard, and looks at the camera all tough or something. Completely demonstrates what a total tool SAS is. He thinks he does great things when in actuality there's nothing worth pointing to.
JENNY: I was going to watch "Quite Frankly" last night to see what I thought, then realized that the commercial told me all I needed to know. That dance he does makes me want to throw a brick through the screen... Stephen A. Smith is dumb, incoherent, and arrogant as hell. There is nothing I hate more than an arrogant person.
FOWLER: "Quite Frankly" opened to mediocre ratings. But Smith is confident in his eventual success. What's next for Stephen A. Smith? Mark Shapiro has moved on, but is already said to be planning "Stephen A. Smith: The Ride" for an amusement park. A fully automated Stephen A. Smith channel, airing 24 hours a day, is said to be in the works. And an operation may clear up his volume problem.
For SportsCentury, I'm Chris Fowler.
-- Mac T.
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance between this work and any events or persons, living or dead, save for the purposes of parody, is coincidental.
Don't vote in this entry. Voting for Smith vs. Bayless starts Tuesday.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 10:01 AM | Comments (15) | TrackBack
Stuart Scott vs. Tony Reali
1. Stuart Scott
Champion, Yankees/Red Sox Regional
Defeated Scott Van Pelt, 123-8
Defeated John Kruk, 111-35
Defeated Jim Gray, 78-32
Defeated Joe Morgan, 85-51
Versus
6. Tony Reali
Champion, Dallas Cowboys Regional
Defeated Michele Tafoya 78-13
Defeated Mike Tirico 50-34
Defeated Bob Ryan, 60-31
Defeated Dan LeBatard, 72-26
Voting is now closed. Results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 07:12 AM | Comments (133) | TrackBack
August 21, 2005
SportsCentury And Beyond: Tony "Stat Boy" Reali
(SportsCentury intro)
CHRIS FOWLER: I'm Chris Fowler and welcome back to SportsCentury. Over the years, there have been many surprises as to who would become the next 'it' guy at ESPN... the next person to hit it big and suddenly be all over our TV screens. Perhaps none are as undeserving as Tony "Stat Boy" Reali, the host of the wildly unpopular "Around the Horn", as well as the role of Tonto to Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon's Lone Ranger. From his birth in Staten Island, New York in 1978, to his youth at the Christian Brothers Academy in Lincroft, New Jersey, Reali has always seen himself a "playa", but after leaving home in New Jersey, "Stat Boy" found a rocky road to success here at ESPN.
JENNY: How this no-talent company whore got his own show is beyond me, since his only redeeming quality seems to be the ability to put Woody Paige on mute (which is actually pretty redeeming, but still not enough). He thinks he's a big, hot man now (Tony, I am a 17-year-old girl and I will tell you right now that you are a greasy little shitface), leading me to proclaim that Tony Reali is the poster child for a complete ban on Italian immigration for the next century.
CHRIS FOWLER: Staten Island, New York on a hot summer day in 1978.
ANGELA REALI, MOTHER: Tony's father was los-ah. Vic 'The Finger' Reali was a capo in the Gambino crime family and was constantly bringing guns, whores and laundered money into the house. I was like, "yo, Vic, lil' Tony is trying to get some of my breast here, can you keep the noise down with da' whores? Anyway, Vic then beat the crap outta me and I took Tony and his sister Mary Theresa and his other sister, Mary Angela and we left to stay with my cousins in Lincroft, New Jersey.
TONY REALI: I don't remember my fadda too much. I just remember one time when I was a kid seeing "Goodfellas" and my mom said that the movie was like real life used to be for her. She was like Lorraine Bracco in that movie married to Ray Liotta; I thought... "cool... can I meet dad and be like him?" She then smacked me upside the head and that night, my uncles Luigi and Nicky took me to my very first Yankees game.
FOWLER: But despite his mother's fierce love for her son, and the family's desperate protection of little Tony from his criminal father in New York and his crime family, the mix of sports & crime was very confusing and also very powerful for little Tony Reali. However, the one thing that trumped both crime & sports... the love of STATS. Hence his nickname in the schoolyard of "Stat Boy".
TEACHERREFPOET: He was the guy who told the starting QB what to do, so the athletes hated him. But then, he was too mean to hang with the nerds, too eager-to-be-liked to be a rebel... Nobody liked him. So he spends his life telling people "you're wrong" and "shut up."
MIKEY PALMEIRI, CHILDHOOD BULLY: Yeah, one day we saw Tony in the schoolyard sitting by a tree with a sports section counting Baseball statistics and we thought it was like the gayest thing we'd ever seen. So me and my boys, Chad Laranza & Jimmy Altieri, we beat little Tony within an inch of his life and sent him to the hospital. After that, we affectionately called him Stat Boy. What a los-ah.
PAT: Humorous though it may be to see him get so many of his "corrections" incorrect on PTI, the guy seems to take himself entirely too seriously while being a total jackass. He is therefore deserving of all the punchings/beatings/maulings that others have suggested.
ANGELA REALI, MOTHER: I was so scared. I didn't have health insurance and little Tony was in ICU for three straight days. His sisters read him Yankee statistics from the New York Times but it seemed like nothing was going to work. That's when a miracle happened... Tony's HERO Dick Vitale came on TV covering that March Madness thing and when he started screaming, Tony's eyes opened.
DICK VITALE: TONY REALI... AKA STAT BOY, STAT MAN... WHAT A PTP'ER, BABY! WHEN HE CAME TO BRISTOL THE FIRST TIME AND TOLD ME THAT I HELPED HIM WAKE UP FROM A COMA WHEN HE WAS TEN...WHAT AN INSPIRATION, BABY!!! OH MY GOD... I IMMEDIATELY CALLED MY FRIENDS COACH K AND DEAN SMITH AND THEY WERE SO TOUCHED. LITTLE TONY REALI HAD TOUCHED OUR HEARTS.
TONY REALI: I loved Dicky V... and between my love for numbers and my love for da Yankees, I knew I had to get on ESPN one day. It was my dream. And besides my love of Dicky V, my boyhood hero was absolutely Donny Baseball.
DON MATTINGLY: Tony used to come to Yankee Stadium all the time and unlike the other kids who wanted my autograph, he asked me to call him Stat Boy and wanted to talk about my on base percentage. Frankly, I thought he was bit creepy and for a kid who had been beaten senseless, he sure was cocky & arrogant.
MIKE: Reali is simply a no-talent punk. I don't begrudge people who are in the right place at the right time. I do begrudge them when they have that look of smugness on their face. Reali is the non-presidential embodiment of the line "born on third, he thinks he got a triple."
COMMERCIALS
CHRIS FOWLER: The question to ask was, 'is Tony Stat Boy Reali a survivor'? For a while it seemed like he knew what his future plans were. But somewhere along the way, his plans got derailed.
TONY'S SISTER, MARY ANGELA: Tony was okay until he was fifteen or so, when the pain from the constant beatings made him turn to drugs.
ANGELA REALI: I finally kicked that little weasel out for using in the house.
CHRIS FOWLER: After Tony's mother kicked him out of the house for using, Tony turned to the mean streets of New York to help his habit along. It was there that Tony befriended a pimp named Marcus Jackson who would bring Tony's life to a screeching halt.
[COMMERCIALS]
LINDA COHN: When I had heard the stories that Stat Boy was a street hustler, I couldn't believe it. At first I felt great sadness for his life but then I thought about my home life and how busy my husband always is with those late nights in the city with his 22 year old Secretary, Ginger, and I wondered if Tony would consider an employee discount for me? I mean, after all, we were colleagues now and when he was an Intern, I certainly never made him go back 3 times in one day to Starbucks like Wilbon and Kornheiser.
CHRIS FOWLER: Marcus Jackson, aka 'New York Nasty', was a 25 year old pimp, born and raised in Harlem when he befriended Reali on the streets of New York, as Reali had been trying to score some coke. Jackson became fascinated by Reali's love of Baseball stats and was also a huge Mattingly fan like Stat Boy. Jackson decided he would take Reali under his wing and teach him the ropes. He figured he could use a kid like him.
REALI: I remember thinking that New York Nasty was my new hero. He said all the right things, he was smooth... a real 'playa'. I won't talk about the things I did with him in the first year, but needless to say that after a few months with Marcus, I became open to hustling men & women. I needed the money to support my drug habits.
DAVID: What a wanka.
MARK SHAPIRO, VP OF PROGRAMMING, ESPN CORPORATE: I will never forget the day... August 15th, 1997. I was in my limo with Boomer, and we had just gone on a binge at the Plaza with Danny, Linda & Pat Riley and we were headed back to Bristol when I saw this young, slick looking Italian kid trying to hustle an older couple for money, sex... who knows. Anyway, I was fascinated with his 'wanna be a playa' look & attitude and with the rise of Stu Scott at the network, this is exactly the kind of NEW face I wanted out there for ESPN.
REALI: So Shapiro and Berman come rollin' up in this phat white limo, just unreal... and I thought, these guys were loaded...a real cash cow opportunity. Plus, I knew Marcus was watching from across the street so I was looking for the biggest score of my lifetime. Anyway, i peer in the limo and I see this overweight, sweaty, familiar face and low & behold, it's Chris freaking Berman. I flashed back to childhood and remembered my dream of being on ESPN and maybe one day, doing stats. My life changed.
CHRIS BERMAN: I will never forget the first time I met Tony Reality "TV" or Tony "n Tina" Reali... Mark (Shapiro) invites him inside the limo and all of a sudden, we hear shots firing. Reali starts screaming "Oh my God, it's Marcus, it's Marcus" -- Reali's pimp -- and Mark bangs his half empty scotch bottle on the window and tells the limo driver to make a break for it. That was the day ESPN met Tony "Stat Boy" Reali.
TODD: Before he became statboy, Tony was known as whoreboy - the man who gave Mark Shapiro hand jobs behind the dumpster at Bristol. He was given a job in PTI just to keep him close to the dumpster without security getting suspcious. When Max left ATH Shapiro needed someone whose natural talents could allow them to work four joysticks in an up and down motion all the while getting yelled at. Thus Stat boy was given a new line of work. the rest was as Shapiro would lead us to believe, television magic. . .
[COMMERCIALS]
CHRIS FOWLER: Mark Shapiro and Chris Berman may have saved Tony Reali from the mean streets of New York City, but life was not immediately easy for this kid from Clifton, New Jersey. Reali had to prove himself as an intern and writer and in 2000, he got his first real break at ESPN after 2 1/2 years of fetching coffee: writing for ESPN's "2 minute drill".
REALI: We all gotta start somewhere but it was my love of getting things right and also being a total wise-ass that garnered me attention while writing "2 Minute Drill". The following Summer, Shapiro announced a new program would begin appearing in the Fall of 2001 called "Pardon the Interruption". Mark wanted me to be the sidekick on the show for Wilbon & Kornheiser, but that too was not an easy road.
JEREMY MILLER, GROWING PAINS: I received a call from several executives at ESPN who were interested me in the role of 'Stat Boy', a wise-ass sidekick to Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon on "Pardon The Interruption". I was so excited... this was going to be my first break since "growing Pains" had ended and was desperate for the work. I mean, I had been cut down to three shifts a week at the Santa Monica Pottery Barn and really needed the money.
TONY REALI: What I did to Jeremy Miller shows me to be a true playa in the business but it also was another low point for me. However, I got the job of Stat Boy and have never looked back.
WILL: How he managed to get himself on TV is beyond me - he seems more suited for Reality (sorry about the pun in there) TV or Stupid Human Tricks or something like that.
FOWLER: On August 2nd, 2001, Jeremy Miller indeed called into ESPN to set up his interview with the higher ups at the network. Little did he know that when he called the cable sports giant, he reached none other than Tony Reali.
MILLER: So Reali tells me the location of the interview has changed to 98th Street in Harlem at this old warehouse. I thought it was kinda strange but I didn't think anything of it. Anyway, I drove down in my new Tercel and proceeded to get jumped by several gang members. They beat me, took my wallet and clothes and car and I was left for naked and dead in the middle of Harlem. Needless to say, I never made the interview and Tony Reali became Stat Boy.
REALI: Hey, Jeremy, don't hate the playa, hate the game... I played you and I am the prince of ESPN.
COLIN HESSE: This is a man who is, quite honestly, the worst analyst/poser I have ever seen. I know people like him, who have that same arrogant smirk plastered on their face, who continually talk down to people, and who accepts Woody Paige's ramblings as pure gold.
JOEY T: Reali isn't funny. He isn't smart. He isn't articulate, nor is he creative... Reali has no skill at all.
MICHAEL WILBON, CO-HOST, PARDON THE INTERRUPTION: Truth be told, I was a huge "Growing Pains" fan and was excited to work with Ben Seaver of all people! Not to mention that Alan Thicke was a personal friend of mine so Reali created a real mess. It's ancient history now but I still think back and wonder what the show could have done with Jeremy Miller in the role of Stat Boy.
TIM: I am still at a loss to discern how in the world he got his position.
MIKE O: I simply have no idea how Reali got the 'job' as Stat-Boy, and has somehow parlayed it into a regular hosting job on an incredibly gimpy show. He seems absolutely talentless.
[COMMERCIALS]
FOWLER: Tony now made an even more dramatic move.
MAX KELLERMAN: If it wasn't bad enough that Reali screwed my boy, Jeremy Miller, then that little Italian Kid from New York claimed to be my 'boy', then he turned around and screwed me... He got me fired from "Around the Horn" and took that job, as well.
ALEX: Kellerman was a clown, but at least he knows something about boxing. I've yet to see any evidence that Stat Boy knows anything about anything.
WOODY PAIGE: YES... IT WAS A SHOCK TO ALL OF US WHEN MAX LEFT 'AROUND THE HORN'. I ASKED SHAPIRO WHAT THE HELL WAS GOING ON AND WHY THE HELL REALI WAS GOING TO HOST? HE BASICALLY CONFIDED IN ME THAT KELLERMAN HAD SLEPT WITH HIS DAUGHTER, WHICH TURNED OUT BE ANOTHER LIE SPREAD BY REALI.
JIMBOHANNA: Anyone who can sit there and say "good point Woody Paige" with a straight face and not put a ice pick thru his eye as Paige rambles incoherently is in a class by himself. Why sportswriters would put up with this intern is beyond me.
MARTIN: Somehow ESPN managed to give a show to a guy who's going to be a car salesman in a couple of years.
FOWLER: Apparently that wasn't the only thing spread, according to Reali.
REALI: I may have possibly told Mark that Kellerman gave his daughter Stacy syphilis. In retrospect, that was very very wrong. Very wrong, but look at me now... I am the host of 'Around the Horn' baby so I guess the ends really do justify the means!
JASON: Stat Boy is a preening little bitch.
MARK SHAPIRO: in hindsight, I have come to realize that Reali is a liar and an opportunist... the fact that he came from the streets hustling should have been my first indication. But even after I found out this it was Reali who gave Stacy syphilis, I still find the guy to be exactly the kind of personality we are looking for here at ESPN.
GAVIN: He's tall, awkward, lacks any style, and tries to be funny while talking loudly to a group of morons whose combined sports intelligence rivals my stool.
CHRIS FOWLER: History has shown Tony "Stat Boy" Reali to be a survivor. From his birth as a mob baby, to his days of being savagely beaten on the playground in Clifton, New Jersey, to the days of street hustling, and finally to his weird journey as "Stat Boy" on PTI and eventually, the new permanent host on "Around the Horn", Tony "Stat Boy" Reali remains the kid who saw Donny Baseball at Yankee Stadium, and the kid who one day hopes to be Stat Man.
For SportsCentury, I'm Chris Fowler.
-- Alex R.
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance between this work and any events or persons, living or dead, save for the purposes of parody, is coincidental. If you think this is bad, you should see the unexpurgated version ("Too hot for the web!")
Don't vote in this entry. Voting for Scott vs. Reali starts Monday.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 02:50 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
August 20, 2005
Schedule for this week
Sunday, midday: Tony Reali SportsCentury
Monday, morning: Voting opens on Scott vs. Reali
Monday, midday: Stephen A. Smith SportsCentury
Tuesday, morning: Skip Bayless SportsCentury
Tuesday, midday: Voting opens on Smith vs. Bayless
Thursday morning: Voting closed on Scott vs. Reali, results posted
Friday morning: Voting closed on Smith vs. Bayless, results posted
Posted by Mac Thomason at 12:21 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
SportsCentury And Beyond: Stuart Scott
[SportsCentury intro]
CHRIS FOWLER: I'm Chris Fowler, and welcome to SportsCentury. Many people have come into our homes through the television over the years, but few have been as pervasive as Stuart Scott. This hard-luck graduate of the University of North Carolina has, through hard work and bootlicking, parlayed moderate talent into a career as one of the nation's best-known sportscasters.
FOWLER: Stu Scott was born in Chicago in 1968.
NEWTON: Did you know that Stuart Scott's voice is a major cause of mental retardation if listened to by pregnant mothers?
SHEILA SCOTT, MOTHER: I think I knew that there was something different about Stuart from the beginning. All babies cry, but it seemed like he had three or four cries which he would use over and over.
STUART SCOTT: Man, Chicago was cold as the other side of the pillow at the North Pole. So we moved to North Carolina. Peace!
FOWLER: In North Carolina, Stu would face many challenges.
DAN: Let me run a bit by you that lets you in on a little bit about the credibility of this faux-soul brother. On his appearances on VH1's "I Love The 80s," he fessed up that his sister grew up loving Barry Manilow. Now, call me crazy, but this shows how un-street Stuey's upbringing is: I've never heard any Barry Manilow in the 'hood.
SHEILA: I told him not to make faces, that it would get stuck like that. He never listened.
FOWLER: It did get stuck like that. However, Stuart would soon meet someone who would have a special place in his heart for all his life.
MICHAEL JORDAN: I was playing pickup ball, just me and some of the guys. Suddenly, this weird-looking little kid started imitating my moves, or trying to, and when the game was over he followed me home. Dad had to chase him off with a broom, but he kept coming back.
STUART: Yo, me and Mike, we tight.
FOWLER: Stu had troubles in high school.
MAY JOHNSON, SCHOOLTEACHER: Stuart was actually fairly bright, as far as I can tell, but he was a real troublemaker. I'm used to some rowdy students, but he was the only one I know who mostly did the same six things over and over.
GREG JONES, FRIEND: Stu had troubles with girls, too. He'd always go up to them, all confident, but as soon as they got a glimpse of that crazy eye of his they'd all laugh. Or throw up.
STUART: Playa please! All the girls, they wanted a piece of this. Word!
FOWLER: When we come back, the Scotts get cable, and Stuart finds his calling.
[COMMERCIALS]
FOWLER: In 1982, the seventeen-year-old Stuart's life would be changed as his family got cable television for the first time, and Stu would find his role model.
BERMAN: I'm his role model? I'm sorry, I have to go, I have to think some things over.
STUART: I saw Chris on TV, doing his thing, making up nicknames, and I knew that was what I wanted to do. My first catchphrase was something my baby sister used to call me.
SKIP: "Booyah." A man defined by a word that is not even a real word must be stopped in our lifetime.
JONES: I told him, look at SportsCenter, you see anybody who looks like you on there? No, I wasn't talking about race, I was talking about the eye thing.
STUART: Don't hate the playa, hate the game.
BILLT: I don't hate the playa. I just hate you, fuckface.
FOWLER: Stuart enrolled at the University of North Carolina in fall of 1983, and studied speech communications.
MATT: We get it Stu, you went to North Carolina and Michael Jordan went there, too.
WAYNE CARVER, PROFESSOR: Stuart was mostly interested in gimmicks, actually. He figured that there were thousands of communications students out there and only a few really good jobs. I told him talent and professionalism would win out, but he was sure that the way to go was to find a schtick and work it hard. I didn't think that would work... Shows what I know.
FOWLER: After graduating in 1987, Stuart worked a string of jobs in the southeast, reporting the news in Florence, SC and Raleigh. In 1990, he became a sports reporter in Orlando. But in 1993, he would get his big break.
KEITH OLBERMANN: ESPN was launching ESPN2, and the lead program was going to be "SportsNight", with me and Suzy Kolber. My god, what was I thinking?
FOWLER: Stuart was hired to do the "SportSmash" highlights segments during the show.
STUART: I knew the Deuce was s'posed to be hip, urban, you know, y'all? So I start throwing stuff in, the catchphrases and the lingo, and soon 'nough, they put me on the anchor desk.
OLBERMANN: "Anchor", like a heavy thing that weighs you down.
FOWLER: While "SportsNight" was obviously doomed, Scott's star was rising. More when we return.
[COMMERCIALS]
FOWLER: Stu Scott's work on the dying ESPN2 show "SportsNight" was getting him attention. One of those paying attention to the network's new star was an ESPN2 assistant producer.
MARK SHAPIRO, EXEC VP, ESPN: I saw this guy, energetic, polarizing, and I knew that if one day I ran a network, I'd put him on it. Constantly. In everything.
FOWLER: "SportsNight" was soon cancelled, but Stuart, as always, landed on his feet, working the late night "SportsCenter" with Rich Eisen.
RICH EISEN, ESPN 1996-2003: Stu's a nice guy, will do anything to help you out, really. It's just that the most dangerous place on Earth is between him and a camera.
BOB: He came in with Eisen and Ravech, who are good sportscasters but Stu is the only one left on Sportscenter....WHY????
EY: I have hated Stuart Scott since the first day his faux-gangster ass appeared on SportsCenter, beginning a painful decline that seems to have no lower bound.
FOWLER: Stuart soon established his own style, which sometimes led to criticism.
STUART: You don't hear anyone describing Rich Eisen as doing his 'Jewish guy-from-Long Island schtick.' Can I get a witness from the congregation?
GERRY MATALON, ESPN PRODUCER: Athletes really dig Stuart. He talks the language of the kids. He brings that attitude. He's opened up a lot of doors.
JORDAN: Sometimes it's nice to have an interviewer lob you softballs, and I can't talk to Ahmad Rashad all the time.
FOWLER: The old guard at "SportsCenter" was leaving. Craig Kilborn and Keith Olbermann left for talk shows on other networks, and Dan Patrick scaled back his involvement. Into their vacancy, a new breed of "SportsCenter" anchor emerged, and Stu Scott would be their leader.
JASON: Essentially, Stuart Scott replaced Keith Olberman. Has there been a worse sequel since The Godfather III?
MIKE O: He is the face of today's E$PN, and he and his ludicrous 'style' have made the network absolutely unwatchable for any but the most simpleminded and drooling.
LINDA COHN, ESPN 1992-PRESENT: I'd been on the show for awhile, and it was nice but I wasn't getting the attention I wanted. I saw Stu was getting traction with that hip-hop stuff, and I started trying that out, though I really don't understand it. Also, I had some work done.
STUART: I don't mind the imitators, dawg. 'Long as I get a cut.
MIKE: When I was in high school and college (1990-98), I rarely missed the Sunday night SportsCenter. In college, I'd watch it 4 times on monday morning, too. It was the unofficial way to cap off a sports week. Stu ruined all that. I haven't watched the Sunday SportsCenter in years. His lame, tired, faux-street cred act is embarassing to watch. He is the living embodiment of all that is wrong with the Worldwide Leader.
FOWLER: In 2002, disaster struck. Stu was hit in the face with a football at New York Jets training camp. He suffered a detached retina. He needed surgery to repair it, but soon was back, more ubiquitous than ever.
STUART: Some people are really surprised when I tell them my eye was always like this. But you gotta be strong. I knew I had to come back even stronger, like I never was away.
FOWLER: When we return, Stuart takes over our dreams.
[COMMERCIALS]
FOWLER: Mark Shapiro, meanwhile, rose to the top at ESPN. Sports was the networks' drawing card, but Shapiro was bored with this, and felt that ESPN needed to find other things to do. Taking a lead from MTV, he knew what this had to be: reality game shows.
LARRY: To think of the days when ESPN filled time not with "ESPN Hollywood," but with Australian Rules Football and other, well, sports. Where have they gone?
SHAPIRO: It's all competition, right? I looked around ESPN, and thought about getting an outside host, but really, there was only one man who could host "Dream Job".
50POUNDHEAD: Scott's voice and approach should be limited to video games about monster truck rallies.
STUART: And the Lord said, 'You got to rise up!
WOODY PAIGE: I WOULD NEVER HAVE GIVEN A PASSING GRADE TO SOMEONE LIKE STUART SCOTT!!!!!
DAVID: If you're a college student, here's a fun Stu Scott game for you: go to a party-- the kind of party where you walk in the door and the host says, "Hey man, jello shots or dynamite keg?" Now, at around 2 AM, strike up a conversation with a really drunken frat boy. I guarantee you he'll be more entertaining and yet also more informative than Scott.
FOWLER: Hosting "Dream Job" was only part of Stuart's duties.
PHIL: Stuart Scott is wreaking havoc on SportsCenter, Stump the Schwab, Teammates, DreamJob, and probably 10,000 other projects conceived in Mark Shapiro's awful fever dreams. And the second: I heard an interview once on the local sports talk radio station with Stu in which he discussed how he came up with catchphrases the way a Nobel laureate might talk about how he invented a new form of rocket fuel.
FOWLER: He hosted "Monday Night Countdown" with Michael Irvin.
STUART: He's a gangsta.
IRVIN: Flarph nangle cokle. Stok tusin reebleprowser! Ha ha!
FOWLER: "Stump The Schwab", with The Schwab.
HOWIE SCHWAB: I still can't believe I'm on TV.
FOWLER: He did sideline reporting at the NBA Finals.
JIM GRAY: I was talking to Kobe earlier, and he thinks that Stuart Scott is a worse sideline reporter than me.
GAVIN: Random NBA sideline bit, "Yo, booyah, talkin' to my g Ben Wallace and was like, bam, how bout that defense and he was all right back at ya, give me a fist bump!"
FOWLER: And movie roles.
LINDSAY LOHAN: Stuart made me laugh when he was on the set. Of course, I was totally wasted.
FOWLER: Even an "ESPN: The Magazine" column.
RIP: Mr Scott's espn the magazine column is written in 20 seconds.
FOWLER: What does the future hold for Stu Scott? Well, Mark Shapiro is gone, but the odds are that ESPN will add more game shows, and more reality shows, and more "original entertainment programming". And Stu Scott will always be there to add his own special je ne sais quois. For "SportsCentury", I'm Chris Fowler.
-- Mac T.
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance between this work and any events or persons, living or dead, save for the purposes of parody, is coincidental.
Don't vote in this entry. Voting for Scott vs. Reali starts Monday.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 12:03 PM | Comments (11) | TrackBack
Cutting Down the Nets: Duke Blue Devils Regional
Bayless 69, Mariotti 21
Jay Mariotti garnered more votes than all of Skip Bayless' previous opponents combined, but still wasn't able to stand in the way of the Bayless Express. Stephen A. Smith gets the next crack at it.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 10:33 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
August 19, 2005
Cutting Down The Nets: Dallas Cowboys Regional
Reali 72, LeBatard 26
Dan LeBatard's campaign for votes in the last round backfired on him, as many held it against him, helping propel Stat Boy to an easy victory and a Final Four berth against Stuart Scott.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 01:00 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
August 18, 2005
Thank you, Danny!
ESPN.com - GEN - Programming exec Shapiro to leave ESPN
Mark Shapiro, ESPN executive vice president of programming and production, will leave Oct. 1 to become CEO of Red Zone, LLC, a private investment company focused on entertainment properties, founded by Washington Redskins owner Daniel Snyder.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 11:05 AM | Comments (7) | TrackBack
Cutting Down The Nets: LA Lakers Regional
Smith 83, Irvin 15
Stephen A. Smith continues to cruise, easily wiping out Michael Irvin, who had won his previous matchups by an average of 78-16. Smith does that little dance of his into the Foul Four, where he is expected to meet Skip Bayless in what's generally considered the "real" final.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 09:13 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Skip Bayless vs. Jay Mariotti
2. Skip Bayless
Destroyed Kirk Herbstreit 110-8
Obliterated Chris Fowler 110-2
Annihilated Larry Bowa, 90-6
The Latest Word:
"The man is pure evil and would boo at the Special Olympics." -- Todd
"Such a venomous, evil little man with the plastic face. Oh Skippy, let us count the ways we hate thee. On second thought, let's not, you aren't worth spending any time on. The sooner you curl up and die from your own poison, the better." -- John in Austin
"Here is an alleged journalist who is so jaded in his hatred that he can't even begin to be partial and level-headed. Terrell Owens is scum, yes, but to say that JERRY PORTER is a better wide receiver than Terrell Owens is pure madness. He's on the level as Mel Webb, the sportswriter who left Ted Williams completely off his MVP ballot when he won his second triple crown, purely out of personal hatred. Skip works the same way. What next? Hating Larry Bird to the point where you place him on the same level of player as Rick Robey? Placing Gary Sheffield's hitting abilities on the same level as Buddy Biancalana's? Skip Bayless is a urinalist, not a journalist. He is also on heroin. Clearly. Vote - Bayless. Let the lynching continue." -- Greg
"There is absolutely no way only 5 people think Bayless is the devil." -- Delrandall
"Skip, I'd like to bash you across the head with this flaming crowbar covered in wasps. How do you feel about that?
"'That would be a very bad idea. I am opposed to you hitting me with that.'
"Oh, you're opposed to everything! (THUD)" -- Mtvcdm
"I disagree that he's Satan, though. He's not smart enough to lead a rebellion against God. He's not smart enough to lead a rebellion against a maitre'd." -- Devin McCullen
"He looks like one of those people that turned into aliens from hell in "The Tommyknockers." A face made for radio, except his voice is made for mime, so that won't work. Here we go: a human being made for being confined to an outhouse in central Siberia, where he will hopefully be eaten by wolves and disappear into the permafrost. Anybody who can make Woody Paige look witty and engaging deserves to win." -- Jenny
"Todd said, above, that Bayless would boo at the Special Olympics. I think Bayless would LOSE at the Special Olympics." -- Ed
"If ESPN replaced Skippy with a steaming pile of monkey sh!t that looked suspiciously like Satan, would anyone know the difference?" -- Gavin
"Imagine if you had a gallon of milk ... and you left that gallon in the fridge long past expiration and it went wrong, turning rancid and sour, with floating curds of green bitterness, hairy with mold, wrong with a smell like that of a corpulent frenchman in a Parisian Bistro during a sweltering August, an olfactory abbatoir of sour sweat, cheap cloying perfume, the bitter reek of stale cigarettes and last week's coffee.
"Now imagine that after you discarded this repulsifying horror in the garbage, your dog, being a dog, came sniffing around to find out what delicacy could ever smell so sweet.
"Now imagine that poor Fido, though gifted with a stomach lining rivaling that of your local community dumpster, found himself overcome by the concentrated vileness of the awful meal and had no choice but vomit it forth, a bitter stream of half -digested rankness: green, hairy, foul curds, half-digested tissues of phlegm from the bathroom wastebasket that you coughed up this morning from your 3-pack-a-day lungs, turds from that cute pekinese down the street with the ass that smells like summertime in Rangoon, and a half-eaten twinky that rolled under the couch during the World Series last year, forgotten to collect dust, dog hair, mites and other microscopic vermin.
"Now imagine a fly, born from a maggot lucky enough to have supped upon the veritable bounty of this stomache-churning vileness, NAY! lucky enough to have SWUM in the most nauseating of abhorrencies, steeped in assorted disgusting essences, infused with the rankness and wrongness of each and every one. Imagine this fly, after soaking in the multitude of indecencies that gave it strength, flying from local epicurean delight to delight, from the rotting corpse of a rat that died of poison behind the garage, to assorted and sundry dog, cat and hobo droppings, to the dumpster behind the old folks home filled with medical waste and bed pan drippings, and back again.
"Now imagine that fly, filled with everything that came before, cruising serenely overhead and letting fly a filthy turd, which hurtled through the ether with a purpose, like a divine bolt of retribution from Zeus on high, and struck you straight between the eyes.
"THAT TURD, that concentrated quintessence of rotted, bitter, rancid, vomit-shit, fouler than Karl Rove's conscience on a dark and stormy night, THAT TURD has the same revolting composition as our dear Skippy's soul.
"AND THAT TURD, that teeny-tiny dropping, smaller than the resevoir of common sense in Bud Selig's over-taxed cranium, indeed, so minute as to strain the capacities of human perspicacity, THAT TURD can only be compared to the shrunken size of our dear Skippy's heart." -- Cult of Basebaal
"Skip embodies everything bad in sports journalism, distills it to its most purely rancid form, and then drags it down to the 9th circle of Hell, where it's promptly regurgitated into the mass media and beamed at the speed of light into my home. He's gotten me to the point that I cringe every time I see a column heading on ESPN.com, and I just can't read any of their content any more, save Gammons and Pasquarelli. Godammit Skip, I hate you." -- Pat F.
Versus
5. Jay Mariotti
Defeated Buster Olney, 84-20
Defeated Beano Cook, 81-12
Defeated Dick Vitale, 73-41
The Latest Word:
"The worst guest on the worst show on T.V." -- Smitty
"I don't even watch Mariotti on TV, just seeing his picture in the Sun-Times next to his columns is enough for me to want to punch him in the face, and that's before I get to his god-awful writing." -- Chris
"I for one don't want to punch Marriotti in the face. I want to hit him with a rake." -- Herman
"Should be a prime candidate for involuntary euthanasia." -- Brad
"A hate-spewing gerbil. If a tiger found its way into the Chicago Sun-Times building and mauled him during a taping of ATH, the footage would warm my heart." -- Mike
"Mariotti, it might also be pointed out, loves no-one other than himself. If he were made of chocolate he'd eat himself in fact. Even by Around the Horn's low standards, he is the worst polllutant on the show. If the EPA had any balls he'd have been outlawed by now." -- Alex
"It bothers me so much that so many of these ESPN talking heads hate sports so much. I mean, why do it if you hate everything about it? Mariotti is one of the worst, I can't remember the last time I heard him say something positive about anything sports-related." -- Sharon
"Deserves to be locked in a room with angry midgets. I don't know why, but the thought of that is really therapeutic." -- Gavin
"An asshole who thinks he is the moral compass of the sports universe. I want to cut of his fingers and feed them to Piranhas so that he can never type again." -- Elm Tree
Voting is now closed. Results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:43 AM | Comments (117) | TrackBack
Regional Final Preview: (2) Skip Bayless vs. (5) Jay Mariotti
VOICEOVER (This awful screeching, annoying one): "Welcome to Arounnnnnnd The Horrrrrn... here's your host, TONY REALI."
TONY REALI: "Welcome to 'Around the Horn'... on today's show our panelists discuss the final match-up for the 'Egregious Eight', more arguing on the steroid scandal, take sides on the continuing saga of T.O. & Andy Reid, discuss whether Phil Mickleson is wearing a 'manssiere' on the PGA Tour, whether even a shorts-clad Jessica Simpson could distract the Red Sox and a possible reuniting of Pedro Martinez and his famed midget friend.
But first, here are our panelists, The Chicago Sun Times' Jay Mariotti..."
JAY MARIOTTI: "I get to comment on my own match-up? Oh, this is too good... but watch out Paige... now you won't be able to handle me twice -- HA!"
REALI: J.A. Adande of The Los Angeles Times...
J.A.ADANDE: "Phil Jackson & Kobe Bryant or Skip Bayless and our own Jay Mariotti... hmmm... which really is the more lethal combination?"
REALI: "Also from The Los Angeles Times, Bill Plaschke!"
BILL PLASCHKE: "Oh, Mariotti, Paige isn't the only one who's been waiting to smack you down. And just to help, I brought this ouija board (lifts ouija board) to see if you have a chance in hell against the Bayless juggernaut!"
REALI: And finally, Mariotti's mortal enemy himself, the wood-man, Woody Paige, live from New York..."
WOODY PAIGE: "I AM HERE TO SCREAM, RANT, TESTIFY AND TEAR DOWN MY MORTAL ENEMY, JAY MARIOTTI. HOWEVER, YOU PEOPLE FORGET... I AM ALSO UNIQUELY QUALIFIED TO RIP APART MY 'COLD PIZZA' CO-HORT, SKIP BAYLESS... OH, MAN... THIS IS GONNA BE MORE FUN THAN SHOOTIN' FISH IN A BARREL!"
REALI: "Ok, gentlemen, the first topic of discussion is indeed the 'Egregious Eight' where our very own Jay Mariotti, fresh off his stunning victory over top seed Dick Vitale will try to pull his 2nd stunning upset in a row as he takes on the #2 seed and now-tournament favorite, Skip Bayless. Guys... can our fair-haired Mariotti really defeat the Cold Pizza monster, Skip Bayless? Mariotti... we'll start with you."
MARIOTTI: "Reali... this isn't even a contest. I mean, C'MON... I just took out a #1 seed and tournament favorite, Dick Vitale (+1 point)...I will walk away with this match-up. Skip Bayless is a joke. (-1)"
REALI: "Mariotti... Bayless has just destroyed three opponents in a row."
MARIOTTI: "Whatever, Reali. You're just jealous (-1)"
REALI: "Uh, Mariotti, I also made the 'Egregious Eight'"
WOODY PAIGE: "LOOK, ENOUGH OF THIS CRAP. YOU BOTH ARE IN THE EGREGIOUS 8 BUT MARIOTTI, YOU ARE GOING DOWN. HELL, HALF THE PEOPLE OUT THERE THINK I AM JUST AS OBNOXIOUS AS YOU (+1) AS YOU AND YET I'M ALREADY OUT... PUH-LEASE! PEOPLE ONLY WANT TO PUNCH YOU IN THE FACE...THAT'S NUTHIN'! I MEAN, AT LEAST 5 PEOPLE HAVE AT LEAST REFERRED TO MY COLD PIZZA BUDDY AS SATAN. (+1)... SATAN EASILY CAN OUT-DISTANCE FACE PUNCHING (+1)."
PLASCHKE: "No contest...I am with the Wood-man on this one, Marriotti. Vitale clearly isn't as hated as we all thought and seeing that no one has even managed double digits against Bayless (+3) so what makes you think you will do any better? You're going down!"
REALI: "Another good point, Plaschke. Adande, last word?"
ADANDE: "Oh please... here in L.A., no one even thought Phil & Kobe could kiss and make up and here they are, together again. If they can get together, and Palmeiro is dumb enough to get caught with steroids and lie directly to Congress, then ANYTHING is possible (+2). My money is on Mariotti to pull the shocking upset. Watch out!"
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:32 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
August 17, 2005
Cutting Down The Nets: Yankees/Red Sox Regional
Scott 85, Morgan 51
Stuart Scott moves on to the Foul Four, easily taking out Joe Morgan. It's a little tough to say goodbye to Little Joe, who more than anyone was the inspiration for this tournament, but what can I say? He tried to take on a power hitter with speed and one-run strategies and got crushed.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 10:13 AM | Comments (7) | TrackBack
Dan LeBatard vs. Tony Reali
4. Dan LeBatard
Defeated Chris Mortensen 64-7
Defeated Steve Phillips 51-20
Defeated Chris Berman, 82-64
The Latest Word:
"LeBatard and his ilk are like a fungus that is over-running everything at ESPN and must be stopped." -- Chris
"I hear his next concoction of fiction will state that Pat Riley is a spineless racist who traded Eddie Jones for a white point guard because only white point guards win MVP awards, due to the inherent racism of the NBA and those who cover the NBA." -- Greg
"Every time I see him I think 'Oh no, not this guy again,' even though I can't remember his name." -- Darlucky
"I don't know whether I dislike him more for his love of the Miami Hurricanes or for the fact that he is the biggest apologist in the world for all the steroid users in baseball." -- Steven
"Epitomizes the dark side of allowing newspaper sports writers to take over ESPN." -- Colin Hesse
"Arrogant windbags like Lebatard have destroyed sportswriting. He also gets special de-merits for acting as an apologist for any outrage committed by any athletes. A perfect fit for the sewer that is E$PN." -- Mike O.
"I get the feeling he doesn't actually care about what he's covering so much as using it as a pogo stick to fame. He never lets the facts get in the way of his opinion, never lets the story be anything other than the fact that Dan LeBatard is reporting it, and never, ever looks past the mountain of his own ego to cover anything outside of Miami." -- Deadguy
Versus
6. Tony Reali
Defeated Michele Tafoya 78-13
Defeated Mike Tirico 50-34
Defeated Bob Ryan, 60-31
The Latest Word:
"One day I hope that 'Stat Boy' corrects a special guest on PTI, maybe someone like Mike Tyson, Kenny Rogers, Ron Artest, or Jim Rome (Anyone who has the possibility to flip out at any random time, you just never know.) And they beat the ever loving hell out of him." -- Smitty
"I don't get what he has to be arrogant about, but apparently it's something pretty big, because man is he a pompous little prick." -- Sharon
"For most of these match-ups I use the following rubric: "who do I want to hit in the head with a stool more?" And for this one there is no question that it's the young up-start." -- Edwin
"ATH is a retarded idea made worse by the fact that it's hosted by this little arrogant schmuck ("pompous little prick" works well, too). When I saw the cinders on his face on the Ash Wednesday episode, part of me hoped that he'd fallen and hit his face on the desk. Unfortunately, that wasn't the case. But I can dream, can't I?" -- Jenny
"I would not piss on him if he was on fire." -- Todd
"Never has someone with so little gone so far, only to show how little they truly have." -- Dan
"Stat Boy, whom I suspect will never grow to be become Stat Man." -- Jeremy B."Tony Reali is a jerk an asshole and a douchebag, by most accounts; a jasshobag, if you will. And I suspect he's been that way since he was born." -- Will
"A seat warmer who somehow has convinced himself that the world pauses each afternoon to see just what score he assigns to Woody Paige's insipid opinions. Pretty heady stuff for a guy who rose to the level of his abilities back when he was fetching pastries for Kornheiser and Wilbon." -- Phil
"Why does Stat Boy even have a job on TV? He should be bussing tables at Hooters." -- Aznemesis
Voting is now closed. Results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:43 AM | Comments (106) | TrackBack
Regional Final Preview: (4) Dan LeBatard vs. (6) Tony Reali
TONY KORNHEISER: "Welcome back to PTI, boys & girls, we spend the next 'five good minutes' with our good friends Richard Justice of the Houston Chronicle and Bob Ryan of The Boston Globe, discussing the 'egregious eight' match-up that hits close to home for Wilbon & me, with my BOY Dan LeBetard facing PTI's own STAT BOY, Tony Reali. Hi Richie, Hi Bobby. Richie, let me start with you... what's your general feeling on this match-up?"
RICHARD JUSTICE: "Well Tony, I was working out with Roger Clemens and Andy Pettitte the other day, shagging fly balls, doing each other's hair, getting ice cream together... and both Roger & Andy were really torn on this match-up. Andy hates LeBatard a lot, he says he has nightmares about him and blames Lebtard for his recent elbow troubles back in New York, while Roger, who mentioned how much he loves the city of Houston and can't imagine playing anywhere else the rest of his life, has a real problem with Reali... Roger confided in me that if Reali came up to bat, he would definitely throw a high strike at his head, at least 98 or 100 miles an hour.
BOB RYAN: "You know guys, I just kept my job losing to Reali and he is one nasty kid. He kept pointing at his crotch and he had a cut out of my last Globe column attached to his pants. it was really horrible! And the kid is soooo ARROGANT... we were playing hoops in this driveway and he bragged about DUNKING on me at this little kiddie hoop? As for LeBatard, I don't like thr guy. I mean.... he STEALS my airtime. Tony, I can't even tell anymore if you like me as much as that preening schmo."
MICHAEL WILBON: "Guys, it's been said about LeBatard that he only wants to win this match-up and move on to the Final Four because he's a huckster & a shameless self promoter. What do you guys think about the fact that LeBatard has become obssessed in an odd way with "The Road From Bristol" and he's even discussed it on his Miami Radio show; does this bother you in any way?
JUSTICE: "Well, Michael, I was having lunch the other day with Yao Ming, Jeff Van Gundy, Tracy McGrady, David Carr, Andre Johnson, Drayton McLane, Craig Biggio, Brad Lidge, George Herbert Walker Bush, Barbara Bush and Kenneth Lay and we were actually discussing this very issue! Lidge felt that Dan had a rough childhood and was picked on a teased a lot to which both Yao and Tracy agreed wiuth him. Then Kenneth Lay mentioned that LeBatard might be after some sort of financial reward and both Barbara Bush and David Carr agreed with that. And then Roger Clemens surprised us all at lunch and got really tired of talking about this but again mentioned how much he loves the city of Houston and wants to retire an Astro and still throw a 98 mile an hour fastball at head of Stat Boy."
RYAN: "You know, RICHARD, If I WANTED to, I could tell you every five seconds that I sleep with Paul Pierce and I want to beat up Jason Kidd's wife and that I am from Boston but OH NO... I don't name drop every second. See, because Boston has more than just 5 famous people. And GUESS WHAT... when Roger lived in Boston, he said I was his very favorite sports writer and no one could EVER replace me, so THERE. Now, as far as Dan LeBatard, OF COURSE, he's a shameless self-promoter. Almost as obnoxious as Skip Bayless. But at least LeBatard has some semblence of an ability to construct a full sentence... I am still UNCONVINCED that Reali could do that."
TONY KORNHEISER: "Final seconds... gentlemen, predictions on tonight's match-up between Stat Boy & my BOY, LeBatard?"
JUSTICE: "Well, I am gonna follow the advice of my good friend, ROGER CLEMENS, who once again mentions how much he loves the city of Houston, the Astros, his Texas family members, Minute Maid Park, the Toyota Center where the Rockets play, Reliant Stadium where the Texans are, the Texas rodeo, as well as the I-10 commute down the road to San Antonio; anyway, Roger bases his vote on who he'd like to throw a fastball at more and he says STAT BOY."
KORNHEISER: "Bobby?"
RYAN: "In the words of the great Red Auerbach... WHERE'S MY DAMN CIGAR?... okay, that has NOTHING to do with this match-up but I am going to go with Dan LeBatard... sadly, in the modern era of the steroid athlete, ye who YELLS the loudest and makes the most noise, is ye who shall get an undeserving win. I think LeBatard pulls this one out."
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:18 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
August 16, 2005
They're very proud
HomeNYC "Quite Frankly" Makes Stephen A. Smith Shine in Spots for ESPN 2
Doesn't everyone just love the "Quite Frankly" promos? Especially the dance?
I would really like an animated GIF of the dance, if anyone can find one. (We're planning the Foul Four right now, and we're pretty sure he's going to be there.)
Posted by Mac Thomason at 12:16 PM | Comments (9) | TrackBack
Stephen A. Smith vs. Michael Irvin
1. Stephen A. Smith
Defeated Hank Goldberg 78-3
Defeated Paul Maguire 115-26
Defeated Jim Rome, 81-40
The Latest Word:
"Quite frankly, he's worse than Stu Scott. Quite frankly, I hate him." -- Jenny
"Thrown all over every program they have for the sole purpose of pissing people off." -- Sam
"The complaints about him are easy to find, and nearly always an understatement. He is truly awful. And to think they fired David Aldridge - intelligent, usually correct, entertaining, able to control the volume of his voice - in favor of this guy is enough to make my head explode." -- Yermom
"If the certain way a certain person says the name Slava Medvedenko is what gets that person a full-time job on a certain sports channel, it's time for that sports channel to fire all the staffing people and on-air talent, and start over again." -- Rob
"Like a out of control virus. He's on Sportscenter all the time, every NBA show (and since my favorite sport is basketball, that's especially painful), the radio, and now he has his own goddamn show for no goddamn reason. In fact, in interviews ESPN execs admit that they realize people hate him and they STILL gave him a show because ESPN's NBA ratings have improved and somehow they've attributed that to him." -- Adam
"Everytime he's around atheletes like AI or LeBron, he pukers up and kisses their ass, then turns around and turns up the volume of his voice, which causes me to press the mute button. THERE IS NO NEED TO SCREAM AT THE TOP OF YOUR LUNGS TO GET ATTENTION!!! Worse, they replaced the brilliant David Aldridge with this fool, which is an act against humanity." -- Mellismo
"I half-expect him to show up doing color on WSoP... and this makes me fearful.
"Lon: 'Negranu has an ace-king suited, while Ivey has a pair of tens. Negranu calls the big blind and raises a thousand.'
"Norman: 'Lon, that set of spades for Daniel is great to have in the hole when you're heads-up.'
"SAS: 'Spades? Who you callin' SPADES, honky? QUITE FRANKLY, I think YOU'RE a spade, boy. At least, THAT'S what A.I. TOLD ME when I was HANGING IN HIS CRIB yesterday.'
"Lon, Norman: *silence*
"And, scene." -- Chris Lawrence
"Evil ESPN executive Mark Shaprio says, "Whether you like Stephen A. Smith or hate him, you can't help but watch him." Actually, Shapiro, I don't really have that problem." -- Phil
"I've worn out the mute button on my remote control because of Smith." -- Ryan V
"There may be more annoying, more uninformed, and more incompentent people working at ESPN (note that I said MAY), however, he easily tops the list of 'most in need of a severe, James Caan in The Godfather, trash-can-involved, monster beating'." -- Edwin
"It took five minutes of Quite Frankly for my brain to start gnawing its way out of my skull as it realized that I was forcing it to watch Stephen A. Smith spout idiocies about every sport, not just basketball. Has to be the first show where I strongly disagree with what he says IN THE PROMOS." -- Gavin
Versus
2. Michael Irvin
Defeated Michael Wilbon 73-6
Defeated Jay Bilas 86-14
Defeated Bill Walton 75-29
The Latest Word:
"Somehow makes less sense than Deion Sanders." -- Will
"Miami + Dallas + Criminal Record + Unintelligible Speech + Poor Fashion Sense = One p!ss-poor excuse for an announcer." -- Jason
"I didn't think it was possible for me to hate him any more than when he was a player. Thanks for proving me wrong Mikey!" -- Dewey
"The next time he says something worthwhile will be the first time." -- Kirk
"With the cooperation of TV directors who can't cut away from pointless showboating, Irvin managed to draw attention to himself for simple things like catching a 6-yard-pass. Mike, when you have single coverage against a smaller defensive back, and you run a route *specifically designed* to get you open, and the offensive line gives the QB two seconds of protection, guess what --- YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO CATCH THE DAMN BALL!! THAT'S YOUR JOB!!! STOP DANCING AND POSING FOR THE CAMERA!!!!" -- Miles Cannon
"Between him and Dan Le Batard, isn't that enough reason to just cut a gigantic ditch south of Disney World and let the southern part of the Florida peninsula float off into the ocean where it belongs? And then - target practice!" -- Giraffe
"Why anyone thought he should be on television after his impressive film debut in "Look at me doing coke in my front seat" I'll never know." -- EY
Voting is now closed. Results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:26 AM | Comments (104) | TrackBack
Regional Final Preview: (1) Stephen A. Smith vs. (2) Michael Irvin
MICHAEL WILBON: "I'm Michael Wilbon, Tony, it's time to play a little 'Good Cop, Bad Cop'. You ready?"
TONY KORNHEISER: "Oh, I'm ready."
VOICEOVER:
"Stephen A. Smith"
WILBON: "I will be the bad cop here... look, this man should be in JAIL. Cocaine, hookers, and he played for the Miami Hurricanes AND the Dallas Cowboys? Plus, it's officially a crime in this country to have appeared on 'The Best Damn Sports Show'. Michael is loud, incoherent, and has committed serious crimes. Just because you win Super Bowls, it doesn't mean you should be co-hosting ESPN's 'Primetime'. This man should be fired and then taken straight to jail. As bad cop, I can take him there."
KORNHEISER: "What are you talking about? Don't you believe in second chances, Wilbon? This man has found God, and you know just like your BOY, Deion Sanders, when a player finds GOD, he means it. Plus, who better to give analysis then a 3-time Super Bowl champion & one of the greatest wide receivers of all time? Plus, he's funny, boisterous, and always wears a phat suit, just like you, Wilbon. Give the man some love."
WILBON: "Next perp!"
VOICEOVER: "Stephen A. Smith"
WILBON: "Good cop, this time... QUITE FRANKLY, the man is a rising star at ESPN. He's loud, funny, and he hails from one of the best sports towns in America, Philadelphia. Look, he's not going to ever hold back and he will say what he thinks. Quite frankly, Tony, we need more honesty... don't ya think?"
KORNHEISER: "Since I am the bad cop, Wilbon, let me just say that your BOY Stephen A. is obnoxious, rude and doesn't actually KNOW anything about Basketball. And QUITE FRANKLY, Wilbon, if he was actually any good, they wouldn't be sticking his show on the deuce. I mean, what's the deal with old school/nu skool anyway? You and I are both old school and we can get by just fine. Once again, I win, I win. Wilbon goes DOWN, Wilbon goes DOWN!"
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:20 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
August 15, 2005
Stuart Scott vs. Joe Morgan
1. Stuart Scott
Defeated Jim Gray, 78-32
Defeated Scott Van Pelt, 123-8
Defeated John Kruk, 111-35
The Latest Word:
"Stuart Scott's hiring was the shark-jumping moment for SportsCenter, to the point where I would turn the broadcast off if he was hosting, and eventually didn't bother checking. Scott to the next round. "Can I get a Boo-ya?" No, no you can't." -- Chris
"I wish the Schwab would eat Stuart Scott." -- Smitty
"Stuart Scott is the guy that changed ESPN from a network about sports with some wit to a network about catchphrases and celebrity with a little bit of sports. And that is the road to hell. And I don't see how it's even paved with good intentions here, just with egomaniacal grandeur." -- Larry
"Booyah Boy is an unbearable, festering, black spot on the soul of sports broadcasting. Be Gone evil seed of all that is wrong with ESPN, and take your bloody stupid catch phrases with you!!" -- KeanoGiggs
"Stuart is unique. His on-screen existence is an insult to black people, white people, green people, and frogs. There might be replacements as bad, but they can't possibly be as bad in the same way." -- Sweeper
"There are very few people or characters that truly reach the nirvana level of annoyance. It is available only to those that make the effort to stand out for their catch phrases, their attention-hogging, and their cries for help. They make you wonder why someone was not fired for their very existence. My friends, I give you Stuart Scott.... the Jar Jar Binks of ESPN. (and no, I don't think you can insult someone more than that)" -- Colin Hesse
"When I first heard "as cool as the other side of the pillow" I chuckled. It was amusing. Stuart Scott was amusing. That was a long time ago.
"He's now some kind of robot programmed to repeat "hip" phrases ad nauseum. This is why he's all over ESPN; I'm convinced that they have 8-9 of him wandering around the offices, going from one show to the next and repeating the same schtick over and over again.
"In fact, one of these days, ESPN will just give up the ghost and reveal the truth - and then they'll hold a televised 5 on 5 basketball game with all the Stuart Scott cyborgs on one side, and the cast of Around the Horn on the other.
"Things will go well until the 4th quarter, when the cyborgs all malfunction at once, spit out a few indecipherable phrases (more a function of Stuart Scott than the malfunctioning) and self destruct, taking out everyone from ATH along with themselves.
"And there will be much rejoicing all over the world." -- Will
"I just want to punch him in his other eye so both are screwed up enough to where he can no longer be on tv." -- Jared
"In his own way, Stuart Scott is as much a symbol of everything wrong with ESPN as is Chris Berman. It's the triumph of the catch-phrase over information and personalities over presence as the network continues to devolve from a sports channel to a provider of infotainment pap. As if that weren't enough, Scott also presides over Dream Job, in which would-be sports anchors are tutored in the ways of the catch-phrase. That's like loosing Ken Lay on a classroom full of young, impressionable accountants." -- Phil
"Hey Stuart, just tell me which eye you are currently using, so that I can line up in front of it when you are talking to me." -- Bill H
Versus
2. Joe Morgan
Defeated Woody Paige, 81-56
Defeated Suzy Kolber, 100-9
Defeated Jason Whitlock, 93-43
"It's the Napoleon Complex; he had to be special when he was a player, and that he did well. But then he had to be something special as an analyst . . . and, well, we all know the results." -- Will
"His interminable, uninformed, stream-of-consciousness rants, delivered with the kind of self-assurance only a locked and shuttered mind can possess, are like fingernails across the chalkboard of the soul." -- Sweeper
"Joe Morgan is the capo di tutti capi of ignorant color commentators. He is one of the rare persons whose horribleness can be described with one word -- Moneyball." J. Lichty
"Joe's status as one of the best 2B of all-time gives him an air of legitimacy such that an uninformed fan listening to his idiocy may assume that he is right." -- Mike
"Yeah, I've heard about this Joe Morgan guy. I've never seen him, nor heard him talk, nor have I read any of his columns, but he has everything backwards. Wait, I did read an excerpt once. I didn't like it. Everyone can go on and tell me that I should at least know something about Joe Morgan before I vote for him, but even though I've barely heard of him, I think I do know Joe Morgan. And he don't know anything about baseball." The Bent Kangaroo
"A willfully ignorant jackass who makes usually good baseball games completely unwatchable. His rants agaist sabermetrics are especially painful since that movement finally lead to him getting his due as a truly great player." -- Adam
"Using his rationale, Margaret Mitchell is to blame for the horrible Gone With The Wind sequel which was written fifty years after she died, because, well, who else could've written it? Maybe Billy Beane wrote "=Gone With The Wind, come to think of it." -- Greg
"Have you ever wondered what would happen if an inebriated retarded chipmunk got a job as a color commentator? That would be Joe Morgan." -- Gavin
"I've been thisclose to enabling the SAP option so I can at least not be forced to comprehend what he's saying on more than one occasion." -- Charles Kuffner
"A hateful, deliberately obtuse toad of a man who has confused playing a pretty good second base back in the day with actually inventing the game of baseball. And unlike the army of failed managers and executives employed by ESPN, Morgan has always made his pronouncements from the safety of the broadcast booth. It's real easy to talk in absolutes when the closest you've been to a front offfice is to pass one on the way to the complimentary pre-game buffet in the press lounge." -- Phil
Voting is now closed. Results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:34 AM | Comments (142) | TrackBack
Regional Final Preview: (1) Stu Scott vs. (2) Joe Morgan
MICHAEL WILBON: "Pardon The Interruption... I'm Michael Wilbon! Tony, it's time for some HEADS ON STICKS!"
TONY KORNHEISER: "And I'm Tony Kornheiser, and we are here at the 'Egregious Eight' to give you our feedback on the match-ups... give us the first one!"
VOICEOVER: "Stuart Scott."
WILBON: "Tony... you are Stu Scott... you wear the phat suits, but everyone makes fun of your fake street cred and that creepy lazy eye of yours. Plus, many people have said that the rise of Stu Scott can be equated to the time ESPN started a long spiral downhill. Stuey... defend your position and tell us why people should LOVE you?"
KORNHEISER: "Yo, dog... yo. You gotta love me! I gots at least 10 pro athletes on my cell phone speed dial and like I am the ONLY guy Allen Iverson talks with, yo... I really do have street cred from the mean streets of North Carolina where I was raised in the hard life with my Carolina Blue gang colors. I mean, c'mon... I went to the same school as Michael Jordan so I gotta get a little love from all my ESPN peeps, right? Peace, Wilbon!"
VOICEOVER: "Joe Morgan"
KORNHEISER: "Wilbon... you're your BOY, Joe Morgan... you're a real live know it all and think everyone else is wrong, except you, just about all the time. You've pretty much called 'Moneyball' a joke and laid the verbal smackdown on Billy Beane, whose Oakland A's are battling the Angels for 1st despite no Tim Hudson and no Mark Mulder; plus, you have started an imaginary feud with the newest Member of the Baseball Hall of Fame, Ryne Sandberg... why should you get some love?"
WILBON: "Because you know I'm right, Tony. I am always explaining myself as well as explaining the ills of Moneyball and Billy Beane. In my world, we should have nothing but speedsters because you can steal first. I know longer believe in taking walks. I know I could take nine Tony Womacks and out-manage Mr. Moneyball himself. As for Sandberg, he's just jealous because I was a far better second baseman. Did I mention how important I was on The Big Red Machine? Man I am good."
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:26 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
Updated bracket
Thanks once again to Bill.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:08 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
August 14, 2005
Results: Skip Bayless vs. Larry Bowa
Bayless 90, Bowa 6
They're gaining on Skip Bayless. If this thing went fifteen or twenty rounds, he might be challenged. As it is, he rolls on with another total destruction of an overmatched opponent.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 03:30 PM | Comments (7) | TrackBack
August 13, 2005
Results: Dick Vitale vs. Jay Mariotti
Mariotti 73, Vitale 41
A second #1 seed falls, this time to Jay Mariotti, who didn't even need to campaign. It's awesome, baby!
I wonder what an age breakdown would show on this. To me, it's UNBELIEVEABLE! that Vitale could lose to someone I don't think I've ever seen on ESPN. But I avoid Cold Pizza and am at work for Around The Horn.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 06:23 PM | Comments (19) | TrackBack
August 12, 2005
Me and LeBatard
Brad has volunteered to host the MP3 of my first segment on LeBatard's show. I'm hoping for a recording of the second but they had audio problems that day.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 02:34 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Results: Tony Reali vs. Bob Ryan
Reali 60, Ryan 31
It was close early, but Stat Boy put on a run late to pull away for an easy win. Bob Ryan had this to say: "Buh-buh-ah-uh, duh-bububub..."
Posted by Mac Thomason at 12:41 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
Skip Bayless vs. Larry Bowa
2. Skip Bayless
Defeated Kirk Herbstreit 110-8
Defeated Chris Fowler 110-2
The Opposition Case:
"YOU KNOW WHAT YOUR PROBLEM IS, BAYLESS? IT'S THAT YOU'RE LAZY. IN MY DAY, COLUMNISTS DIDN'T JUST WRITE THE SAME THING OVER AND OVER, 'SO-AND-SO ISN'T AS GOOD AS SUCH AND SUCH', 'I DON'T THINK HE'S A HALL OF FAMER'! THEY PUT SOME EFFORT INTO THEIR WORK!!! DROP AND GIVE ME TWENTY!!! -- Larry Bowa
The People Speak:
"Skip Bayless is, in fact, the Dark Lord Satan, and feeds on the souls of children." -- Adam
"Treats sports as more important and earth-shattering than terrorist plots. Face made for radio, yet he is on ESPN at every turn. Consistently wrong about just about everything. The walking embodiment of everything wrong with sports journalism in particular and journalism in general." -- Matt
"Possibly the devil incarnate. A nastier human being has never been known in the sports world. He would write a column trashing his own mother. He must advance." -- Jenny
"If he's the representative of the good old school days, then I'm glad they are gone. That and the plague. But mostly him." -- Brad
"Skip Bayless sucks at life." -- Ramar
"The personification of pure evil." -- J [Satan Count: 3]
"I would voluntarily hurl my television from my third-floor apartment window if doing so could somehow guarantee that Skip Bayless would never be allowed to talk, write, or even think about sports for the rest of eternity." -- Vic
"I think I'd rather take a sponge bath in the collected pus of 1000 Ebola victims, with full knowledge of certain horrible painful death that would occur when my internal organs liquified and ran in bloody rivers from every pore and orifice of my body, than ever, Ever, EVER subject myself again to the sight, sounds or words of Skip Bayless." -- Cult of Basebaal
"The spawn of hell. You feel bad for Skippy? Ask if he needs some ideas for suicide methods.
Just an evil person. No redeeming qualities. A small person who cannot stand accomplishment in others. Lies, yells, distorts the truth." -- Kelly from SD
"What are you guys talking about? I love Bayless. He makes me smile, and think about rainbows, bunny rabbits, and butterflies. I go to a world of make-believe where unicorns exist and run with the centaurs and Keebler elves.
"*snicker*
"Go to hell, Skip." -- Colin Hesse
"bayless, go back to hell." -- Jay R. [Final Bayless is Satan Count: 5]
Versus
3. Larry Bowa
Defeated Mark Jackson 67-34
Defeated Mel Kiper 62-31
"This guy was a hack as a Manager, a nut job of a human being and even I appear sane next to Bowa. Geez, he might blow gasket the next time anyone dare suggest he was a bad manager. And besides, let's be honest... considering the way I have steamrolled all the competition, is there ANY doubt I won't just steamroll Bowa? Hell, he's so stupid and crazy, he will just show up anyway to get his ass kicked, AGAIN, like he's the phillies Manager all over again." -- Skip Bayless
The People Speak:
"Bowa is a terrible coach, analyst, and human being, I have no idea why he has a job." -- Adam
"You know you're bad when you make Harold Reynolds look like a friggin genius. Bowa could've driven the '27 Yankees into the ground." -- Aram
"Larry Bowa was annoying as a player, worse as a manager and adds nothing as a baseball analyst except a few well timed expletives - see ya Larry." -- J Lichty
"I AM LARRY BOWA!! LOOK AT HOW LOUD I AM TALKING!! THAT AUTOMATICALLY MEANS I KNOW WHAT I AM TALKING ABOUT!! BOW DOWN TO MY &*$$-ING SUPERIOR KNOWLEDGE OF BASEBALL FUNDAMENTALS!! BAH HAH HAH HAH!!" -- Colin Hesse
Voting is now closed. Results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 09:54 AM | Comments (101) | TrackBack
August 11, 2005
Could our long national nightmare be over?
Variety.com - Inside Move: ESPN on the verge of no Shapiro
I will take back everything bad I ever said or thought about Daniel Snyder if he hires Mark Shapiro away from ESPN.
It was unclear late Wednesday exactly what role Shapiro may play in the Snyder empire. In addition to owning the Redskins, the billionaire has a 9% stake in Six Flags, which controls 31 amusement parks.
Maybe he can replace that dancing old guy in the commercials. Though I suggest "Redskins Tackling Dummy" would look good on a business card.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 01:48 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
Dick Vitale vs. Jay Mariotti
1. Dick Vitale
Defeated Linda Cohn, 66-51
Defeated Digger Phelps, 79-18
The Opposition Case:
"What, Dick Vitale is going to call ME out? Please. In Chicago, they think Dick is a joke... more like Dick-less Vitale if you ask me. I think he's clearly seeking advice from Woody Paige so this is gonna be easy despite his #1 seed. Look, Vitale is like the Cubs... annoying, loud, always thinks he's good and yet won't go away from the American public." -- Jay Mariotti
The People Speak:
"When your shtick is cutsie phrases, you should be required to come up with a new one once every ten years or so, baby." -- Jonathan F.
"If you want Hell on the airwaves, listen to him pontificate on non-Basketball topics, or hear/see clips of his motivational speaking. Even mildly insane people will only choose to do so once." -- Herman
"Listening to him every so often on MIke and Mike is like getting a barium enema. And watching him explode all over TV during march madness -- it's awful, babeee!" -- Brian
"He's the worst color commentator EVER, in any sport. Worse than Walton, worse than Joe Morgan, worse than Tim McCarver, worse than the Sunday Night Football duo. Completely unlistinable." -- Adam
"It's obvious Dickie V loves college basketball, loves the kids who play it, and wants to give respect to all the teams and players who work so hard to make it great. It is also obvious that he needs to be hit with a tranquilizer and beaten with a baseball bat." -- Brad
"My least favorite Vitale memory: several years ago, he was broadcasting a game with Keith Jackson, whose mother had just died that morning. For whatever reason, Jackson came in and did the broadcast anyway. Vitale spent most of the game repeatedly and loudly commending Jackson for his noble dedication to his job in the face of this painful tragedy. Just incredibly callous. I'm certain Keith was thrilled to be reminded of the fact every five minutes at volume setting eleven." -- Sweeper
"The quintessential Vitale at the Draft moment was in 2004 when the Celtics took high school power forward Al Jefferson 15th overall. Vitale, almost literally foaming at the mouth, starts YELLING at the camera about teams ignoring college players for high schoolers with his key phrase being "I don't understand the thinking". Damn right you don't you ancient sack of monkey crap. Of course if they redid that draft today there wouldn't be a team in the league that wouldn't take Jefferson in the top 5. Josh "sure bust" Smith too. Not to mention that Dwight Howard would still go number 1. Yeah all those high schoolers sure are ruining the NBA, Dickie!" -- Ted
"Remember that frozen pizza commercial Vitale did a few years ago? (And wasn't that a brilliant idea? Get the guy with the most annoying voice in the world to hawk your product? Maybe they were thinking people could use the empty pizza box to puncture their eardrums.) Is it wrong that I kind of hoped that instead of leaving Vitale hanging from the rim, the basketball players would instead nail him to the backboard?" -- Phil
"I do, however, keep on hoping that if Vitale shouts "Bay-bee!" enough, it will somehow re-animate the vengeance-seeking corpse of The Big Bopper, who will then climb out of his grave, seek out the offender, and make him pay in best B-movie fashion for abusing the catchphrase so horrificially." -- Deadguy
"Wouldn't it be awesome if his co-anchor suddenly snapped after hearing one too many "bay-be's" and started strangling Vitale, Homer Simpson style?" -- Charles Odell
"Of course for him to accept any award, you'd have to surgically remove him from Coach K's posterior, but that in itself would be Must See TV." -- DJ
Versus
5. Jay Mariotti
Defeated Buster Olney, 84-20
Defeated Beano Cook, 81-12
The Opposition Case:
"OH MY GOD... MARIOTTI... WHAT A PTP'ER... I MEAN, HAVE YOU SEEN HIM ON AROUND THE HORN? WHAT A JOKE. HE CLEARLY HAS NOT COMPLETED 4 YEARS OF COLLEGE. LOOK, UNLESS YOU GO TO COLLEGE FOR 4 YEARS AT DUKE OR NORTH CAROLINA, HOW AM I, AS A #1 SEED SUPPOSED TO SEE, JAY MARIOTTI AS REAL COMPETITION? IT'S LIKE HE'S A HIGH SCHOOL KID OR A EUROPEAN WHO DIDN'T KNOW BETTER AND PLAY FOR COACH K FOR 4 YEARS. JAY, BABY, YOU'RE DOWN!" -- Dickie V.
The People Speak:
"The man is just aching for a punch in the face. Aching for it." -- Dan
"If he's a writer, I don't need to know how to read." -- Chris From Park Slope
"Can we rig up a punching machine and tie Mariotti in front of it? That would save everyone's arms & hands from fatigue and pain." -- John in Austin
"There is a reason these writers are better on paper than on TV - its called the delete key. BTW...what exactly does Jay have to be so arrogant about anyway?" -- Dewey
"I haven't watched a show that he's been on in so long that I'm only going by memory, but those memories are strong enough that I'd still punch him in the face." -- Paul [It is incredible how many people want to punch Jay Mariotti. -- MT]
"The first time Mariotti appeared on ESPN i couldnt stop thinking he was the nerd from "Freaks and Geeks," then he started talking and i realized he just blows." -- Kasko
"Mariotti might be the biggest asshat on television right now." -- Mattskralc
"Instead of tapping a patients knee, doctors should measure reflexes by seeing how fast someone reaches for the remote when they first realize Jay Mariotti is filling in for Tony on PTI." -- Chris
Voting now closed. Results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 11:41 AM | Comments (125) | TrackBack
Results: Chris Berman vs. Dan LeBatard
LeBatard 82, Berman 64
With a late surge that certainly didn't have anything to do with him going on the radio and asking for votes, Dan LeBatard knocked out Chris "Tim-"Berman to move to the round of 8. I have the vote as 62-52 before LeBatard went on a 30-2 run.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 10:00 AM | Comments (17) | TrackBack
August 10, 2005
Results: Michael Irvin vs. Bill Walton
Irvin 75, Walton 29
Cocaine wins easily, as Michael Irvin takes out the big hippie, who wants to know if you've ever looked at a basketball, I mean really looked.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 01:20 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Tony Reali vs. Bob Ryan
6. Tony Reali
Defeated Michele Tafoya 78-13
Defeated Mike Tirico 50-34
The Opposition Case:
"Tony Reali is a Yankee-loving punk. His own mother is ashamed of him. What a joke! I am going to lose to THIS guy? Over my dead body. Whose thumbs did you have to break, Tony, to get a job in Bristol? You are clearly taking steroids which would explain both your surly attitude and slick hair. You're going down, Yankee boy!" -- Bob Ryan
The People Speak:
"How did the bland, talentless stat boy ever become the host of a show? They must just hire guys who'll never have any reason to ask for a raise." -- Sam
"Reali is a rancid piece of [MUTED...] monkey [MUTED...] testicles [MUTED...] for breakfast!! I hate that guy." -- Mattymatty
"Reali was fine as Stat Boy. Then they gave him hosting duties for ATH and his head grew so much that it now fills both studios." -- Mtvcdm
"I just can't get over this one mental block: Tony Reali has won fame and fortune entirely because he sits at a desk and pushes a button to rate the cogency of arguments by Woody Paige and Jay Mariotti. Swirl that bitter wine around in your mouth for a bit, and see if you can choke it down. I can't -- not without my head exploding with rage. So the vote goes to Reali." -- Phil
"I simply can't let my hatred of Tony Reali ever go unregistered. He is without a doubt the biggest douchebag on ESPN. None of you have any idea how much I hate this man. He is the belligerent version of Ryan Seacrest. I would like to suggest a new show: "Soak the ATH Participants." Audience members would be invited forward to hurl projectiles at Paige, Mariotti, REALI, etc. and every time they hit the mark the TV personality would fall into a vat of acid. I would tape every episode." -- Jenny
Versus
10. Bob Ryan
Defeated Peter Gammons 75-23
Defeated Tim Legler 54-29
The Opposition Case:
"Look at this old, pudgy Irish flake... how does a young, good looking Italian guy like me ever lose at ANYTHING to that overgrown leprechaun. Hell... points for Mariotti, point for Woody Paige, point for Cowlishaw. Ryan, I will take you down. Somebody get me some more airtime... I am where it's at!" -- Stat Boy
The People Speak:
"Bob Ryan represents everything that is wrong about Boston. And possibly all of New England." -- Will
"For all I know, he's a sensitive soul who's gentle with children, and cries when he sees big-eyed kittens, and has personalized unicorn stationery, but he sounds like an angry, liquored up Irish uncle going on about the Battle of McBleaogh of 1723." -- Bill Walsh
"He looks like an Oompa Loompa who left the Chocolate Factory for a stint at J-School. Actually, that's not fair to the Oompa Loompas. They still have relevant things to say to society." -- Phil
"Ryan just talks. Actually, he yells, rants, and behaves like a child. You don't want to have a cup of coffee with Ryan. You just want to stick him with the bill. Then, go find his car and slash a couple of tires." -- George
"Evidence that stupidity is not only expected but rewarded at ESPN." -- EY
Voting is now closed. Results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 12:26 PM | Comments (94) | TrackBack
August 09, 2005
Chris Berman vs. Dan LeBatard
1. Chris Berman
Defeated Rece Davis 56-12
Defeated Sean Salisbury 45-40
The Opposition Case:
"If I lose this match up it will be because of racism. Racism against smart white guys from Miami... and did I mention I was devastatingly handsome? My mom sure thinks so... she says I am a real stud with the ladies. Berman is fat and smells really bad. Not to mention that I may claim racism and make outrageous statements but Berman would actually have to remember people's real names to even get the nicknames right anymore since he's so clearly senile. It's probably all thos eyears of steroids he's been taking. I mean, c'mon, you just KNOW he's taking something and I will continue my ridiculously irresponsible Journalism and make outrageous claims that I would think COULD be true." -- Dan LeBatard
The People Speak:
"A catchphrase spewing jackass whose inexplicible popularity gave rise to every catchphrase spewing jackass that followed. As such, he's pretty much solely responsible for the decline of Sportscenter, and ESPN in general." -- Adam
"Just because Fatso is the face of your network doesn't mean he has to be present at every big event. Next time you broadcast the U.S. Open golf tournament do not, DO NOT, allow Berman anywhere near the course. He ruins an otherwise fine broadcast." -- Andre La Plume
"His nicknames were cute when I was 12 - back when Gallagher and Carrot Top were funny, too. " -- Brak
"He single-handedly ruins every sporting event or sports-related broadcast he is a part of with his tired, awful, annoying schtick." -- Sam
"The emodiment of nearly everything that's awful about that increasingly awful network. Despite ample evidence of his awfulness, he's trotted out for everything -- the Home Run Derby, the NFL Draft, and, for all I know, those putt-putt tournaments ESPN2 used to show over Thanksgiving Day weekend. And he's never, ever going to leave or be fired -- decades from now our children's children will listen to Berman sleepwalk his way through another Sunday of NFL highlights and curse our generation for not doing the right thing by putting this fat Christmas ham in the deep-freeze." -- Phil
Versus
4. Dan LeBatard
Defeated Chris Mortensen 64-7
Defeated Steve Phillips 51-20
The Opposition Case:
"Dan 'Labatt Blue' Batard... Dan 'Leberetard' Lebatard... Dan 'Patrick' Lebatard... yes, folks, I could go and on with nicknames, but it doesn't change the fact that this guy is a puss filled windbag who makes boastful claims and distorts the truth! When it comes truth... Dan goes back, back, back, back... way back... to the backtrack. And yes, Dan... could... go... all... the... way... but he's facing me, a true #1 seed and an ESPN stalwart. Proof that I can say whatever I want and always have a job at ESPN. Yes...I am a legend in my own mind." -- Chris Berman
The People Speak:
"He actually called himself "The Hateable Dan LeBatard" when he showed up on some episodes of PTI...and he has no idea how right he is." -- Ed K.
"I know someone who knows LeBastard.He says he's the biggest horse's patoot on the East Coast and has an ego the same size." -- Andre La Plume
"Columnists should be read and not heard. And some columnists shouldn't even be read." -- Phil
"I just can't get over the articles he wrote after Ricky Williams ditched the Dolphins to go smoke pot with Lenny Kravitz. He was actually angry that people would be angry with Ricky! And, of course, a key member of the "Steve Nash MVP vote was racist" committee." -- Colin Hesse
"His departed ESPN Sunday Morning radio show helped broaden my mind, by either making me listen to something else or just contemplate the silence while driving to church." -- Herman
"When Kornheiser finally gets too old and rich to consider getting out of bed in the morning worthwhile, LeBatard is poised to demolish PTI, perhaps the only watchable half-hours on ESPN that doesn't involve live college sports." -- Harvey
Voting is now closed. Results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 09:58 AM | Comments (147) | TrackBack
Results: Stephen A. Smith vs. Jim Rome
Smith 81, Rome 40
Not even a clone army could help Jim Rome stand up to the Stephen A. Smith steamroller, as Smith heads towards his seemingly inevitably semis matchup with Skip Bayless. Rome's callers are outraged.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 09:17 AM | Comments (10) | TrackBack
August 08, 2005
On a much smaller scale
Mister Poll: Who's the more annoying baseball broadcaster?
Morgan vs. McCarver. Unfortunately, not to the death.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 01:56 PM | Comments (7) | TrackBack
Michael Irvin vs. Bill Walton
2. Michael Irvin
Defeated Michael Wilbon 73-6
Defeated Jay Bilas 86-14
The Opposition Case:
"Michael Irvin... you were once a GREAT PLAYER...but now? You are just TERRIBLE, AWFUL, JUST AWFUL... I mean, how else do you explain being on "The Best Damned Sports Show" -- what the hell is that all about? Besided, the last time I checked you are only a mere 6-2...whereas I am standing 7-0...you always bet on the big man. and Let me tell you something... I don't need my tie dye shorts, pot brownies or encouraging notes from David Stern to beat you. You are just awful, terrrrrible. Just horrrrrible." -- Bill Walton
The People Speak:
"He makes my ears bleed with his butchery of the English language." -- Djcolts
"Sterling Sharpe was mildly entertaining, and the collapse MNC experienced when they brought Irvin in to replace him was horrific. He's a complete *ss, and I can't stand him." -- Sweeper
"He may actually be able to outshout Stu Scott." -- Randy
"I can't think of one useful or legal thing he has done or said since he retired from football." -- John in Austin
"His performance on ESPN's 2004 NFL Draft show should be shown on an endless loop to the terrorists held at Abu Ghraib. Now that would be torture." -- Grandcosmo
"I'm surprised Steve Young hasn't shot Irvin in the face yet. He seriously looks like he's about to strangle him after every one of his inane comments." -- Luke
"If it weren't for the over-hyping of his personal friends, complete lack of attention to facts that don't support his pet opinion du jour, and all at a volume better associated with many major airports, Irvin might be tolerable." -- DrTizz
"He's managed to personify the worst aspects of college football, the worst aspects of professional football and now the worst aspects of the new sports media." -- Arford
"If felons can't vote, they shouldn't be allowed on TV either. You can do more harm on TV than in a voting booth." -- Miles Cannon
'If Michael Irvin was hopped up as a player, what could have possibly sunk in that would be of any use as a commentator?
"Whoa... the Browns had their heads dyed orange."
"Those are helmets."
"Helmets? That's like a cover that covers your whole head."
"That it is."' -- Mtvcdm
Versus
3. Bill Walton
Defeated Merrill Hoge 56-14
Defeated Bill Curry 68-50
The Opposition Case:
"Look here Walton, you can't touch me, brother... you can't contain me. Whether I was embarrassing cornerbacks in the Big East* or the NFC East, I am a Miami Hurricane and a Dallas Cowboy... Do you have any idea what that means. Do you realize how much more powerful being high on cocaine is than being high on marijuana? Please. You are a stoner, I am a drug crazed criminal and your ass wouldn't be able to handle me. You and your bad knees are going down!" -- Michael Irvin
(*Note that Michael has done so many drugs that he's forgotten that Miami was an independent when he was there.)
The People Speak:
"I used to like the NBA, but my frequent changing of the channel when Walton calls a game has taken away almost every opportunity I had to maintain any interest in the sport." -- Joey T
"He's never made a good point that I can recall and he detracts from the game. A good color man should make good points but most importantly STAY OUT OF THE WAY OF THE GAME. People want to watch a basketball game, not listen to you ramble. Guys like Doug Collins have mastered the art, Walton's never been able to do it." -- Adam
"Literally makes me ill when I hear him "enlightening" us while watching an NBA game. Stupidity realized in it's highest, purest form. Doesn't even realize he has just contradicted himself... for the 9000th time in the last 10 minutes." -- Tony
"You want to hit the mute button for the whole game. And then you realize you have automatic closed captioning. So you hear the WHORRRRRRRIBLE in your head. All that's left is putting out your eyes and hoping that there's a Braille account in the paper the next day." -- Bill Walsh
"Once heard him go rambling for 5 minutes on espn.radio and I had no idea what the hell was going on. It was just a mess, so I thought it was some sort of weird commercial, then it kept going and I thought some sort of anarchist pirate radio station was blocking the signal. Turns out it was his basketball anaylsis. WTF??" -- Chris J
"Walton has to be THE dumbest announcer in major league history, any sport. His shtick would almost be poetic if it was actually coherent. He will never say anything useful, and his consistent adoration of Kobe and Shaq borders on insanity. "'Oh, the perfection! Oh, the wonder!'" -- Gavin
"He's probably the best argument on this planet against smoking marijuana. I think he has literally smoked himself retarded." -- Ted
As for this matchup:
"A battle of wits—I use the term loosely—between the two guys who butcher the English Language the most. Walton knows the words, but he cannot take the marbles out of his mouth long enough to speak coherently. Irvin just makes things up as he goes along." -- Andre la Plume
Voting is now closed. Results when I get a chance. Before this evening, I hope.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:39 AM | Comments (109) | TrackBack
Results: Joe Morgan vs. Woody Paige
Morgan 81, Paige 56
A surprisingly game Woody Paige couldn't quite keep up with Joe Morgan, who moves on to meet Stu Scott in a regional final battle of vapid versus malevolent. Who cares what Paige thinks?
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:22 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
August 06, 2005
Stephen A. Smith vs. Jim Rome
1. Stephen A. Smith
Defeated Hank Goldberg 78-3
Defeated Paul Maguire 115-26
The Opposition Case:
"Thanks for the vine, Stephen A... 'cause let's face it, Philadelphia is a jungle, right? Anyway, I am the real deal here and athletes love me... no one gives them more air time than I do in the Jungle. And speaking of the Jungle, I have the clone army backin' me up, easily outnumbering Iverson, Larry Brown and your 3 other friends. Besides, you have absolutely zero talent and you should be embarrassed by how much you DON'T know as evidenced by your Chris Rock-Oscars like performance at the NBA Draft. War Me...War the Goatee... War the Gouchos... War 'Rome is Burning'... War just being so damned sexy... I'm out." -- Jim Rome
The People Speak:
"Maybe he thinks that if he screams loud enough, he will be able to override viewers' mute buttons." -- Jenny
"Scream'n A's is the biggest head with the loudest (and somehow simultaneously least productive) mouth, blasting 200 decible inanities from high atop Mount Shapiromore. If I never heard him utter a word in my life I would be much smarter than I am now." -- Mattymatty
"STEPIN A. SMITH HERE.
QUITE FRANKLY, I'M TELLING YOU I JUST GOT OFF THE PHONE WITH MYSELF. I TOLD ME THAT I WOULD EASILY DEFEAT THIS MAGUIRE-CHARACTER. THERE IS NOTHING ELSE TO SAY. I HAVE TO GO. I NEED TO GO KISS SOME MORE PHILLY-ATHLETE ASS." -- KC from SD
"I really thought this blog was kidding when they said he was getting his own show...then I hoped it was kidding...now I just stare at walls, unconsolable, for hours at a time." -- Egghead
"Stephen A. Smith should be strapped to the first missile that we shoot into Syria during the shock and awe campaign." -- Sam
"Can we just boot him from Bristol now? Seriously, ESPN needs to fire this guy. Preferably from a cannon." -- Ryan V.
Versus
5. Jim Rome
Defeated Jim Donnan 75-9
Defeated William C. Rhoden 101-27
The Opposition Case:
"However Mr. Jim Rome, your goatee is infested with fleas. I am
tellin's you... I will take you down. You are a bigger poser then Stu Scott and I, Stephen A. Smith. While 'Rome is Burning' at some ungodly hour at 4 pm where only grannies and out of work fools can see you, my new show will be in primetime. Sure, we drew fewer viewers than McEnroe on MSNBC, but Mark Shapiro and I have a plan... see here... the plan is that eventually, only Stuart Scott & I will be in the air and people like you, Jim Rome, will be rotting flesh on "The Worst Damn Sports Show". Now excuse me while I call Iverson and get the scoop on everything Philly--peace!" -- Stephen A. Smith
The People Speak:
"Maybe the most over-rated, over-hyped sportstalk guy ever. Who is possibly watching that show?" -- gbirch32
"The biggest jackass to ever show his sorry face (complete with 90's era goatee!) on television." -- Mattymatty
"The thing is, I've thought Rome made one or two (but just one or two) good points over the years--he just didn't need to make each one of them 5,000 times each at top volume." -- Aznemesis
"A loud-mouthed abomination with little to nothing to say. He reminds me of a drunken frat boy trying to sound knowledgeable about the local sports team only to avoid comments of his own hidden homosexuality." -- Gavin
'Rejected titles for Rome's latest show:
"Rome is Itching and Throbing"
"Rome is Dully Aching"
"Rome is Swelling"
"Rome is Smoldering"
"Rome is Smelling Vaguely of Burnt Hair"
"Rome is Recovering From Third Degree Burns Over 90% of His Body"
"Rome is Irritating"
"Rome is Out of His Depth"' -- Phil
"Who thought that taking Random Sports Talk Radio Hack #721 (Rome) and giving him a TV show would be a GOOD idea?" -- Mtvcdm
"Has there ever been anyone who repeats the same point over and over again, I mean anyone who says the same thing again and again, really anyone who keeps beating the dead horse....." JimBoHanna
Voting is now closed, results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 07:23 PM | Comments (129) | TrackBack
Results: Stuart Scott vs. Jim Gray
Scott 78, Gray 32
Gray kept it close for awhile, but Stuart Scott pulled away starting at about the quarter mark and went on to an easy victory. Scott becomes a deserving first member of the Egregious Eight.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 07:17 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
August 05, 2005
Joe Morgan vs. Woody Paige
2. Joe Morgan
Defeated Suzy Kolber, 100-9
Defeated Jason Whitlock, 93-43
The Opposition Case:
"LET ME TELL YOU SOMETHING MORGAN... YOU ARE A GASBAG. WHEN I FIND YOU, I WILL BEAT YOU OVER THE HEAD WITH MY COPY OF MONEYBALL. IN FACT, I DON'T EVEN AGREE WITH MONEYBALL, I DON'T EVEN LIKE MONEYBALL, BUT I LOVE TO PISS PEOPLE OFF SO I WILL BEAT YOU DOWN WITH MY COPY OF IT. AND THEN, WHEN YOU LEAST EXPECT, I HAVE PAID JAY MARIOTTI $250 TO SPIT IN YOUR FACE YOU OVERRATED OLD HACK. HAVE YOU EVEN READ MY BRILLIANT COLUMNS? I DON'T THINK SO. BECAUSE IF YOU DID, YOU MIGHT LEARNS SOMETHING, JOE. I AM BUSY TEACHING JAY MARIOTTI A LESSON DAILY, SO MAYBE I NEED TO SWITCH GEARS AND TEACH YOU A THING OR TWO."
The People Speak:
"His arrogant, self-absorbed commentating drives me up the wall, and his voice could crack asphalt, it's that grating. And no matter what's happening right in front of him, he'll keep blabbing, even if the game before him BLATANTLY CONTRADICTS EVERYTHING HE'S SAYING!" -- Jenny
"The best second baseman of all time AND the worst sports journalist of his generation." -- John
"To hear Joe "analyze" something is to have a thousand conflicting bits of evidence blissfully woven into an unholy tapestry of preposterous conclusions and repeated as gospel for the remainder of the game only to have another howler that completely repudiates it proferred the next night without nary a blush at the self contradiction." -- Spike
"He could have been good. He could have been a useful and entertaining color man. Instead, he deliberately, purposefully *chose* to be stupid. And now we're stuck with that, week in and week out, until he dies." -- Sweeper
"Joe Morgan should be sending checks to Tim McCarver, because that's the only reason he's not the worst color man in baseball. Listening to him is like watching a completely different game to the one being played." -- Chris
"If Joe Morgan the player, circa mid-1970s, were transported in time to 2005, Joe Morgan the announcer would hate him. While loathing the very type of player you were is rather unique for an announcer, it is idiotic in this case." -- P Clark
"Morgan in a landslide. This moron went on and on in a SNB Red Sox broadcast about how they did not re-sign Pedro because he's a "superstar." WTF? As if you just hand out huge long term deals to declining stars just like that? Plus, the Moneyball thing...just unbearable on every level. And one more thing, if the replay shows the guy is out, YOU CAN ADMIT YOU WERE WRONG. You dont have to guess the result on EVERY close play." -- FWA
Versus
6. Woody Paige
Defeated Tom Tolbert, 86-20
Defeated Joe Theismann, 88-67
The Opposition Case:
"Woody Paige knows absolutely nothing. Though I have not actually read any of his columns nor I have even seen his work on Television, and frankly, I am not even sure what he looks like, I can promise you he's wrong, he knows nothing and if he would like to have a lesson on what is wrong with Baseball and what is right with Baseball, he should read my ESPN columns. I imagine Woody probably spends most of his time sitting around admiring terrible second basemen like Ryne Sandberg, drinking beer and thinking that on base percentage is the only way to go. He'd be wrong. I have come to the conlusion that Billy Beane is in fact the devil and I am here to deliver all Baseball fans from the likes of Moneyball and anyone who would support it. You know, I could go on and on about this subject and why Woody Paige clearly does not know what he's talking about, so I think I will..."
The People Speak:
"Paige barely knows how to speak, in addition to not knowing what he's talking about. My favorite was when, on an episode of "Around the Horn," he predicted that some football player would have a bad game because 'it's really, really cold in the South.'" -- Stephen Silver
"How a man who is that incoherent is allowed to be on THREE different shows on ESPN is beyond me. I find it especially funny when he is actually DOLING OUT ADVICE AND CRITICISM on Dream Job, saying things like, "I wanted you to be a little more clear," and, "None of your information was original". (Note: not exact quotes, but I think I heard something like that while my hands flew to the remote control to change the channel)." -- Chesse
"There was once a time when you had to be mildly pleasant to look at and seemingly in possession of your five wits to appear on TV. Back in this golden age, Woody Paige would have been relegated to late-night public access shows in which he ranted about the Red Chinese taking over the local school board and fielding calls from like-minded nutbags and drunken college students.
"These days, he's on ESPN. A lot." -- Phil
"I travel forty-five minutes through the hellscape that is the Los Angeles 405 Freeway on my way to work every day. Recently, I've found a foolproof method to help assuage my daily dread at the prospect of of dodging careening Hummers and sitting in bumper-to-bumper gridlock: I flip on "Cold Pizza" as I get ready for work, and subject myself to a few minutes of the most banal, annoying, obtuse blathering currently found on cable television. The nonstop inanity spurs me to flee my apartment as quickly as possible, and has thus transformed my daily commute into a tranquil and serene respite from the mind-numbing stupidity of Woody Paige." -- Vic
"I would rather have a three-way with Chris Berman and Stephen A. Smith than listen to the sound of Woody Paige's voice." -- LisaJunior
"Does anyone else get the feeling that he and Skippy Bayless have hot, passionate makeout sessions between segments of 1st and 10 on Cold Pizza? They remind me of a couple that disagrees on the most obvious things just to have the makeup. Either that, or he makes the stupidest arguments about sports possible because he's a goddam idiot." -- Jim Small
Voting is now closed. Results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:13 AM | Comments (143) | TrackBack
August 04, 2005
Updated bracket
Posted by Mac Thomason at 02:44 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Stuart Scott vs. Jim Gray
1. Stuart Scott
Defeated Scott Van Pelt, 123-8
Defeated John Kruk, 111-35
The Opposition Case:
"I have unsubstantiated proof here that not only is Stuart Scott a no talent jerk that has ruined ESPN SportsCenter, but he also has a gambling problem and takes steroids. Stu, if I could have a minute with you, I would like to show America why we should hate you. Anyway, this just in... Stuart Scott is a poser... I repeat he's a poser. He's not really black and didn't grow up in the hood. He's actually a white guy posing as a black man in order to make a name for himself. Also... this just in... every athlete refers to Stuart as the 'little white weenie' behind his back. Finally, I have a report here that says that "Dream Job" sucks and please ESPN, to save the show you must "fire" Stuart Scott." -- Jim Gray
The People Speak:
"He's EVERYWHERE, sort of like those microscopic hairy crawling things that inhabit your furniture. If he were safely confined to the late SportsCenter, where I could just go to bed to avoid watching him, that would be fine, but instead he's on ALL DAY. Every dumb show ESPN comes up with to fill airtime somehow has Stuart Scott and his obnoxious ghetto-wannabe attitude oozing into my living room." -- Jenny
"Stu Scott no doubt here. "Holla at a playa when you see him in the streets." lol!!! I've never seen anyone try so hard for street cred." -- Tre-4
"Most of all, there's thnis: he nbever tells us about the game. He's too busy listening to himself give a shout out to Ray-Ray, and Keshia, and Ashey Larry, and ..." -- Colin
"I ain't gonna say nothin', but he ain't right." -- Ed K.
"Stuart is as urban hip as Carlton from The Fresh Prince of Bel Air. SportsCenter won't get better until Stuart's corpse is as cool as the other side of the pillow, Dog." -- Chris
"Here is the real question I have about Stuart Scott. Does he think what he is saying is remotely cool or hip, or does he realize what a humongous idiot he sounds like and is doing such things in a post-modern attempt to own the expectations the public had previously made about black anchors inserting slang into their broadcasts?" -- (A different) Chris
"I think the thing that's put him over the top is the glasses... now he's become like Urkel trying to be hip." -- Chris Lawrence
Versus
4. Jim Gray
Defeated Trev Alberts, 100-26
Defeated Jeff Brantley, 90-42
The Opposition Case:
"Boo-Yah! Watch me be like Mike and take it down the lane for a little razzle dazzle on Jim Gray. Jim is a little white man with no game... He didn't grow up on the mean streets of Charlotte as a brother like me. My plan is to distract Gray with a giant cut-out of my dog Kobe in his briefs... Gray will be so drawn to the Kobe cut-out, that I can sneak around him like I was back in Chapel Hill and 20,000 heel homies were schillin' for me as I smoothly destroy little Jim-bo Gray." -- Stuart Scott
The People Speak:
"He misrepresents comments by some individuals while interviewing other individuals in a petty, slimeball attempt at getting an interesting reaction." -- Joey T
"A schmuck, plain and simple." -- Bill McCabe
"Gray somehow looks like the dirty one when he stands next to Marv Albert." -- Matt
"As far as I can tell Gray is only around becuase he can get interviews with Kobe Bryant due to his endless sucking up." -- Adam
"Gray just weirds me out, and someone needs to remind him (preferably with a blunt object) that the reporter is only the vehicle for delivering the news, not the news himself." -- John in Austin
"He has to be the WORST sideline reporter in the history of sports, a profession which is moronic enough to begin with is just brought lower by a man trying desperately to be taken seriously." -- Gavin
"His first thought each morning must be, 'Whose ass am I going to kiss today?'" -- Shannin
Voting is now closed. Results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 02:22 PM | Comments (110) | TrackBack
Second Round Results: Mike Krzyzewski Subregional
Bayless 110, Fowler 2
Skip Bayless won the most lopsided victory of the tournament so far. Only two people voted for Fowler. One said he hates Bayless too, the other just felt sorry for him. There were six times as many null votes as Fowler votes. Bayless actually equalled Fowler's Libertarian-like vote total in the other matchup, where he wasn't a contestant. He may be a #2 seed, but he's #666 in everyone's heart.
Bowa 62, Kiper 31
It may not matter much who faces Bayless in the Sour Sixteen, but Larry Bowa doubled up Mel Kiper for a surprisingly easy victory. Look at it this way -- just being one of 32 makes Mel a first-round pick!
Posted by Mac Thomason at 12:43 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
August 03, 2005
This is gonna suck
Disney's ESPN2 to debut sports-Hollywood show - Yahoo! News
The new half-hour show, "ESPN Hollywood," is set to debut Aug. 15, with first-week segments spotlighting the likes of basketball icon Shaquille O'Neal, sibling tennis champions Serena and Venus Williams and NFL star quarterback Tom Brady.But the focus of each piece will be on their off-field -- or off-court -- performance as celebrities, such as Shaq spinning records as a nightclub DJ or Brady posing for a photo shoot in GQ magazine.
Yeah, anything to avoid showing actual sporting events. We're rapidly reaching the stage where the World Series of Poker is one of the more athletic events on the network.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 12:19 PM | Comments (14) | TrackBack
Second Round Results: Christian Laettner Subregional
Vitale 79, Phelps 18
Dick Vitale rebounded from his first round scare to smash Digger Phelps and strike a blow for the follically challenged against the overly haired. Nobody cares what Phelps thinks.
Mariotti 81, Cook 11
Jay Mariotti crushed Beano Cook and moves on to face Vitale. Someone might want to wake up Beano and give him the news. Or not.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 10:01 AM | Comments (19) | TrackBack
August 02, 2005
Larry Bowa vs. Mel Kiper
3. Larry Bowa (Defeated Mark Jackson, 67-34)
The Case Against:
"[Expletive deleted] Larry Bowa [Expletive deleted]! [Obscene gerund]!" -- Phil
"I could never understand how Bowa kept a major league manager job so long, but how he got on ESPN is really a mystery." -- Randy
"He'd have to act like the jerk he was on the field and destroy a toilet with a bat live on the air for me to reconsider." -- Charles Kuffner
Versus
6. Mel Kiper (Defeated Ron Jaworski, 65-34)
The Case Against:
"Kiper appears to be incredibly knowledgeable about a lot of college players, but since there's approximately 30 people on earth who could call him on it (and they all work for NFL scouting departments), there's no real way to have any confidence in what he's saying, except going back and checking it years later. Which no one does." -- Bill Walsh
"Mel, if you make 82 first-round mock drafts, you'll get at least 1/3 of the guys right." -- Wyrn
"I don't need you to start forecasting the 2006 draft the day after the 2005 draft." -- Chris
"I look forward to when the NFL Draft ends every year because it means he goes away." -- Ed
"Ever hear him try to talk about something other than the NFL draft while co-hosting an ESPN radio show? He'd be better off talking about his hair ..." -- Pankleb
Voting is now closed. Results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:45 AM | Comments (97) | TrackBack
Skip Bayless vs. Chris Fowler
2. Skip Bayless (Defeated Kirk Herbstreit, 110-8)
The Case Against:
"He just seems to be the sourest human being I have ever read. In fact, my hate for his continued existence as a human being may turn me into someone that is just as bad as he is." -- Chris
"He is the poster-boy for everything wrong with info-tainment." -- "Pantsless" Joe
"He is the worst of the worst (yes, including Stephen A. Smith and Mr. Boo-yaah). He has nothing postive to say about anyone. If someone accomplishes something big, you can bank on it that Skippy will tear it down." -- djcolts
"I forgot how much I hated him until I saw his picture there and it made me want to break my monitor." -- Sharon
"He's like the mean drunken family member who tells all of the family secrets just to make himself feel better. Except the drunk is more logical." -- Buzz
"A spineless, brainless pig." -- Peter
"I'm waiting for the NIH study that conclusively proves my informal hypothesis that listening to him kills brain cells." -- Jeremy B.
Versus
10. Chris Fowler (Defeated Greg Anthony 54-47)
The Case Against:
"I can't remember what he did, but his face has triggered some powerful hatred inside me, so I figure he did something bad." -- Jenny
"Actually makes on air claims that there is no anti-SEC bias on ESPN. Then intro's an SEC hit piece to prove it." -- Downtown ATL
Voting is now closed. Results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:37 AM | Comments (124) | TrackBack
Second Round Preview: Mike Krzyzewski Subregional
JAMES BROWN: Welcome to the Fox Sports studios, where I'm joined by Terry, Howie, and Jimmy, and we're taking a look at the Mike Krzyzewski bracket in the Duke Regional. First up, Skip Bayless versus Chris Fowler. Terry, your thoughts on this matchup?
TERRY BRADSHAW: Whoo, this is gonna be a blowout. Chris Fowler ain't got no chance against Bayless. Everybody hates Bayless.
HOWIE LONG: As they should, because he hates everybody. Fowler is going down hard.
BROWN: The other matchup should be closer, Larry Bowa versus Mel Kiper. Your thoughts, Jimmy?
JIMMY JOHNSON: Well, I dealt with Kiper when I was with the Cowboys and Dolphins and ESPN was covering the draft. He's like a big old puppy following you around. "Who are you going to take, huh, Jimmy? What are you looking for, huh?" Sooner or later you tell him anything just to get him to go away. I like Larry Bowa, he has a football attitude.
BRADSHAW: Whoa, there, pardner. You didn't do your homework there, did ya? In the first round, everybody hated on Bowa, while a lot of folks just voted for Kiper 'cause they liked Jaws. Bowa's got this one in the bag.
BROWN: Care to break the tie, Howie?
HOWIE LONG: Well, JB, I hate to agree with Terry. [UNDER HIS BREATH: You have no idea how much.] But Bowa is awful, and he should advance easily.
BROWN: Okay, then, two out of three say Bowa. Let's send it to Durham for the call. Joe?
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:36 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Second Round Results: Jerry Jones Subregional
Berman 45, Salisbury 40
The clock ran out for Sean Salisbury, who mounted a furious late run at #1 seed Chris Berman only to fall short at the end. Salisbury will take out his frustrations on John Clayton.
LeBatard 51, Phillips 20
Meanwhile, Dan LeBatard easily handled Steve Phillips, who was busy trying to line up another GM job. Billy Beane would love to give him a reference.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 08:18 AM | Comments (8) | TrackBack
August 01, 2005
Dick Vitale vs. Digger Phelps
1. Dick Vitale (Defeated Linda Cohn, 66-51)
The Case Against:
"Dick Vitale is probably my least favorite person ever." -- Greg
"Vitale's the one guy on ESPN who can regularly provoke me into actual screaming rage, especially with his moronic, willfully un-educated ranting during the draft. Here's hoping he goes all the way." -- Devin McCullen
"He makes anything he is on completely unwatchable without use of the mute button." -- Larry
"I wish he would just shut up about how great Duke is when he is broadcasting other games." -- James G.
"Is there any doubt he suffers from a severe case of xenophobia after watching his NBA draft 'commentary?'"? -- J. Rauch
"You could kill Dick Vitale and his entire family with a chainsaw, and as long as you could get them to play one of his March Madness promos for the jury, you couldn't possibly be convicted." -- delg
"does vitale have a family, wife, kids? i'm assuming they are all in mental institutions." -- X
Versus
9. Digger Phelps (Defeated Tony Kornheiser, 65-38)
The Case Against:
"In the hallowed tradition of Packer, he knows what everyone on the court is thinking at any given moment and will not hesitate to communicate that to you." -- Cy Young
"He's just not good at anything." -- Paul
"Wishing Mr. Phelps would self-destruct in 5 seconds..." -- Ed
Voting is now closed. Results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 12:15 PM | Comments (98) | TrackBack
Beano Cook versus Jay Mariotti
13. Beano Cook (Defeated Brent Musberger, 53-41)
The Case Against:
"The sight of Beano Cook's neck has turned me off from ever eating a Thanksgiving turkey ever again. His radio appearances with Crank Oldberg, er, Hank Goldberg, should be used by the powers-that-be at Gitmo to torture Al-Qaeda prisoners." -- Greg
"They wheel him out for the occasional commentary like they just shocked him back to the living." -- John in Austin
"Still things the single wing is innovative." -- Ron
"Beano needs to advance - though I'm not sure if he'd know it if he didn't." -- Dewey
Versus
5. Jay Mariotti (Defeated Buster Olney, 84-20)
The Case Against:
"The eyebrows. The puffiness. The yelling. It's just too much." -- Eric
"I'd like to punch him in the mouth until my arm got tired and then switch hands." -- Spike
"I thought when four-letter was going the more provocative route in punditry, they didn't mean provocative as in 'I want to punch that punk in the mouth when I see him.'" -- Quinten Ross
"If the sports columnist-as-talking-head trend must continue, let's at least make sure the columnist in question can string two sentences together without sounding like a tool, hmmmm?" -- Phil
"For a while, I didn't think anyone could actually be that much of an insufferable bastard. Then I woke up. My hatred for him burns with the fire of a thousand stars. A man who has earned the right to be punched in the balls every day for the rest of his life." -- Edevay [A lot of people want to punch Jay Mariotti. -- MT]
"Didnt he play eddie munster in a former life?" -- Rip
"You have to be a gigantic jackass to turn Woody Paige into a sympathetic character." -- Arford
Voting is now closed. Results coming soon.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 12:10 PM | Comments (93) | TrackBack
Second Round Preview: Christian Laettner Subregional
Dickie Victory by the Anonymous GuyThis bracket is more poorly designed than the seats in Fenway Park. Why are Digger Phelps and Dick Vitale meeting in the second round? Anyway, as terrible as Phelps is, Vitale drives me nuts. Why was this guy allowed to cover the NBA Draft? He hates the NBA! ESPN has hundreds of millions of dollars invested in the NBA, they have a dozen or more NBA commentators, and they bring in Dickie V to trash the product? I can't believe David Stern lets them do that. If they plan to use Vitale in next year's draft, expect to see him meet with a little "accident" before then.
Not to get on a rant here, but Vitale is so horrible that I can't believe anyone would vote for Linda Cohn. Now, as far as I'm concerned they should never let women on SportsCenter, and if they are they should only be picked for reasons of attractiveness, but come on, this is Vitale! It's like if you had a choice between watching both Godfather movies or A Few Good Men. No matter how good the latter movie is, this is The Godfather! You'd choose that every day and twice on Sundays! I will not argue about this.
AG's Pick: Vitale by 40
I just can't get worked up about the other matchup. I don't even know who Beano Cook is. Who watches college football? Jay Mariotti is just another reporter turned talking head, and not the worst of them, but compared to some old sloth nobody's heard of, he's an easy pick.
AG's Pick: Mariotti by 30
Posted by Mac Thomason at 12:09 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
Second Round Results: Jimmy Johnson Subregional
Ryan 54, Legler 29
Bob Ryan ended Tim Legler's Cinderella dreams with a smashing victory, taking an early lead and building it from there. Legs is down with that.
Reali 50, Tirico 34
Stat Boy jumped out to a 7-0 lead and held on from there for the mild upset. Tirico was too busy groping to have a comment.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 12:02 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Updated bracket
Bristol.pdf (application/pdf Object)
Thanks once again to Bill.
Posted by Mac Thomason at 09:29 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Put on all the makeup you want
ESPN's New Master of the Offensive Foul - New York Times
He's still going to look like Stephen A. Smith. And I still can't believe they gave him his own show. (Registration required, use BugMeNot as desired, yada yada.)
Posted by Mac Thomason at 09:20 AM | Comments (13) | TrackBack