[originally posted April 27, 2004]
This column is going to sound like marketing copy (and trust me, I’m no marketer) but we need some fresh blood in sports journalism. I’ve been working on Sportscolumn 2.0 for a little bit of time now. It’s slow going but that’s what happens when you have no deadline and you actually have a full time job. (This is also my excuse for not having posted anything in 3 weeks.) Today, I read an article that really sent me over the edge and was another example of why SC 2.0 is needed. Am I hyperbolizing? Absolutely. But I talk to a lot of sports fans and everyone is sick of the traditional media outlets as well. Think about the writers that you read. How many of them do you actually like? 1 out of 5? 1 out of 10?
Let me give you a bit of background. In every major sports city, there is a journalist, whether in print, radio or tv, that everyone hates. I mean absolutely loathes. In Denver, they have Mark Kizla of the Denver Post. In Philly, we have the double whammy of Stephen A. Smith and Howard Eskin. Then you have the national media, with assclowns (not exactly sure what that expression means but it is so fitting) like Sean Salisbury and Merril Hoge. Then you have Stephen A. Smith again on NBA2Night.
SAS is absolutely the worst professional sports journalist I’ve ever read. The only reason he has any kind of pull is because of his relationship with Iverson and his “inside sources” on NBA teams. If you ever read any of his opinion columns, you’ll quickly realize that 1) he’ll play the race card whenever he can and 2) he’s a goddamn joke. (My loyal readers from Philly – please feel free to add your examples of SAS’ terrible columns.)
The article that set me off today was “Sixers Can Take Cue from Knicks”. What?! The Sixers want to follow a sub-.500 team that got swept out in the first round of the playoffs? The Knicks are knee deep in salary cap hell and they hired Isiah Thomas to turn the ship around. ISIAH THOMAS! What is Isiah’s track record on managing organizations? Toronto? Great job. CBA? Even better. Coaching the Pacers? That worked out well.
Seems to me that that model to follow might be the Nuggets? But nope. Denver is too far away. SAS prefers to kiss ass that’s within driving distance.
So What is SC 2.0?
Why am I so pissed off? Because that’s my personality. But also, if the readers could vote, do you think Stephen A. Smith would ever get read? He’d be pushed to the back back back pages until he finally had to settle for hawking popcorn at the next Sixers game.
Sportscolumn 2.0 is going to allow the readers to vote on what gets published to the front page, what gets dumped, and what gets ridiculed. I read a lot of message boards and there are true fans out there that have more insight in a two paragraph post than these professional writers do in 500 words of dog vomit. It seems their only intent is to meet their deadlines, get the word count up, and say something so stupid, it’ll get emailed around. To me, these writers and tv analysts are like terrible pop music. We have to stop buying or the corporations will just keep churning out more of this shit. Damn the corporate bastards! (Whooo.. time to go buy some LSD and follow the Dead around.)
It’s time we stopped supporting these know nothing, lazy sports writers who spew ridiculous crap. Plus, do you really want a half page scrolling ad and a reminder to download ESPN motion at page turn?
Viva la Revolution!
