I'm just disappointed they didn't post my phone number on the show. Maybe next time.

Anyway, hopefully some of the glitches and pinwheeling that went on with the new comment system today will be worked out in the near future, perhaps tomorrow, next year or never. We'll see.

Tomorrow: Very Special Guest Editor days are here again. Your host will be Yoni Brenner, Shouts & Murmurer and a screenwriter on Ice Age 3: Dawn Of The Dinosaurs. So expect a strong dose of highfalutin cartoon humor.

*******

Thanks for your continued support of Deadspin. Pass it around.

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From an ESPN radio affiliate employee:

Doesn't ESPN Radio know where its bread is buttered? Sure they have their owned/operated stations in major markets and their satellite radio and dot-com connections, but now they're taking to the airwaves bashing the local stations that carry them as well as those that do not. The majority of the country hears ESPN Radio on stations that air them solely as filler between revenue-producing local shows, and now they're being blindsided by Bristol... Below is the e-mail sent to ESPN Radio affiliate stations today, along with the link to the TV and radio spots which ridicule local radio...

A new take on ESPN Radio's "You know us. We know sports." marketing campaign developed by ESPN and Wieden + Kennedy, New York encourages sports talk radio listeners to find their radio host matches. Giving a nod to the popular dating site Match.com, three TV and two radio spots running on ESPN networks and ESPN Radio stations poke fun at the difficult relationships many listeners have with their local sports radio stations, and how it might be time to find their true matches at ESPN Radio. National ESPN Radio hosts Scott Van Pelt (Tirico and Van Pelt), Colin Cowherd (The Herd) and Mike Golic and Mike Greenberg (Mike and Mike in the Morning) appear in the spots. In addition, Jimmy Rollins of the World Series champion Philadelphia Phillies makes a cameo.

To complement the spots, listeners can go to a dedicated micro site to evaluate their potential radio host match. Many national ESPN Radio personalities provide a personal introduction explaining why listeners should choose them as their match.

And here's one of the spots:

Remember that ESPN infuriated its affiliate stations just a few weeks ago when the company asked for $100,000 from local stations to air their programming. I guess these spots are dedicated to the ones who didn't pay up.

Oh, also of note: From Colin Cowherd's Radio Match page:

5 Things I Can't Live Without

Cell phone
Lip balm
Gym
My kids
Footed PJs

Oops.

Do you like the Colin Cowherd? Do you not like the Colin Cowherd? Go, we guess.

Gawker Media polls require Javascript; if you're viewing this in an RSS reader, click through to view in your Javascript-enabled web browser.

Remember that inmate who files all those ridiculous and hilarious lawsuits against celebrities? Well, he filed one earlier this week against Colin Cowherd. It's pretty awesome.

I'm suffering ear poisoning weekdays at 10 a.m. Eastern from listening to the defendant on my Walkman. ... I'm subjected to lies and propaganda from "The Herd."

Here's the full "suit," generously provided to us by our friends at The Smoking Gun.

Sean Taylor, great player has a history of really really bad judgment, really really bad judgment. Cops, assault, spitting, DUI. I'm supposed to believe his judgment got significantly better in two years, from horrible to fantastic? 'But Colin he cleaned up his act.' Well yeah, just because you clean the rug doesn't mean you got everything out. Sometimes you've got stains, stuff so deep it never ever leaves.

No, all the information's not in. But I feel pretty confident that my gut feeling, like any of yours, by the way, is right and was right.

DC Sports Bog does an amazing job taking Cowherd apart, and we can't recommend reading him enough. And we promise, now, there will be no more mentions of Colin Cowherd on Deadspin again. Promise. We don't want to make the guy more famous, as the saying goes.

Some of the politer terms my correspondents used to describe [Schrutebag]'s behavior were immature, irresponsible, arrogant, malicious, destructive and dumb. I agree. The official response from ESPN's communication department was: "Our airwaves should not be used for this purpose. We apologize." It is the kind of bland public statement that does little to assuage the anger and distrust of ESPN's audience over an episode like this.

Schreiber then got ESPN Radio's senior VP to say, "Such attacks are off limits. Zero tolerance. I can't say it any stronger." So she's not messing around; we have a little bit of a crush. (For now.)

So that's the good news. The bad news? Because ESPN Radio had no official policy about this, Schrutebag will not be disciplined ... though if he does it again, there will be trouble! Meanwhile, The Big Lead is finally back online and looking for a new site host. No word on how they'll make up any revenue they lost during the attack; as much as she might be trying, Schreiber can't give this tale a happy ending.

Radio Hosts Attack Was Off Limits [ESPN]
Do It Again And The Kitten Dies [The Big Lead]
The Big Lead, Still Down. Thanks, Schrutebag. [Deadspin]

(UPDATE: The Big Lead discusses the matter further.)

If you have attempted to access The Big Lead over the last 24 hours, the attractive image above — good Lord, those rectangles are ENORMOUS ... and they're headed straight for us! — is all you've been able to see. It's pretty, but it ain't that pretty.

That's right, folks: Almost 24 hours after Colin Cowherd's little stunt yesterday, The Big Lead is still down. We contacted the editor to see how they were hanging in. Here's their report:

It's a weird, powerless feeling - we're on the playground with the rest of the first graders and, without provocation, some angry-at-the-world sixth grader comes over and drops you with a roundhouse you didn't see coming. What's that about, Colin? We still don't know if this was your sly way of saying you enjoy the site, or whether you did it so people would 'talk about you.' Either way, thanks. Major kudos are in order to sports bloggers everywhere. And readers, too. The support has been incredible.

The best part: With the blog down, we finally get to leave our parents' basement and see the light of day! What a productive Easter weekend it'll be!

Meanwhile, Cowherd's show starts soon. The guys at KSK have been trying to come up with a universally accepted name for which Cowherd shall heretofore be known, and they have settled on "Schrutebag." We find that one perfect. From now on, he's Schrutebag.

This Hurts Us More Than It Hurts You, Schrutebag [Deadspin]

However: Today, upset with something The Big Lead had written about him (or someone, or something, imagined or otherwise), Cowherd told his listeners to unleash a DNS attack on the site. One of the tech people here at Gawker Media tells us: "When someone floods a website with so many fake hits that the servers get overloaded, the site, essentially, goes down. A programmer could write a script to load the website once a second." That appears to be what happened; The Big Lead was down for about half an hour after the announcement, though it's up and running again now.

Now. We're still not sure why Cowherd decided to go after The Big Lead — we're the ones who said he sucks in a headline — but we're not mad at him. We really just kind of feel sad. It must be frustrating to have a fan base only because of your affiliation with a Vader-esque national network, to want to feel "freewheeling" and "controversial" when your name is Colin. We understand how alone it can feel to realize that the game has passed you by, that the same schtick you've made your "career" out of is in danger of collapsing in on itself like a dying star. When one is threatened and scared, one tends to lash out at the ones they love. So we are sorry, Colin; we can't imagine how hard it must be to go through what you're going through. You're in our thoughts.

Oh, and go ahead and try that shit with us. We dare you.

Why Your National Radio Host Sucks: Colin Cowherd [Deadspin]

(UPDATE: And yes: The Big Lead is still down. Grrrr.)

A reader braved the wilds of ESPN Radio to listen in, and sends us this rough transcript:

Cowherd: Two things we take a lot of pride in. . .One we try to be different. . .Two is work ethic. . .the least we owe you is a really good day's work. . that said, last Wednesday, at this very time. . . last 5 minutes of the show we presented a very funny and very smartly written fake Wonderlic test. . .the people who run michiganzone.blogspot created it. . they were furious with us. . .they deserve all the credit because it was very smart and very funny. . today, mzone gets the credit for this. . we have no problem with giving people credit. . .you tell us where you got it, we will give you credit. . .burden falls on me, its my show. . .last Wednesday, I didn't do a good enough job checking. . there you go. . you can go to Google and punch up Mzone. . they are absolutely killing me and that's fine. . .interesting thing about all this is. . .all this really got me going this weekend. . emotions flowing. . .I wrote a book this weekend. . .called "To Kill A Mockingbird". . totally original. . talks about social issues.. ."

So, Cowherd apologizes under pressure from ESPN, and The M Zone gets a nice little week of traffic out of this whole business. And we all can hold hands and smile and laugh about the old days, back when radio people pilfered items found online and used them without credit. Those were the days, weren't they? So glad they're past us.

The M Zone
"Much Of The Information You Read Is Unreliable" [Gelf Magazine]
Doing The Right Thing. Eventually. [Deadspin]

Krulewitz also said that Cowherd admits his e-mails in response to his theft were "an overreaction." That's not quite how I see them—the words "arrogant" and "total dickbag" come to mind—but I guess it will have to do. It's a step in the right direction.

And as I noted the other day, this whole thing really could not have worked out better for the folks at the M Zone. Not only does Cowherd end up giving them the credit that they deserve, but the hits that they've gotten from the controversy have to be just off the charts. Well-deserved for them. And as a special bonus for all of us, Colin Cowherd was served a little public humiliation.

Why Your National Radio Host Sucks [Deadspin.com]
'Much of the Information You Read Is Unreliable' [Gelf Magazine]
Colin CowherdItSomewhereElseFirst Responds [The M Zone]

During Wednesday's show on ESPN Radio, Colin Cowherd read to his listeners a copy of "the real Wonderlic test." The questions, obvious parodies, were funny and a hoot for his listeners. The problem? He didn't write them. The questions were written by the excellent Michigan bloggers over at M Zone. Did Cowherd credit them for writing them? Absolutely not.

And here's where it gets good. When The M Zone folks wrote to Cowherd and asked for a little credit, the ESPN host responded rather, um, tersely.

WE WERE SENT IT....WE HAD NO IDEA..BUT THE INCESSANT WHINING...MEANS I WON'T GIVE YOU CREDIT NOW..GET OVER IT. CC

Needless to say, blogs have been buzzing ever since, with the best takes appearing over at Every Day Should Be Saturday, MGo Blog and of course at The M Zone itself. Here's the original piece, posted at The M Zone on March 1. Another Cowherd response can be found here. As for us, we get a kick out of how Cowherd said he "found the piece on the Internet," like he was walking down the street and happened to spot it in the gutter.

A note — once again — for those of you who read "the Internet." The "Internet" is produced by people, human beings; it is not something that just appears, zap!, out of the ether. When you read something on "the Internet," it was written by someone, a person who has a dog, eats cereal in the morning and pays his/her electric bill. It didn't just show up; it belongs to someone. You can't just take it. It's pretty amazing we have to keep saying this.

ESPN Radio's Colin Cowherd 'Borrows' M Zone Material [The M Zone]
Asshole of the Year [Burnt Orange Nation]
The Herd With Colin Cowherd [ESPN Radio]

(After the jump, by the way, a sample Wonderlic test for Cowherd from HockeyDirt.)

——————————————————————
1. When you read an interesting column online or in a newspaper you should:
a) add it to the list of accomplishments on your resume
b) sent it to your Mom to show her just how smart you are
c) re-type it and shop it around to various publications
d) fire off an angry letter to the editor claiming that you thought of everything in the column first

2) When you get caught stealing something you should:
a) go with the Palmiero defense; "Let me start by telling you this: I have never stolen anything, period."
b) go with the teenager defense; "I didn't steal it, somebody sent it to me, I have no idea where it came from!"
c) go with the Bonds defense; attempt to tarnish the reputation of your accusers, claiming that they have a hidden "agenda"
d) call your accusers whiners who need to "get over it" and generally behave like a jerk.