Theismann-Kimmel, BFF

Who's The Next Person To Get Banned From Monday Night Football

AJ Daulerio's Cultural Oddsmaker runs every Friday. Email him to let him know what you think.

Dumpy talk show host Jimmy Kimmel's banning from Monday Night Football based on what MNF producer Jay Rothman called his "classless" and "disappointing" comments is quite a monumental achievement, especially since it appeared he had a cozy, collegial relationship with the WWL. Whether it was ESPY-hosting gigs or his consistent shout-outs from the Sports Feller, Kimmel appeared to be on the network's good people-list. That is until Monday Night Football, when he playfully tweaked Joe Theismann and made some Brady-model-impregnation joke. Faster than you could say "Tirico Tits!", Kimmel was vanquished.

I understand that in life and especially in work there are lines that needn't be crossed (really, I do), but this seems excessive — even coming from a company who doesn't allow its employees to take home up-rooted trees to be re-planted. But a banning a comedian who works at your own network, who gets paid (essentially) by the same employer, is harsh. I have experienced the humiliation from an utterly dumbfounding banning.

Here's the situation: I was hanging out at my friend Rich's house with a couple other friends. His parents weren't home. We were watching the videotape of "Fanny Hill," a low-budget porno that someone had secretly taped the night before off cable. I went into his bathroom to go piss, but realized that I was still sporting an erection that can only occur when an 11-year-old just watched a grainy porno featuring an ample-chested redheaded woman getting boinked in a haystack for the first time in his life. The sucker wouldn't go down, yet the urine was coming. I did not have time to take the requisite three steps back nor control the trajectory of the stream. I hit the top of the toilet. The walls. The rug. Underneath the bowl. By time this unholy yellow geyser had dissipated, the bathroom was ruined. I couldn't have made a more disgusting mess had I walked in there blindfolded and hurled a pee-filled water balloon.

Apparently, my clean-up abilities were also a bit off. And apparently, the purple hand-towels with the flowers were not to be used to sop-up such dreadful things and, if they were used for that purpose, they were not to be sloppily re-hung on the wall while still damp. Rich's mother came home later that evening, long after I'd left, and, terrified, yelled to her son "Who Pissed All Over The Bathroom?" It didn't take long to figure out that I was the culprit, being that I had nervously left his house in a panic soon after the incriminating accidental explosion. The next day my mom received a phone call from Rich's mother. Between the afternoon of conspicuous "Fanny Hill"-watching (she found out about that as well after the tape was left in the VCR), her urine-soaked guest bathroom and ruined hand-towels, she relayed to my mother that I was no longer a welcome as a guest in their home. I was a reckless savage. In fact, one could probably categorize these actions as a little disappointing and classless.

But Jimmy Kimmel? Not so much. But his predicament sends a strict message to all future guests stepping foot inside that hallowed booth: compose yourselves accordingly or risk permanent banishment.

So this week, I'm flicking Joe Theismann's inflamed prostate, pissing all over Jay Rothman's hand towels and placing odds on the next guest to be permanently booted from Monday Night Football this year.

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What Will Be Cut From This Year's ESPY Awards?

AJ Daulerio's Cultural Oddsmaker runs every Friday. Email him to let him know what you think.

One of the funniest moments, in my opinion, in history happened at the ESPY Awards. In 1998, the ceremony was hosted by Norm MacDonald, post SNL, pre-Dirty Work, who spent most of the night dancing around controversial topics and went for the soft jokes until Peyton Manning won the award for college player of the year. After Peyton left the stage, MacDonald congratulated him and unleashed perhaps the gutsiest joke ever: Manning, he said, had won the Heisman Trophy which nobody could ever take away from him unless he killed "his wife and a waiter." Groans. Silence. The pan of the dumbstruck crowd (many of which would probably be considered O.J. Simpson's peers) was stunning. By his expression, it appeared that if Emmitt Smith had a gun, he would have shot Norm MacDonald right in the face at that moment — and he probably would've received a standing ovation.

Most of the time, the ESPYs don't run like this. They're a well-oiled combination of every major televised awards show, except most of its guests will be wearing Under Armour undeneath their tuxedos. (Click. Clack.) On July 15, ESPN will air the ceremony (that actually takes place on July 11) with Jimmy Kimmel and LeBron James hosting this year. One of these men is positioned to be the most recognizable face in professional sports; Kimmel, on the other hand, is known for his milquetoast talk show, inexplicably having regular sex with Sarah Silverman and indirectly launching the writing career of the floppy-haired Midwestern boy who oversees this Web site. Sure, Kimmel can be funny sometimes, but he's also been known to toe the company line when necessary. And most of this night will be centered around weak steroid jokes, a few minutes of self-deprecating fat-white-guy-hosting-a-sports-awards pap and wacky shoutouts to the athletes in the crowd. (Hey everybody, it's the Flying Tomato!)

But there are four full days in the editing room, so most of the really good jokes will be cleaned up and all of the gaffes will wiped away for Disney-fied consumption. Hey everybody, it's the Flying Tomato.

So this week, I'm putting on my Jim Valvano mask, sprucing up Dan Patrick's resume and placing odds on what will be cut from this year's ESPY Awards.

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