media Page 149 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

I-Team: Help Us Solve The Mystery Of Mitch Albom's Ears
Tipster Chad D. (or Chadd?) writes in, [sic]s and all:...

Dead Comedian Of The Week: Andy Kaufman, The Unlikely Bombthrower
For Comedy Week, we're running a handful of tributes in the vein of our Dead Wrestler of the Week series. Here, from the best book ever written about stand-up comedy, Phil Berger's The Last Laugh, we look at the evolution of Andy Kaufman, meshuga provocateur....

Dead Comedian Of The Week: Mitch Hedberg, The Comic's Comic
For Comedy Week, we're running a handful of tributes in the vein of our Dead Wrestler of the Week series. Here, the Masked Man looks at the legacy of Mitch Hedberg, the surrealist who developed a cult following before his death in 2005—and an even bigger one after his death....

Dead Comedian Of The Week: Vaughn Meader, Assassination Victim
For Comedy Week, we're running a handful of tributes in the vein of our Dead Wrestler of the Week series. Here, Alexander Woo, a writer and co-executive producer for HBO's True Blood, eulogizes Vaughn Meader, the wildly popular JFK impersonator whose star plummeted after the assassination of his sub...

Total QB Rating: Everything Great About ESPN Multiplied By Everything Insufferable
It's been fascinating to watch ESPN roll out its new, proprietary Total Quarterback Rating over the past few days, and not just because we got to see Tirico, Gruden, and Jaws huffing and grunting and puzzling over the thing as if it were the first stone tool. ("This new measure of stats," Tirico cal...

Noted Chubby Quarterback Makes Widely Derided Prediction
Rex Grossman is the No.1 quarterback on the Redskins' depth chart. I know that means close to absolute zero in the long term, but c'mon: read that first sentence again....

Radio Guy Apologizes For Calling Giants Pitcher An "Illegal Alien"
When the Phillies and Giants sorta-brawled last night, radio guy Tony Bruno (on right in photo) sent out this Tweet: "gutless #!@%*! Giants. Bochy is a coward for having his illegal alien pitcher hit a guy since mighty Frisco boys ..." and quickly deleted it. But nothing's quickly deleted. ...

ESPN Does Not Want You To See Dick Vitale Meeting The Pope
The following directive recently went out within the ESPN empire, via its newswire:...

This Atlanta Sports Radio Guy Dares You To Call Him A Homer
Beau Bock was born and raised in the Bronx and played college football at Miami, but he's been a sports radio guy in Atlanta since 1973. We learned this about him (and quite a bit more) when we read through the even-tempered and very detailed 3,000-word partial autobiography on his website today....

It Sure Looks Some ACC Football Players Got Married In New York City Last Month
Yes, hundreds of same-sex couples lined up for the chance to get married in New York City last month. If this report from the NBC affiliate in Charlotte, NC is taken at tipster-provided face value*, Clemson University football center Dalton Freeman and defensive tackle Brandon Thompson were among ...

Did Michelle Beadle Tell Aaron Rodgers, "I Just Wanna Get Fucked" After The ESPYs? ESPN Wants To Know
Two weeks ago, after serving as ESPN's show pony during their annual ESPY Awards, Michelle Beadle hit many of the late-night parties around Los Angeles. She readily admits that. After all, she hadn't gone out at all after last year's event. And she even admits that, upon her return from L.A., she wa...

Colin Cowherd Predicts NFL Teams Will Go 268-244 This Year
Cowherd has the entire league 24 games over .500. Such optimism! It's what makes him the best. [ESPN Radio, via Dan Steinberg]...

Will ESPN's Coverage Of Northwestern's Dan Persa Convince ESPN To Cover Dan Persa? ESPN Investigates
This is a story on ESPN.com about a Heisman marketing campaign launched by Northwestern on behalf of quarterback Dan Persa. The school has purchased billboard space not in Times Square but in Bristol, Conn., near ESPN headquarters. "Northwestern," writes ESPN's Adam Rittenberg on ESPN.com, "is hopin...

Florida International University Hires Noted Sociologist Rick Sanchez
The AP reported — and a tanned portrait, complete with dapper summer hat, on the Florida International University sports site confirms — that former CNN anchor Rick Sanchez has been hired to be the radio voice of the FIU Golden Panthers football team. Sanchez has two sons at FIU....

ESPN Interview With Skateboarder Carries On Despite Possible Abduction Of Child
Last week an ESPN crew interviewed Nyjah Huston, a 16-year-old skateboarder from Davis, Calif., to talk about his preparations and expectations for this year's X-Games. Huston's interview is nothing riveting — "um, yeah, like, gonna be sick, like, you know?" — and his cause isn't helped at all by ...

ESPN's Sources Are Awfully Chatty Today
Tipsters Amos and Miles alerted us to the "Headlines" section of ESPN.com. We await the Poynter Institute's 76,000-word monograph on why Adam Schefter really just needs to sleep. [ESPN.com]...

Where NFL Rumors Are Born, Pat Devlin Is In The Details
We got an email last night from "prism" with the subject line: How Sports Media Blows, and it was a series of links in chronological order....

Don't Dream It's Over: Disney Permanently Cancels ESPN: The Weekend
Last week, we mentioned, barely suppressing our glee, that ESPYs ratings had hit their lowest point in 16 years. With similar exuberance, we gave you ESPN's condom-obsessed in-house standards bible. Death knells....

Stephen A. Smith, The Comeback Kid?
Amateur LeRoy Neiman impersonator Bob Raissman poses a disarming theory in his New York Daily News column today: Stephen A. Smith might actually be doing a good job on an ESPN outlet....

Everybody Feared The Worst When Old Man Brent Musburger Went Rogue In Vegas For A Spell
Your morning roundup for July 23, the day after we learned that high-school tennis coaches really might want to stay away from strip-club ownership....