Stool Samples

By Pat Imig and Josh Bacott
JoeSportsfan.com Staff
email:pgi@joesportsfan.com

One of the steadfast rules in the world of sports media is that the bigger the game, the bigger the headline typeface. A historic championship game along the lines of the Rose Bowl can garner a headline that takes up four or five inches of the page. As a result, the job of sports headline writer continues to be crucial for a web site or newspaper attempting to stand out amidst the gluttony of media outlets.

From what we can gather, the primary qualifications for the job are that 1.) you have some functional knowledge of sports and 2.) you are a dork. Other than that the only notable skill is the ability to take any event, game or player and turn it into a line so snappy that Fox announcer Curt Menefee would marvel.

After Vince Young and the Texas Longhorns upset defending National Champion USC three weeks ago Wednesday night, the nation’s leading headline writers sharpened their pencils and went toe to toe to see who could piece together a play on words so obvious and simplistic that even a child could appreciate it.

Roughly 250 publications around the country, including CBS Sports’ sportsline.com went the most obvious route dropping the headline “In-Vince-Able” in reference to the star Texas QB. Even by crappy headline writing standards, this was an inspired choice. It had it all, the obvious play on words, the material that had been used hundreds of time before. Headline scribes across the nation were likely dreaming of a dominant performance by Vince Young, so they could break it out. It was destiny.

Other top notch snappers that were seen courtesy to the fraternal order of nerdy headline writers included a mention of breakfast food (“A Texas Toast” - St. Louis Post-Dispatch), a reference to the Rod Stewart video featuring the freaky red-headed afro kid (“Forever Young” – msnbc.com), a simplistic double entendre (“Lone Star” next to a picture of Vince Young by himself - Sporting News) and a shout out to the most annoying over-quoted movie of the last 10 years (“Austin Power” – espn.com). And all of them were somehow able to take a memorable game and make you not want to read about it.

Keep up the good work.

Crap that actually came from somebody’s mouth

“He’s got the toughness of Allen Iverson.” – Sean Salisbury on Steve Smith

In case you didn’t hear, Jake Delhomme called Steve Smith the “Michael Jordan” of his team. That officially gives loud voices like Salisbury the green light to say anything. On the other hand, Salisbury is a basketball expert, so maybe we’re wrong.
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“We’ve got a football game here.” – Dan Dierdorf during the second half of the Steelers/Colts game

Paging Dan Dierdorf… Dr. Schlereth wants to meet with you.
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“And who will win in the battle of geniuses: Mike Shanahan or Bill Belichick?” – CBS Pre-game Voice Guy

The loser of this contest of course gets to be questioned by the media as to whether they were ever really a genius to begin with.

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“He believes his team will win if they are good enough to win” – Chris Fowler on Texas Coach Mack Brown

Mack Brown raises a great point. Cleary we can’t argue with that comment.
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“It was billed as a battle of legendary football coaches but somehow the Orange Bowl came down to a couple of place-kickers.” – ESPN College Gameday Voice Guy

The odds of a game coming down to two players as opposed to two non-playing coaches are actually much better than one might think.
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“Where’s his broom? I don’t see a broom!” – Dan Fouts on Reggie Bush after his touchdown leap and flip

Let the record show that Dan Fouts was the only person in America comparing Reggie Bush to a witch.
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“Tonight I saw the greatest game of all time!” – Lee Corso immediately after the Rose Bowl

“It was the best performance I’ve seen in quite some time.” – Kirk Herbstreit immediately after the Rose Bowl

Just take note of the difference between an illogical overreaction and an opinion that can’t be challenged.
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“There’s a frost in the air.” – Paul MaGuire upon Redskins punter Derrick Frost entering the field

We’re pretty sure Paul stayed up all night Friday thinking of that comment.
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”Craig Krenzel is behind you, Jon, so the team wants you to stay healthy.”- Phil Simms, discussing then Bengals starting quarterback Jon Kitna

Translation: Craig Krenzel sucks.
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“He showed that he is a GREAT football player. He has savvy. He's an athlete.” – Mark Schlereth on Vince Young.

Nice to see that the money spent on insightful analysis at ESPN is being wasted on obvious comments that don’t mean anything.
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"I'm not a big Gay guy" - Rick Majerus saying he’s not all that impressed by Connecticut forward Rudy Gay

It took Steve Lavin a few seconds to regain composure after that comment. This is why we love Rick Majerus…well that and the fact that he rests his belly on the studio desk while talking.
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“This is a football team that prides itself on running the football.” – Mark Schlereth on the Steelers.

“They are going to have Clinton Portis on the football field and Clinton Portis is going to demand to be on the football field." – Mark Schlereth on the Redskins

If we got paid a penny every time Mark Schlereth said “football”, we’d be sitting on our yacht in the Bahamas writing this on a diamond-encrusted laptop.
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“The Longhorns pass the “look” test. This is critical for an underdog leading up to a major sporting event.” – Pat Forde, espn.com explaining why Texas would win the Rose Bowl

Silly us, we thought it was because of their All-American Quarterback and dominant defense.
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Stat of the Week

Two weeks ago Friday in anticipation of the Wildcard weekend, 19 of the 27 stories on the ESPN.com NFL Wildcard Page were available only to “Insiders”.

A Job Well Done

Since most of the content in this column is about all things wrong, absurd, or comical in the sports media, we thought we’d give credit where credit is due - and that is to the ESPN College Gameday crew. While too often insightful and well thought out analysis is replaced by the loud and brash, Chris Fowler, Kirk Herbstreit, and Lee Corso continue to be the exception on the Bristol payroll.

Fowler is a solid studio host who keeps all news and stories in perspective while Herbstreit presents his quality analysis like a normal person. There’s nothing flashy, they just do their job, they do it well and they give the viewer the feeling that there is no real agenda here, just info and opinions. Stuck in between is Lee Corso. While Corso is more on the goofy side and isn’t afraid to overreact or throw out a ridiculous prediction (i.e. naming Chris Leak the Heismann winner after one week of college football or calling Vince Young the greatest QB in college football history 5 minutes after the Rose Bowl), his act is balanced by his two counterparts. Plus, Corso isn’t afraid to wear a mascot head in front of 50,000 people and, lets face it, mascot heads are funny.

Kudos to the College Gameday Crew. If more sports shows were like this one, this column would suck every week.

Media Rant of the Week – Disrespected by the Media

We’re just flat out sick of it. Players and teams throughout the NFL are claiming that they are being unfairly disrespected by the media, and you know what? They aren’t the only ones.

The Stool Samples crew is being disrespected too.

Sure we spend the majority of our time ripping on everything the media says and does, but every single week we read all of these magazines and newspapers, browse all kinds of websites, watch endless amounts of TV and never do we see Stool Samples getting the respect it deserves.

We see references to other columns and columnists on more popular Web sites, but no one ever talks about Stool Samples. We understand that some of the other columnists are nationally recognized and, we admit, that some of the other sites are amongst the highest traffic sites on the Web, but that doesn’t excuse the lack of coverage on this column. Frankly, we can’t think of another column that has been looked over time and time again by the media than this one. It’s just blatant disrespect and we’re using it as bulletin board material.

For those non-believers out there, Stool Samples is going to set you straight. How dare you make predictions, conduct interviews and write columns without respecting us. We’ve got news for you – we write our best columns when we’re ticked off and now, thanks to the disrespect from the same media that all but spit in the face of Tom Brady, Bill Belichick, the Jacksonville Jaguars, the Pittsburgh Steelers, Peyton Manning, Joey Porter and a host of others, we’re writing with a chip on our shoulder.

On the playoff preview shows this week, guess how many times they mentioned this column? That’s right, zero. There’s only one way to look at that – a straight dis.

I think Porter summed up our case best when he said, “it was like the 9/11 year when they wanted the Patriots (who beat the Steelers in the AFC final) to win it for the world, just for the patriotic of the world.” Exactly. We couldn’t have said it better ourselves, Joey. Clearly the media is conspiring to promote these other columns based on 9/11.

And we’re pissed.

Playmaking Made Retarded

On Saturday of Wildcard Weekend, Times Square in New York City had a strange new look to it. It didn’t have anything to do with the New Years Eve celebration that had just taken place a few days earlier. It wasn’t another TRL stunt on MTV. Instead, it was four grown men in suits playing football on a green slab of astroturf in the middle of the street. An impromptu pick up game, perhaps?

Nope. It’s the ESPN/Staples Playmaking Made Easy field taking it up a notch for the playoffs. Steve Young, Michael Irvin, Tom Jackson and Chris Mortensen took the act outside to teach the millions watching Sunday NFL Countdown at home how Tiki Barber changed the way he carries the football to reduce fumbling. Why do grown men have to go through all the theatrics to show us basic football fundamentals that could have been explained in two seconds on the regular set?

Because it’s ESPN, that’s why.

Sean Salisbury is Angry at You (Part I)

After Ben Roethlisberger talked about how great the Colts were prior to the divisional game nine days ago, Sean was quick to point out that only gullible people wouldn’t see that Ben was merely operating a ploy to create an “us against the world” mentality…

"If you believe that, then (you probably think) a bunch of reindeer just landed on ESPN's roof!"

Rest assured, if there were reindeer on the roof at ESPN, Salisbury would gladly kick the crap out of them.

More Anger (Part II)

After Jerome Bettis fumbled in the 4th quarter, Sean wasn’t afraid to let viewers into his head to see what was brewing…

“My initial reaction was, ‘Bill Cowher, HAVE YOU LOST YOUR MIND!’”

Probably not, but we often wonder if Salisbury has. In fact, we’re pretty sure of it.