I, BobLee-stradamus predicted all this 12-14 years ago. I am neither surprised nor dismayed as all my cyber-quatrains are unfolding.
I predicted that: The Internet will generate radical change in “Big Time Sports” both college and professional. It has. The Internet, together with the “Worldwide Leader” Colossus in Bristol, has redefined sports into a combo of Soap Opera / WWE / Reality TV.
“You’re travelling through another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind; a journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination. That’s the signpost up ahead:
WHO SHOT (JR)… MACK BROWN ??
“Truth” in sports is whatever you want to believe it is. Your version is every bit as legit as the version being held sacred by that cross-eyed goober with terminal dandruff that just stepped into the elevator with you. STOP!…. don’t make eye contact with him or he will own your soul.
Universal Truisms:
• All referees / officials / admins are crooked / incompetent / low-down & no-count.
• Every fan base has a bottom-feeder faction. Larger fan bases have more bottom-feeders. “They” are inter-changeable.
• 99% of today’s “student-athletes” can’t spell SAT….. except for OURS of course who are all Eagle Scouts and future neuro-surgeons and astrophysicists.
• “Our fans” are special and “the most incredibly passionate” in all of sports. All others are gross cretins with smelly feet “from a place with a negative connotation like “New Jersey”….. a rural area….. or _______)”.
• The Mannings, Tim Tebow, Russell Wilson, and Danica Patrick are all frauds, hypocrites, and (insert any negative nouns) because they are successful, attractive and too good to be true so they must be eeeevil.
• Oh and, of course, “our school / program” is A SLEEPING GIANT. Ya think fans of the Minnesota Timberwolves actually say that?
Who Shot Mack Brown ???
Big Time Sports (pro and college) IS Entertainment. It exists for no other purpose than to attract and hold your attention and thereby generate revenue for the various entities involved. That purpose is NOT eeevil or at the root of the impending Collapse of Western (and Eastern) Civilization. It simply IS.
Say; am I the only one who noticed that ESPN’s Jimmy V Week coincided with the latest round of Dean Devotionals? Coincidence? Yeah, right. Which little ceramic statue you have on your dashboard as your messianic coach of choice – St Jimmy V or St Dean – it’s your dashboard, by golly. ….. Hank Iba ??
How much you “care about” sports generally or specifically as regards “your teams” is irrelevant. Using the outmoded analogy of “a newspaper”….. what section you read first or most thoroughly might place you along the “how much I care about sports” spectrum. “A newspaper” is the Internet. What websites you go to first each day can substitute as your newspaper. We have not subscribed to “a newspaper” in over ten years. So I don’t wrap fish or carpet bird cages.
Yes, there is a “Who Shot PJ?” faction but it is confined to Orange County and Dick Vitale and a designated look-out from PackPride. The candlelight vigil for PJ has dissipated to two KA pledges and a homeless guy calling himself Sophocles.
Sports / TV/ Movies / Concerts et al compete 24/7 for your time and attention. Whether you are conversant about Tony Romo’s playoff woes…. Khloe Kardashian’s marital dilemma…. what the Robertson clan is having for dinner on Duck Dynasty…. who will play 2nd for the Yankees…… or when Anchorman2 opens “at a theater near you”….. its all competing for your eyes and your interest.
Knowing all the names of The Kardashians is no different from who you will start in this week’s Fantasy League….. or whether you have Taylor Swift, Lady Gaga or Ferlan Husky in your iPhone / iPad. Someone somewhere thinks whatever interests you is silly and frivolous.
I could throw “politics” into this mix; but lets leave that to AgentPierce. The antics of the NotForPrimeTime political players on all sides of “the aisle” are no different from the Kardashians, Robertsons, Jerry Jones or “who Texas will go after”.
If you, or someone close to you, gets a “bad biopsy” or a late-night call from Officer So&So with the Highway Patrol asking “Are you the parents of _______?” then all the filler crap that you absorb each day gets flushed. Your “what’s important” priorities get reordered REALLY quickly.
So…. Who Shot Mack Brown?
It was 1980. America, if not the America-centric Civilized world, was abuzz with Who Shot JR? I was relocating to Dallas in the midst of the faux-hubbub. Everyone had an opinion. The “who” was absolutely of no consequence whatsoever. I bet you can’t name the character and actress who did the deed. Hint: it was NOT SueEllen or Pam.
Whatever happened to Priscilla Pressley?
Now sports-ophiles are abuzz with Who will replace (shot) Mack Brown? Partisans of various teams are holding their breath it won’t be their guy….. or a guy that will leave a job that will then come after “their guy”. The dominos from Texas’ choice will reverberate across the ESPN-uverse like a mega-tsunami.
We haven’t seen this level of coast-to-coast hysteria since LeBron left Cleveland. Ya think ESPN and FoxSports1 are bidding to see who get “The Announcement” exclusive. Maybe hold it in Al Capone’s vault or Area 51.
In a pre-Internet world, it was proven that Wall Street stock buy/sellers were responsible for spreading jokes. They were the Paul Reveres or “bark patrol” that passed on the latest jokes or rumors as they worked their inter-continental phones to clients and insider contacts. Now that mantle has been passed to our favorite foils….. ye olde board monkeys of all stripes and partisan leanings.
Indeed, ‘dem not so lovable dim-wits in mamma’s basements and cheap apartments and dead-end cubicles are pounding out their profane opinions and random revelations. Crazier than hoot owls and rabid bats but possessing a modem and a keyboard which is all you need in 2013 to be “a media source”.
Twas a board monkey goober that fashioned the first “short list” for replacing Mack. That got passed around in the ether until someone with a byline or in a cubicle in Bristol got it….. THEN it became “gospel” and KABOOM.
It can all be as immediate as fifteen minutes for a WAR (Wild Ass Rumor) to go viral and have otherwise reasonable adults bobbing and weaving, trying to disprove pure fabrications and convert half-truths into either pure BS or “confirmation”. Think panning for gold at Sutter’s Mill and getting excited at any minute speck that sparkles.
Names come and go. The pecking order gets reshuffled by the quarter hour….. and 97.3% of the reshuffling is being done by cross-eyed goobers with runny noses and cheap haircuts.
The total absurdity of the whole process is AWESOME. As a knowledgeable society, we have fallen so far down “the rabbit hole” that Up is Down and Down is Sideways. The Perian Spring has run dry and we are all thirsty wildebeasts sucking on stones for our news-water.
There is no “real news”. Everything you read or hear pretending to “be news” is generated from thin air by a 37 y/o frustrated Cirque Soleil grip code-named “Jiggs” who lives in Ted Kazinski’s old cabin high in the Wausach Range. He subsists on Reese’s Pieces and flat ginger ale and a burning desire to “make a difference”.
Many of you will see Anchorman2. We “go to the movies” about four times/year. This might be one of’em. You will laugh at Ron Burgundy and his goofball cronies….. then go home, turn on your HDTV and see other Ron Burgundys telling you “Who shot Mack Brown”…… or how great/awful Obamacare is or…… or…… or…… and you will choose who/what you want to believe.
And then fire up your computer and pass that new-found “Meaning of Life” revelation on to all your buddies.
It was….. Kristin Shepard played by Mary Crosby.
That last column about Butch, Dickie and Meezie sorta/kinda went viral…. but that was a given, given the absolute lunacy of the whole mess.
Here’s a video of DeaconDave’s first day. I swear it’s The Same Guy that Frau introduced exactly a year ago as WuffDave doing that wuff finger thingy. Until I see both WuffDave and DeaconDave in a Zapruder photo , I’m going with “the single coach” theory”.
Dave Clawson’s First Day As A Deacon – LINK
