Mister Faded Glory | The critique of everything

These are always so fun!

Let’s recap, in case you’ve been away from ESPN’s Mike and Mike, the ESPN ticker, and even ESPN Outside the Lines today.

• First, a blogger on Midwest Sports Fans explores the reason Phillies’ left fielder Raul Ibanez is enjoying a banner season at an advanced age. Read the piece; it’s exactly what you would expect from a thoughtful sports blog. The author evenhandedly examines the stats and postulates theories.
• Second, a Philadelphia Inquirer columnist publishes a column excoriating “Jrod” for daring to mention any possible substance use for Ibanez.
• Third, a new story is published, by a different Philly sportswriter named Jim Salisbury. Apparently Ibanez lashes out after reading the column, professing innocence, and opining that the court of public media is unfair – especially the actions of this “42-year-old blogger living in his parents’ basement.”
• Fourthly, Jerod Morris, the blogger, posts an evenhanded response to the unforeseen media swirl. He doesn’t even rip on Inquirer columnist John Gonzalez. Not surprisingly, with mass-media readers on the case, he’s suffering a deluge of knee-jerk hatred.
  
• Finally, the national media picks it up. Mike and Mike wrap this into an ill-fated discussion of libel law.  ESPN runs Ibanez’ story on its crawl. Did I mention Outside the Lines?

Before you take any sides at all, read the original piece. Especially take note of Morris’ use of terms like “acknowledging the elephant in the room,” or endeavoring to call his steroid speculation exactly that – speculation. Hint: It’s in the title. Did we mention this post was originally about his fantasy team?

But now we’ve reached ground zero, again, in the tiresome sports reporting vs. sports blogging debate. And lucky for us, a story that shouldn’t have been snowballed into a question of journalistic ethics. (Yay?)

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No wonder I like Wings and Quantum Leap so much (and, to a much, much lesser extent – Quick Change and Necessary Roughness). Not only is today the official birthday of Mr. Faded Glory, but it’s also the birthdays of Tony Shalhoub and the inimitable Scott Bakula. And here I thought sharing a birthday with John Lennon was impressive. And Charles Walgreen - no wonder I use that dreadful chain as my pharmacy. Not only that, John Entwistle and Jackson Browne also were born October 9, and I like The Who and Running on Empty. And down by the water, it’s also P.J. Harvey’s birthday. Weird, I know. (The coincidence, not the singer. Well, actually, both.)

Finally, of course, the Baltimore Orioles’ Brian Roberts is exactly the same age as me. Perhaps even to the minute. I don’t think I need to illustrate the implications here – it’s now imperative the Cubs trade for Roberts, my exact double. Instant karma’s gonna get you, indeed.

Obviously, Mister Faded Glory is so hopelessly narcissistic that he lets each and every four of you in on most of his innermost dialogues. In fact, MFG’s been trying to do this as coherently and amusingly as possible for nearly six years – which boggles the mind (Our current strategy: Gain two readers per year. Which should put us on pace to overtake the insipid Bleed Cubbie Blue by nearly 2154.).

In any case, maintaining a blog requires a certain amount of narcissism, arrogance, self-deprecation and self-loathing. So it was no surprise to me to read the August 11 issue of Newsweek - that’s right, fuckers, I read actual print – and learn all about a phony disorder currently plaguing waiting rooms all across the country – namely, thousands of males assuming they’re a primary character in their own reality TV show. (Which is patently absurd: None of these douchebags are in my TV show.)

If you think about it, however, this is life in the now. Each of us, armed with a blog, livejournal, facebook, myspace, or whatever – we’ve all convinced ourselves our daily minutiae is more important than your daily minutiae. Some of us even have written entire novels about self-indulgent narcissists swimming in each other’s malaise. (How’s that for self-reference?)

In any case, no disorder exists featuring these oversensitive, overwrought, overanalyzed symptoms.  Rather, it’s a fact of life for many Gen X, Gen X.5, or Gen Y males. None of us are the macho archetypes of the 1940s or the grizzled savage action heroes of the 1970s or early 1980s. Instead, we’ve been weaned on a pop culture featuring self-obsessed dweebs – everyman – furrowing through inner monologues. From The Wonder Years through Scrubs, this is our life. And it’s no wonder any of us with blogs cast ourselves as the lead, the Kevin Arnold or J.D. Dorian within our own lives, amid requisite soundtracks. (Cue Joe Cocker or New Slang. My personal preference? Well, duh.)

Anyway, most of us appear afflicted with this disorder, a profound bloggers’ disease of self-importance. At least, however, I haven’t descended further into Twitter-territory – offering you personal anecdotes by the millisecond, assuming each of my thoughts is of utmost importance and/or interest. And you thought wordy posts were a problem – what about this?

• MFG84sez:Can’t wait for my state fair should I get a Pronto Pup or ten thsand sno cones
• MFG84sez:Daunte Culpepper? What about Daunte Cul-salt?
• MFG84sez:FTW – how can all these bloggers call The Big Lead the US Weekly of Sports Blogs. U kno what’s the US Weekly of sports blogs? SPORTS BLOGS.
• MFG84sez:He’llbe back, he went out for his urinalysis. HOW CAN NUN UV YOU SEEN FLETCH?
• MFG84sez:ChaseUtley=DREAMY ZOMG was that outloud? LOLLERSK8S!!11!

Seriously, I’ve already got this blog to highlight my neuroses and stupidity – I don’t need a service cataloging my severely boring trains of thought. Sure, I’m as big a narcissist as any male suffering from MyOwnTVShow paranoia. Don’t need Twitter to further my dementia.

Um…right?

• MFG84sez: Unflappable? That’s right – I can’t be flapped.

Zuh.

How cute, they’re fighting!

You know, one sports blog giant vs. another. Though Deadspin has become somewhat scattershot and caricatured, and The Big Lead has horrible taste in movies, we admire both sports blogs and enjoy reading. Yes, even though Will is a Cardinals fan who lugs a scorebook to each baseball game. (Sole message: I am a better, more cerebral and refined fan than you, you fucking heathen.)

And Jason continues to exhort Cloverfield or The Blair Witch Project ad nauseum at The Big Lead. (Egad, has he actually watched those?) Both became embroiled in today’s recent, ridiculous dust-up, prompted by yet another “sports blogs vs. the MSM” article, this time in the LA Times.

But seriously – there’s a reason MFG failed to weigh in on the overblown Bissinger vs. Deadspin argument from Costas Now ( Just google the damn thing). Supposedly blogs repeatedly piss off old-school writers, and has-been sportswriters piss off blogs and everyone wrings their hands. I’ve ignored it for one simple reason.

Because these are sports blogs. Most of them suck. Mine probably sucks. They’re for the fans, by the fans, that’s it. To shoehorn them into mass media as though it’s some sort of global struggle, well, it’s just pointless. Bloggers begin because they love writing, because they love their own voice, and usually because they’re opinionated and misunderstood or arrogant or an extreme fans or WHO CARES. Even if some do occasionally break news, or operate as an extension of a decorated sportswriter, personality ekes out.

Just as there are terrible sportswriters, old, obtuse, frustrating wretches “who never fucking leave.” (Simmons’ words, not mine), there also are legions of annoying, shabby, stupid sports blogs. The good and bad, in both media. The only reason we notice the bad more is because, well, all of us morons who chose not to climb the ladder operate our own ramshackle sports blog, pointing out fault among the ridiculous, the sublime, and everything in between. Some fantastic, some featuring irritating, endless Ronny Cedeno-Ryan Theriot debates, clearly unable to discern what’s happening in the real world.

This ridiculous fight between TBL and Deadspin underscores each’s recent, somewhat phony gravitas. Yes, both writers do good work. Yes, humor and sports and satire and commentary enjoyably mesh. Yes, the Web features plenty of room for billions of stupid blogs about sports. Yes, this is all fine. No, we are not at war. Why can Howie Kurtz and Howard Fineman get along, but not you guys? Answer – because sports is all so very unimportant, and we all know this, but we take it oh-so seriously anyway.

I’m guilty as charged. Any decorated (or, in my case, vapid) blogger is still on the outside of some ridiculous pastime that he/she follows passionately. Each sportswriter knows they’re just a little bit luck – and not much separates each camp. Therefore, anytime real questions or real issues arise, grizzled writers and snarky fanboys quickly lash out to assert some sort of credibility, vehemently and vociferously. When we all shouldn’t really care. At least not this much, and not this seriously. (We’re seven paragraphs in and now you call me a hypocrite?)

Will is not a martyr, and Jason is no professor. Return to the humor, and the fun, and the dressing down of sports culture. Leave these manufactured issues alone – taking oneself too seriously will ruin you in the end. Example: Jay Mariotti. I say this as a fan of both blogs, and with respect of both writers. Yeah, that’s right – respect. So much so that I criticize Deadspin’s founder on his way out the door, and pretending I don’t click on TBL 40 times a day. See, fellas? We’re unrefined and annoying and sarcastic, too. We kid ’cause we love.

(Also, no one reads this particular blog. Minor point.)