If there’s one thing daytime and primetime television have been lacking the past few years, it’s the impact a washed up, retired pro athlete brings to the screen.   Thankfully, our leaders in broadcast entertainment have pulled their heads from their proverbial hineys and realized it’s what creates quality television.
 
As an example, last Wednesday night, John McEnroe guest starred on CSI: NY as a loudmouthed former tennis champ name John McEnroe.  McEnroe was the prime suspect in a murder investigation.  Let CBS’ uber-suspenseful teaser wet your appetite for crime-dramas featuring a guy who used to host a show called “The Chair”: 

The CSIs are puzzled when evidence and witnesses point to John McEnroe as their murder suspect despite his air-tight alibi, and as Mac's investigation causes a political firestorm, the team worries he'll be dismissed when they are asked to testify, on CSI: NY. 

We only caught glimpses of the episode, but if his one-time CNBC talk show is any indication, McEnroe tore the set down (out of suckitude, not quality acting).  Cynicism aside, our lone gripe is that McEnroe appeared on the NY version of CSI instead of Miami and its crime fighting genius Horatio Cane, where we could have heard lines like this…

“No ace will save you this time John.  When I get through with you, you’ll be locked up: game, set, match.”
 
In what has the potential to be more entertaining than those hypothetical scenes, Media Circus favorite, the Big Savvy, Mark Schlereth, will be guest starring as a detective in various episodes of the daytime soap opera “Guiding Light” (starting June 14th).  

Taken straight out of Cinemax’s Late-Night Soft Core Encyclopedia of Film Names, Schlereth’s stage name will be “Roc Hoover”.  Yeah, that’s right baby; Roc Hoover.  Picturing Schlereth responding to Roc Hoover on daytime soap is funny enough, but learning he was nervous during the filming makes it even better. 

We can only imagine what was going through Roc’s, errrr, Schlereth’s head when he heard the director yell the word “ACTION!”…

“Okay. Settle down and just execute.  Bear down and execute.  All we need to do is execute the lines and the acting will be executed.  Execution is the key to this role. You’re an actor. Actors act.”

Needless to say, we’re on pins and needles awaiting the debut of the newest crime fighting soap star. To his credit, he and Trey Wingo were able to have a little fun with the whole thing on Tuesday’s NFL Live.  Something tells us if Salisbury was playing Roc Hoover, he’d be deathly serious about it.      

Crap that actually came from somebody’s mouth
“I personally would take a twentysomething athlete who frequents strip clubs (though I don’t condone it) over an older radio broadcaster who spews racism and sexism on national airwaves.” – Stu Scott, responding to getting called out on his previous comments about taking Pacman Jones’ indiscretions over Don Imus’.

It’s almost as if Stu just completely ignores the fact that Pacman Jones has been arrested five times and questioned by police ten times in under two years. Nope, the guy just likes strip clubs, that’s all. 
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“The Cardinals are likely ruing their decision not to pursue him this offseason and so far the Cubs are reaping major benefits.” – Mark Simon, ESPN on Jason Marquis

We guarantee that fewer than 5% of the people who work for and/or root for the Cardinals are “ruing” the decision to let Jason Marquis go.  
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“Even the notoriously cheap team across the state that hasn't won a thing in decades spent $55 million on Gil Meche (wisely, it turns out).”  – John Heyman, SI.com

If this wasn’t baseball and instead John Heyman was a movie critic or something, this sentence would be the equivalent of him claiming that he watched 2 minutes of a Nic Cage movie and has conclusively determined it was worth the $8.
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“The Cardinals wound up losing three starting pitchers and bringing in one new one. That's not good math. And that's why this spring Duncan was busy trying to turn relievers into starters (i.e. Braden Looper), trying to make magic. Yet there's only so much magic that can be made.” – John Heyman

Knowing Heyman’s penchant for jumping to early conclusions, it’s curious that he would select Braden Looper as the one pitching project he calls out by name in the Cardinals rotation since he’s pretty much the only one who’s been worth a crap (5-2 record with sub 2.60 ERA as of this writing).
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"It's really not surprising, but why would he say it now? I'm pretty sure you guys asked him that question before." – Terrell Owens on Bill Parcells’ comments about “doing the best he could with TO”.

We can think of one reason – Parcells knew he had a sociopath wide receiver who would start holding press conferences in his driveway and faking drug overdoses the minute he smelled controversy.   
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"There's one thing Favre has missed in this whole drama. I think that once the Patriots were in the picture, (Randy) Moss didn't care about the Packers anymore. If New England hadn't been involved, Green Bay probably would have gotten Moss and Favre would be a happy man today." - Peter King

Oh my God!  He's... he's making sense.  Here here for Petey King!
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"If you enjoy dog fighting, then you're a sick puppy." 

"Who would have believed that Tank Johnson would be let out of jail but that Trent Green would still be in custody?" 

"Ricky (Williams) would rather smoke pot than play football... call this a "blunt" assessment." - Michael Ventre, msnbc.com

And this, friends, is what the folks over at msnbc along with Ventre deem "Trash Talk". 

Really, this is supposed to be a “manly” sports section?
Foxsports.com’s Funhouse features a weekly sports list provided by the fine folks at AskMen.com.  What’s wrong with that?  Nothing.  Until you look at the headline picture that accompanies it.  

Here’s a quick suggestion from your friends as JoeSportsFan.com – when writing for a sports site, lose the picture of the d-bags.  May we suggest substituting them with someone that fans can really relate to.  Like this guy…

Is that too much to ask?

Mini Media Rant – Can we let people determine what they find exciting, please? 
Is anyone else as tired of this phrase as we are…

“Jose Reyes is the most exciting player in baseball”

It’s quickly establishing itself as one of those media driven titles that steadily goes from opinion to acknowledged fact.  Nowadays it’s almost like Rawlings is handing out an award for excitement at the end of the year.

Google the words “Jose Reyes + Exciting” and you’ll get several pages of articles deeming him as such with the writers ranging from SI.com’s Tom Verducci to local Mets blogs and everything in the middle.  

One would think that the determination of what makes a player “exciting” would be based on a certain criteria that are probably different for every person watching baseball.  It’s not like saying he’s the “fastest” player in the game or the “most balanced”.  Those are things that you can support with facts and comparisons.  Fast is fast, balanced is balanced right?  

As for being exciting?  Kind of depends on what you find exciting, no? If we find dancing around in the dugout like a spazz exciting then, we’re on board with Reyes’ title.  But what if we think the most exciting play in baseball is the 500-foot homerun or the fake-throw-to-third-look-to-first pickoff move?  Suddenly Mr. Reyes is in the middle of the pack.

Maybe the media should just stick to handing out titles based on criteria everyone can agree on, like who’s the most “valuable” player.     

Mini Media Rant II - Coke and Crack Addict a Hero
One of the recurring storylines of the 7-week-old baseball season has been the on-field progress of Reds outfielder Josh Hamilton.  His 6 bombs in April were enough to win NL rookie of the month and as of this writing, he’s hitting .250 with 8HR and 18RBI.  Not bad for a guy who was addicted to drugs and attempted suicide multiple times just three years ago. 
 
As the feel-good story moves on, the feature stories in print and on television continue, with the theme that Josh Hamilton is a hero.  Really?  The guy who was addicted to alcohol, cocaine, crack and tried ending his life 5 different times is a hero? 
 
This isn’t to say Hamilton doesn’t possess courage and isn’t a good story; he certainly is.  But we’re not too sure we’d go as far to say he’s a hero, something sportsline’s Greg Doyel did a few weeks ago.   In his article “Rooting for flawed hero, Hamilton becomes new addiction”, Doyel writes, “as long as he stays sober, Hamilton’s a hero.”
 
Really?  
 
Again; we’re not saying Hamilton doesn’t have potential to be an inspiration to recovering addicts and isn’t a good story.  What we are saying is that Hamilton shouldn’t be called a hero because quite honestly, he’s not one.  If Hamilton worked at the store bagging groceries, we doubt people would call him a hero for staying clean.  
 
And let’s take it a step further: if a celebrity or athlete doesn’t have a known drinking problem, but comes out to announce he hasn’t had a drink in 6 months, is he or she considered a hero?  Our guess is no, which makes it all the more ridiculous that Hamilton fits the mold because he took things to the extreme and nearly lost his life.  Good story that he got his life in order, but he's not a hero.  
 
If nothing else, we hope we can all agree that Doyel’s assertion that Hamilton can be the “Lance Armstrong” of addicts is a bit silly (just a tad).

Bob Carpenter Memorial Snappy Line
It’s a rare occurrence for the Bobber to open the doors to the Table of Snappy to a non-sports personality.  However, things change when an athlete is on the direct receiving end of a snappy one-liner, especially when the individual delivering the poetry endorses sub sandwiches of 6 grams of fat or less.   

Welcome Jared Fogle… the panel is awaiting your wit for NASCAR’s Tony Stewart:

”Would you say that makes Subway your favorite PIT STOP?”

Bob, how do you like your 6-grams-of-fat-or-less Subway sandwiches?  “Piled high with a heaping dose of snappiness”, says he.  Two thumbs up and gunpoint pose from Robert C.

[Update: After scouring the online globe for classic Family Matters DVDs, Bobby came across some potentially damaging news that Jared was the porn king of his college dorm.  As a result, he reneges his thumbs up and turns the gun pose into a loaded shot.  He also has a message for Jared, “Go fu** yourself!”]

The Media Circus is written by Josh Bacott and Pat Imig.  They swear this stuff is real.  Email them at info@joesportsfan.com