The good people over at Fanhouse ponder, in light of the recent sports media “trade” that saw longtime Sportscenter talking head Dan Patrick and overrated, sarcastic columnist Rick Reilly trading places, who comes out on top: ESPN or Sports Illustrated?

In the words of the famous (and Western New York’s own) Nick Bakay: Push.

Both of this guys have a shtick that we’ve seen before. It’s nothing new here folks. You know what you’re getting with DP. You’re getting his heterosexual lifemate Keith Olbermann, you’re getting the widow’s peak, the weekly Reggie Miller appearances on the radio show, the daily Adam Sandler name-drops and of course, his trademark, suffocating smarm. Ditto for “Riles,” as he was called by Patrick when he used to appear on Patrick’s radio show. You’re getting an occasionally clever column, some cliché pop culture references, favorite targets include Britney Spears and Paris Hilton, some golf columns and the Albom-esque tearjerker usually involving parents of kids who have killed themselves, died in car accidents and/or donated organs to thankful now-living folks wracked with guilt. I’ve seen it before. None of it’s clever, none of its new and none of it is noteworthy.

The real question though is what will fill the backpages of two, seemingly rival but completely different sports publications. I speak, of course, of Sports Illustrated and ESPN: The Magazine. I’m hoping, as a subscriber, that SI opts to groom a young columnist and give him a chance to shine or lure George F. Will away from Newsweek and write some heady, statistic-laden baseball columns that no one not wearing a bow tie can understand. I hope they don’t consider publishing some version of the dopey, Dan Patrick “outtakes” that formerly ran in ESPN: The Mag. Let’s see some originality from the most authoritative sports publication in the country. SI is the Time Magazine of sports and now that it’s tricky pony has jumped ship for the Worldwide Leader, the magazine will be left with a very interesting choice.

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 25th, 2007 at 11:13 am and is filed under Dan Patrick, ESPN, Sports Illustrated, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.