And now that he’s lost about 10 MPH off that fastball he’s apparently raking it in hand over fist. So, good for him…I guess.

But I’m glad you mentioned Gammons.
I know I should hate those awkward Baseball Tonight spots featuring him and his Fender, but I don’t. I find them oddly charming, and they work for me. (The “Battle of the Bands” itself is a different matter. We could probably gang up on that.)

I disagree with your characterization of the blogosphere. I don’t think that it is a herd mentality it all. The people who are targets are not randomly chosen. They all share the same characteristics. Mariotti, Shaughnessy, Woody Paige, Skip Bayliss, Lupica etc. People don’t like hackneyed mailed-in columns, and people don’t like arrogance.

If you look at figures that are respected by the blogosphere it is people like Peter Gammons, Bob Ryan etc. who are humble, enjoy what they do, and turn out great, honest work.

It’s too often that sports blogs are seen as the harbingers of doom. We take sports seriously. We think that sports journalism should be a held to a higher standard. And, we believe that if someone is getting paid over $3 million a year to write an 800 word column per week he should do better than swiping an idea from blogs or YouTube.

Hef, how in the hell did you get my Myspace alter ego? That’s some heavy duty investigating on your part..

Dude it’s your picture and you left a comment. I’ve got an eye for faces.

But I’ll come to his defense for two reasons.

1.) I hate the unification of opinion that exists in the blogosphere.
We pick who we like and who we don’t like. After that, it isn’t questioned. A defense of Around the Horn, Jay Mariotti, ESPN or any number of entities that have fallen out of our favor are dismissed out of hand.
Around the Horn, Dan Le Batard and Scott Van Pelt are the lucky beneficiaries of this hive mind mentality, but I’m sure they’d also look real bad if we chose to put them under the same brutal microscope we subject other to.
So, now Reilly sucks and he’s no good anymore or maybe we never liked him anyway.
Like I said, I’m not a Reilly fan, but teeing off on him because it’s easy is pretty worthless.

2.) While making room for the blogger and YouTube in the media in general and sports specifically is a laudable objective shared by all those who frequent this place, we’re forgetting that the role of the writer must inevitably change.

He basically summarized the event and said it was bad days after it made the rounds through the blogs. I think this is a perfect example of why traditional journalists like Mr. Reilly are on their out. A few years ago this would have been the first we heard about the ducking incident, and it probably would have been a decent read. Now? It’s old and stale and hard to chew.

No shit, sir.

Sportswriters aren’t going to break this incident. That’s going to be up to YouTube and bloggers.
Hooray, that a good, exciting thing.
So what’s Reilly et al. to do about it?
Ignore it? Play dumb? Stay out of touch?
I hope not.
YouTube gave us a few seconds to see the incident unfold. There was no context, no aftermath, no nothing. (Unless you can’t slow-motion replays as something, or those fucking worthless comments).
Reilly rehashed the situation, then he expounded on it and gave us some details.
Interesting video clips that raise as many questions as this one deserve and benefit greatly from a written companion like Reilly provided.
Now we know the names of the players involved. We know the umpire is considering a legal response, and we know that it cost one of the players a shot at walking on to Gordon College.
Maybe a few seconds of action and gratuitous replays are enough for some, but I want to find out what the hell that was all about.
And Reilly provided that.