Mike and Mike have some promotions coming up that I wanted to point, and while I know most are stunts to gain viewers, a couple are actually pretty cool. The first being their yearly auction of themselves for the Jimmy V Foundation. Yes, you can bid on having the duo come to your house (basement if you're a blogger), and broadcast live! Last year's broadcasts was pretty fun, and of course, it goes to a good cause.

The second idea, is a little goofy, but the guests they have lined up are amazing. Mike and Mike will be going 80s for a day, and will feature interviews with the likes of Joe Montana, Larry Bird and Brett Michaels. Yes, Brett Michaels from Poison....

In the middle of the ‘80’s, Mike Golic was drafted into the NFL while Mike Greenberg was graduating high school. On Tuesday, July 7, ESPN Radio’s Mike & Mike in the Morning (6-10 a.m. ET M-F, simulcast on ESPN2) will celebrate that decade with a special “80’s Day” broadcast.

Guests will include former athletes including Larry Bird, Joe Montana, Bears QB Jim “Super Bowl Shuffle” McMahon, Dodgers OF Kirk Gibson, 49ers Hall-of-Fame WR Jerry Rice, Mike “Do you believe in miracles?” Eruzione, and Bret Michaels from the band Poison.

While it wasn’t that Kenny Rogers who sang “Lady” in 1981, “Ghostbusters” wasn’t about the 2004 Red Sox, and “9 to 5” was in theatres 29 years before Rachel Alexandra won the Preakness at those odds, the ‘80’s are still close to the hearts of Greeny & Golic, who will don 80’s apparel for the occasion.

Mike & Mike’s ‘80’s Day’ show will feature:

- ‘80’s-related guests
- ‘80’s-related topics (Miracle on Ice, ’86 World Series Game 6, Celtics-Lakers, Giants-49ers, Everett-Navratilova, sports movies, and “Hello To” USA Today, sports talk radio and NFL instant replay)
- Tri-hourly updates will look back at plays of the decade
- ‘80’s-style graphics on ESPN2 simulcast
- ‘80’s-related poll questions on ESPNRadio.com (voting taking place now)
- ‘80’s biggest scandals
- ‘80’s biggest flops

Themed radio shows can get a little lame, but I think with those interviews filling the spots in between the cheesiness, it will leave no time for Greeny and Golic to mess it up. Please to be wearing Bugle Boy jeans and/or any article of clothing from Body Glove.

Today in great "Take Me Out To The Ballgame Performances" at Wrigley, comes the one and only Mr. T. Not only did Mr. T throw out the first pitch in zubaz pants, AND sing during the 7th inning stretch, but he also inspired a heck of an impression by Scott Van Pelt....

"THREE STRIKES YOU OUT!!!" Love it. It doesn't get much more entertaining than that.

The highlight of today's match between Tiger Woods and Brendan Jones wasn't Woods' convincing win over the youngster, or any of the shots or putts he hit. No, it was far and away this spot that the Golf Channel ran throughout his round....

Now the Sam Jackson one was entertaining, but that one gave me goosebumps. It's so refreshing to have him back.

I don't know how many of you folks out there are old enough to remember ABC's "Superstars", but the network is planning on dusting off the old "Wide World of Sports" program for a six-episode run in 2009. Via Variety....

ABC has given a six-episode order to a new celeb take on the sports-themed franchise "Superstars."

"ABC was the most aggressive, and they were big on getting the authenticity of the original 'Superstars' format," said Juma prexy Bob Horowitz. "And the fact that they have the NBA Finals in June makes it a phenomenal springboard for promoting the series."

In bringing out the franchise last summer, Horowitz had cited the success of ABC's "Wipeout," as well as the popularity of celebrity reality competitions like the Alphabet's "Dancing With the Stars."

In "Superstars," eight celebs will be paired with eight male and female pro athletes to compete in various events, including swimming, biking, running and kayaking. Teams will be eliminated each week, until one athlete/celebrity pair is crowned the champs.

While there is no word on who is involved this go around, back in the day the show was called by both Jim McKay and Keith Jackson, and featured such athletes as: Herschel Walker, Willie Gault, Dave Johnson (decathlete), Jason Sehorn and Joe Frazier. Frazier even almost drowned during an episode, so anything is possible this year!



ABC fields 'Superstars' (Variety)
The Mid-Week Links (Fang's Bites)

Ahh, hockey. Where else would you find a clip of Def Leppard playing a concert on Versus, having members of the Red Wings bring the Stanley Cup on stage, and the lead singer subsequently placing the thing on a podium upside down?

Rock! The years of drugs have probably destroyed Joe Elliot's brain cells, but seriously....who would ever think that a trophy would go little side down? Hell, the thing has names written all over it. You'd think that would have been a clue.

Def Leppard Singer's Upside-Down Stanley Cup (Going Five Hole)

I personally never liked the Sports Reporters, and I'd regularly get mad at the TV on Sunday mornings when it came on. It wasn't the format, but I just couldn't stand Mike Lupica. Even at the age of ten I would watch the intro with Dick Schapp and as soon as Lupica spoke, I would change the channel to cartoons or something. Obviously I'm in the minority though because the show's popularity has kept it on the air, as of this Sunday, for twenty years. The show has a litany of popular guests including Howard Cosell, David Halberstam, Bob Costas, Al Michaels, Jim Nantz and Lesley Visser, and was really the first Sports panel show of its kind.

Here's a clip of the first show that ESPN released with news of the anniversary, and take notice of a young Gary Thorne (the first host), Jackie MacMullen and Ralph Wiley. It's a little bit choppy but still viewable (it also helps to let it load all the way before first)....

While the show wasn't always my favorite, it certainly has had it's moments. One I remember vividly was the airing following 9/11, which actually turned out to be Dick Schapp's last show. All four panelists (Lupica, Schapp, William C. Rhoden and Bob Ryan) expressed their feelings gracefully, and Schapp's account of his frustration, and the pain of not being able to do anything, still sticks in my mind.

Happy Birthday Sports Reporters.

I'm not really sure what Bob Costas is doing at a John Cougar Mellencamp concert, but after just posting Al Michaels on Hawaii Five-O, nothing will surprise anymore. Via Scott's Shots comes this video of Costas intro'ing the rocker at Farm Aid this past Saturday....

Ten seconds my ass, Bob. That was more like forty or so, and a very unimpressive forty seconds at that. I guess there really isn't a "cool way" for Costas to intro Mellencamp, but he should have at least tried to get a "fetus-faced windbag" line in the somewhere.

Bob Costas Appears at Farm Aid (Scott's Shots)

Man, you're probably going to see this just about everywhere today, but if you haven't you're going to thank me. In what is perhaps the funniest video of the year, Comcast Sportsnet got hold of video that features Jonathan Papelbon in a high school talent competition. That part of the video is hilarious, but giving it to David Ortiz so he can show it to the whole team is even better....

Unbelievable. I'm ready to start an offshoot of Dancing With The Stars and I think I have my first two contestants in Collinsworth and Paps. I don't easily get embarrassed but if someone came across my Fourth Grade performance of Pinocchio, and put it on the internet, my face might get a little red. And I wasn't even in drag (although I did have on a ton of makeup).

Papelbon: The High School Years (Comcast)
The Papelbon Dirty Dancing Videos Are Here. Oh, Man (Deadspin)

While I normally skip on posts that have already been a few other places, I just couldn't pass on this video of Alan Thicke on skates. Thicke, most notably from the 80s TV show Growing Pains, was at a "celebrity" Hockey game over the weekend and some great human shot this one on one with a goalie....

The best part is that you can faintly make out the Growing Pains theme after he scores and destroys the net. Good times.

Alan Thicke Knows How to Crash the Net (Fanhouse)

I swear I've been watching Baseball Tonight a lot as of late but I didn't see any of these performances when they were aired for the first time. Anywho, here are the first set of musical acts including John Pizzarelli, Lloyd, The Cab and Gretchen Wilson. For some reason the Punch Brothers (who were third on the list) won't load, so we'll have to do without them for the time being.

My favorite part about those is how Gretchen Wilson strung out a :20 song into about a 2-minute version. This is what happens when you throw in a violin solo though. Pretty boring if you ask me, but I did enjoy the Pizzarelli version. And yes...it's still the most boring Sports time of the year.

Here's the rest of the schedule....

Monday, June 23
(after Arizona at Boston)
Ozomatli

Wednesday, June 25
(after Arizona at Boston)
Branford Marsalis

Saturday, June 28
(after Indycar Richmond)
Candlebox

Sunday, June 29
7 p.m. ET
REO Speedwagon

I mentioned that Baseball Tonight is holding a Battle of the Bands competition to see who can do the best rendition of Take Me Out to the Ballgame last week, and we have our first video today. I missed John Pizzarelli last night, and I'll have his submission up when I can find it, but Peter Gammons rocked out a tribute to Bo Diddley on Sunday night.

Unfortunately Peter isn't in the competition, but I have to say that was pretty badass. Everyone knows the guy can jam with a band, but I've never seen him go solo like that. Great start to the competition and I'll try to get each up as we go along.

Introducing Baseball Tonight's Battle Of The Bands (Awful Anouncing)

It's Summer programming time folks! Are you ready?! Oh, I'm not so sure. Of course Titletown is going to be annoying but how about a "Battle of the Bands" playing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" on Baseball Tonight? What if I told you Journey and Peter Gammons are involved???

But you won't see it from ESPN analyst Peter Gammons, who will play Ball Game on-air Sunday (7 p.m. ET) in a sort of homage to the late guitar legend Bo Diddley: "It's how Bo Diddley would have played it."

And ESPN's Baseball Tonight on Monday will begin airing music videos from nine musical acts — including REO Speedwagon — playing the 100 year-old anthem. (FYI: Lyricists Jack Norworth and Albert Von Tilzer never went to a baseball game — and weren't even interested in the sport. Art needn't imitate life.)

The idea, says ESPN producer Jay Levy, is to create a battle of the bands decided by online voting, starting June 29, with a winner announced July 13: "Personally, I'm a huge American Idol fan, so I figured why not have our own little American Idol."

Other contestants: Jazz guitarist John Pizzarelli, bluegrass band Punch Brothers, rhythm-and-blues singer Lloyd, rockers The Cab, country singer Gretchen Wilson, Latin and salsa hip-hop group Ozomatli — "they're fabulous," Gammons says — as well as saxophonist Branford Marsalis and rockers Candlebox.

Wait, Candlebox?!?! I love Gammons, Journey, and Ozomatli, but f'ing Candlebox??? Actually, come to think of it....I might actually get into this. At least they tried to get a nice variety of different musical acts and this could be fun. If they hadn't tried to compare it to "American Idol" then I would definitely be on board.

(Yeaaaaaah. You left me faaaaaar behinnnd yind. Now may-a-a-be I dint mean to treat youuuuu oh sooooo ba-a-d, but eye diddddd it anyway yay!!)

Try to get that out of your head the rest of the day.

Old 'Ball Game' will get new treatments on ESPN (USA Today)

These Madden 2009 videos are popping up everywhere, and I'm sorry for hitting you with two in a day, but this one is just completely odd. The premise for the clip seems pretty awesome, but the execution seems, as Shutdown Corner explains....Tron-like.

The clip is of yet another new Madden 2009 feature called Madden IQ and it's a system that lets the computer gauge your strengths and weaknesses and responds accordingly. You do a few drills and then the Computer's game is supposed to to adapt to your skills. The drills themselves are explained to you by a glowing John Madden and then you practice them as digital figures. Here's the clip.....

I guess it's good that Madden actually is in the game, but I'd rather have him announcing than leading me through drills. That might just be me though.

Your Madden IQ (which may have nothing to do with your real IQ) (Shutdown Corner)

I once thought that I hated Chris Berman, but I didn't know the guy so I couldn't really justify it. Then those old MNF Halftime vids came out and it drew my a little closer to my theory. I still haven't met the guy, so I can't say I hate him, but after this interview with Sign On San Diego I can say that I absolutely hate his schtick and how he comes across on-air and in interviews.

Berman actually thinks the reason people can't stand him is because they aren't paying enough attention to his "work". Seriously....

“First of all,” he said, “it's unfair because if you're on the air for six hours and heaven forbid I say, 'Ground control to David Toms,' you're writing it like I said it 500 times. Not the case.”

Said Berman: “It's unfair if people say I'm trying to make it my show. Then you haven't paid attention. Then you haven't done me fair. 'Cause I'm not. But I'm trying to be me and have a good time with it as someone who's an avid follower of the game; someone who's like most of the audience who are watching, a 16-handicap give or take, not a 3 (handicap) or a scratch.

“I would think that's someone loaded for bear before I even come out of the woods, and I can't help that. . . . You should deliver your columns or your sportscasts in the way that you are. And so that's the way I am. So is it going to please everybody? No. I'm not doing the final round, either. You've got to remember that. I'm doing the early rounds.

“It's the only way I know how to do it. There's a lot of ways to announce it; I'm just being me. I'm not trying to overdo it at all. If anyone thinks I come in to overdo it, you're not being fair and you're not listening.”

I'm trying not to be angry about this, but when someone is this clueless it's just frustrating. The problem is that he IS doing the David Toms thing these days and others 500 times and he just doesn't realize it. I would love to listen to you Berman but I just can't. Everything is such a joke that when he tries to sound serious that comes across as even more funny than the cheesy joke. He's the reason for the movement in where announcers and writers make themselves bigger than the game. If you like him then good for you, but I think you're in the minority.

Oh and he also ended the interview with this....

Still, he added, “You can't fault me. I've been doing it for 28½ years, but maybe this guy heard it for the first time. I view myself as not a rock star, but if you go to see Rod Stewart, at some point you want to hear him sing 'Maggie May.' You don't want to hear him sing 'Maggie May' 50 times. But I owe it to the audience to sing 'Maggie May.'

I give up.

C'mon, you can take Berman for two days (Sign On San Diego)

Two of the people I couldn't stand more in this world at the moment (add Romo, Favre, and Bissinger and you have my starting five for the "I'm sick of hearing about you team") are going to by doing a scene together on the small screen. Yes, Terrell Owens is going to be on the "hit" show Under One Roof which "stars" none other than VH-1 staple Flava Flav. Via Starpulse....

T.O. will make his sitcom acting debut on the MyNetworkTV show ''Under One Roof'' as the long-lost brother of the show's star, Flavor Flav. Owens tries convincing Flav and sitcom sibling Kelly Perine that they're all brothers in hopes of getting them to invest in his Web site. ''I see dollar signs,'' Owens said in an interview with The Associated Press. ''I'm trying to kind of smooth my way into the family, but Flav is not buying it. It's a lot of funny dialogue. It was a good time.'' It might also be a first step toward a second career.

''If I'm going to really consider doing acting after football, this a great start to let me get my feet wet,'' Owens said. ''For an actor trying to become an A-lister, I think I'm on the bottom of the pile. I'm a D-lister.''

If I had any idea what that show or network was I'd record it, but I don't think I get either. Such a shame too. I wanted to witness this ground breaking acting duo live with the rest of the world. Also, is it really an "acting debut" if someone's been in a supposedly racist MNF promo (MSM's words, not mine) and was an extra nauseating movie Football movie with Al Pacino? Just curious.

Getcha popcorn ready.

T.O. To Make His Sitcom Acting Debut (Starpulse)

Hilarious find by reader EJ this evening. I'm not sure what this is doing there, but apparently the Nationals take on Indiana Jones on May 22nd (click for larger)...


I know the new Indy movie comes out that day, and my first thought was that it was a promotion, but it's not a link to anything. It's just a random picture of Indiana Jones. Is Harrison Ford throwing out the first pitch or something? If so, I'm so going to that game.

I posted the most awkward moment of the College Dunk/3-point Contest last night, but this is by far the most funny. JR Giddens threw down his first dunk last night and decided to break out a prop. He ties a sweater around his neck, does a dance and completely stumps Steve Lavin....

George Michael from Wham? What was that '81??? Pretty sure JR wasn't even born yet. I if you watch the video it stil works, but with the sweater it's the Carlton Steve.

Do the damn thing C!



JR Gidden's Reach Back Dunk & Carlton Dance (Real Clear Sports)

At a shooting range in Las Vegas of course.....

That is just about the most hilarious thing I've ever seen. The Phil Collins was a very nice touch. Also, who gave the go ahead for Spence to go to Vegas while I have to freeze my ass off in DC?! Mottram!!!

Spencer is going to be providing Sportsbook updates all day over at TSB, so be sure to head over there for more hilarity.

Belmont Is No. 1 With a Bullet. Literally. (The Sporting Blog)

P.S.- Like I said yesterday....Go Belmont Bruins!!!

I've said it time and time again, but the 11pm Sports Center is absolutely hilarious. It's almost like the true talent and people with humor at ESPN sit around all day and come up with ideas to try out. Like how many Bruce Springsteen songs can we name during the show?

Reader SG pointed me to this clip and he said that this continued throughout the show. If they got 10 out during the opening do you think they could get through the whole Bruce catalog? Roger Clemens is up "The River" without a paddle???

Add yet another Movie that ESPN has worked into it's programming. It was Die Hard 4 back in June, but they've been turning to Sports movies as of late. We got Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and The Gameplan last go around, but now we can add Semi Pro to that ever growing list.

I think I'm at the point in my life where I can't take anymore Will Ferrell. The dude is everywhere and his schtick has just gotten stale. With that said, I will probably still see the movie and laugh my ass off.

Oh and Bill....please retire those shorts.