I think you meant conception. I'm not sure what anal contraception would be but it sounds like a good time.

For the record, Jay Mariotti's now writing columns online at AOL Sports & still getting muted weekdays at 4p on ESPN's "Around the Horn" by Tony "Stat Boy" Reali...

January 8, 2009
BY DAN MCNEIL

My editors get nervous when I suggest I'd like to write something that pertains to the point spread. They also bristled when I suggested we're due for a report on my brethren in the sports media.

» Click to enlarge image

Dan McNeil



I've decided to meld the two sensitive topics.

I'm betting on Mike North and Dan Jiggetts to do a compelling show when ''Monsters in the Morning'' debuts Monday on Comcast SportsNet. It's easier to plunk down a ''C-note'' on the under in a Bulls game than to project this, but I'm optimistic Northy and Jiggs will recapture some of the magic that made them the most popular tag team in the city for eight years.

And the Chicago sports media are due for a win. This past year was as disappointing for local media as it was for the teams they covered. Submitted for your disapproval, the following events:

• • North's 16½-year run at WSCR-AM (670) concluded acrimoniously. North and Score management hurled insults at each other after North rejected a reported $750,000 salary. If North -- whose morning-show ratings were below par but not off-the-chart miserable -- was so bad, why would he be offered a deal that would've made him the city's second-highest-paid sports yakker? And why would he reject it?

Neither decision was sound. And the result was the end of an era that began when the station plugged in on Jan. 2, 1992. North was the station's lifeblood for a decade. His unorthodox, unpredictable, sometimes unprofessional style is what put the Score on the map.

• • Jay Mariotti, who bolted the Sun-Times after the Beijing Olympics, surfaced this week with an online column in which he sedated readers with a tale of struggles making deadlines in the traditional newspaper medium.

The cantankerous Mariotti, who always was a must-read for me, also unearthed revelations about the Internet being the wave of the future. I can't wait for his next offering, perhaps confirming Columbus' suspicion that the Earth is round.

• • Better point the thumb if I'm pointing the finger. My WMVP-AM (1000) radio show, the ''Mac, Jurko & Harry Afternoon Saloon,'' didn't keep its heavyweight title belt in '08. We were clipped by the talented but boorish ''Boers and Bernstein'' program on rival WSCR in the fall Arbitron afternoon-drive ratings.

A half-dozen times or so over the last several years, the Saloon has been No. 1 among adult men. That happened only once in '08. Anything less is unacceptable. We need to do our jobs ''a whole lot better.''

• • Also on the radio ratings beat, it's nothing shy of embarrassing that ESPN's nationally aired ''Mike and Mike in the Morning'' has become the highest-rated sports radio program in any time slot in Chicago. They do a fine show, but it's best consumed in markets such as Bangor, Maine, or Enid, Okla., or Salem, Ore. In big towns like ours, local sports talk never should lose to a more vanilla national show. Shame on all of us.

• • WMAQ-Channel 5's hiring of Daryl Hawks as lead anchor is the worst decision by a broadcast executive since the last Mike Adamle assignment. The hideous Hawks, who debuted in September on Channel 5's brutally produced NFL postgame show, makes viewers want to pull the covers over their heads more than any local anchor since Jon Kelley.

And we should pass around the hat so Channel 5 can buy some high-definition cameras for the next big event it produces, such as the Winter Classic pregame show. I only can imagine that NBC's Bob Costas was thinking, ''This is our No. 3 market?'' when he willingly joined the obnoxious Hawks on the no-budget set, shot in standard definition, before the puck dropped.

• • I want to say Channel 5 made me appreciate Comcast SportsNet's pregame and postgame shows, but I'm reminded of how execs there also behaved recklessly in '08 when they didn't renew the contract of the talented Kerry Sayers. Sayers and co-anchor Pat Boyle consistently were an enjoyable watch, the best 1-2 punch in town.

• • I'm rooting for North and Jiggetts. They're guys with whom I've laughed, cried and engaged in heated arguments and philosophical differences. The kind that led to my resignation at the Score in October 2000.

We as a trade need a win here, boys. I'm betting on you.

_________________

What are you the new SHARK?

Oh my there is blood all over the pen Who actually was barbequed???? It was more
like a light sautee

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I'm going to bounce from the spot for awhile but I will be back at some point to argue with you about this hoops stuff again. Playoffs have been great this season. See ya up the road.

I'm out.

Daryl Hawks and Channel 5 got bbq'd

The rest wasnt so bad. I guess the big insult would be if you werent even mentioned. Mulligan Hanley and Murph

Long time troller, first time poster (to this forum). Mac, this article was a phone in for you. Boorish Boers & Bernstien? You would trade in Harry and the stinkmonster in a heartbeat to get back with the bycracky one Terry Boers. Wishing North & Jiggs well, hmm.... Yeah right who you crappin. You and North are like oil and water, if you had to work with him for more than a half hour segment on your show, I think it would be safe to say you would be back in the penalty box. And lastly, the Score throwing insults to North, me as a locked in Score listener, didn't hear enough shots to make a valid point. North sure as hel l couldn't keep his mouth shut though. Norths Webio show and comments he made on your station (a must listen even for a scorephile like me) were entertaining but were the musings of a man who thought he had everything and just found out he had nothing. Of course these are all topics that have been covered ad nauseam here and there on this message board. What really gets me though with this article is as you were writing it Mac did it dawn on you that you would be stirring up the shi tfest that was here and there on this message board. If not then shame on you.

Alright, I will be expecting the purfunctory spanking by Macs ALS member: Stu Gotz

There is a little McSlezak at the end there with a "win one for the gipper", but I agree with the point that sports media needs a bump because what has been on the air sucks. Which I believe I stated prior to this article with the MLH TV show thoughts.

However, I don't see North and Jiggs making it for the same reason the Radio show failed, Mike North. Now that it is has cash on the line, I think we can only expect more foolishly bad North ideas and I am one to usually enjoy foolishness, but just as it was on Radio, it was forced by North upon the other members of the show and none of them ever did anything for fear of being fired.

If the show is better than expected, I will be the first to give the Kudos out, and my expectations are low.

_________________
"That's what the internet is for. Slandering others anonymously." Banky
“Been that way since one monkey looked at the sun and told the other monkey ‘He said for you to give me your fuckin’ share.’”

Can someone show me where to find the BBQ? All I read was a soft mushy potato-like article.

_________________
Proud to be UNVERIFIED.

Looks to me as if he got the coals as hot as the Sun-Times would let him. Pointing fingers and the thumb, I like it.

_________________

How far has sports media fallen when you're pinning your hopes on the new Monsters Show?

That show is going to be a trainwreck.

Good Luck.

North and Jiggs will fail for 2 reasons, IMO.

1. It is on a medium that no one goes to for sports in the morning or, at least, not enough for something to be deemed a "hit" in a general sense. Maybe they will outperform other local sports morning TV programming (if there is any) but I doubt it will compete with morning news ratings. Relative success for CSN will not compare to the type of ratings North used to get and will thus be deemed a failure by the average fan.

2. North and Jiggs are done, dated, played out. HMMMMM....Dr. Ken.....bad man....sorry. If North really wanted to do an intriguing show, he would pair up with someone that is nothing like him - younger, current, eager to argue. Then, he could have something.

_________________
You know me like that.

Older White Guy Danny Mac rips on 2 black sports guys at NBC5, maybe LH can turn it into a whole show on race!

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If anybody cares, Coztansa is in a new band:
http://www.myspace.com/groverclevelandband

It's amazing how you managed to reference yourself, the MJH show, or use the word "I" in nearly every nugget.

_________________
"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

LH: So this morning after I listened again to a tape of that FUN broadcast Zach did from his alma mater last night--that was SO cool!--I read the Danny Mac column in the Sun Times. Whoa, Mackey, rippin' on the brothers! Where 's that coming from?! And besides, how bad can NBC5 be? They hired that absolutely gorgeous Paula Farris. Anyway, as soon as I read it, I texted all my buddies and said, "Can you believe this guy?!" I wanna hear your thoughts on this; give us a call!

DH: Y-y-y-y-yeah, g-g-g-give us a call.

He most recently served as host of ABC's award winning reality TV gameshow The Mole.

Regarding the newspaper article, I have never read such a scathing column in my life! I could see the flames flickering from my LCD!

_________________
"All crowds boycotting football games shouldn't care who sings or takes a knee because they aren't watching." - Nas

I guess that explains why we haven't seen a chest thumping post on ratings in a while. I know ratings sell ads which pays the guys, but in the end, does anyone outside of the suits and on radio guys at 1000 and 670 care about this? I listen when I'm interested in a topic - if the topic changes or commercial break, I flip. I could give a hoot about ratings.

Loved the column. Spot on with everything, though I'm wait and see on North and Jiggs.
Loved that Mac didn't spare himself.
I like hearing when they share time with other local sports people, the way Waddle and Silvy talk to Giangreco every week, and the way MJH talked with Carrie Sayers after Comcast let her go.
Here's who I'd like to hear on the air with them. People with some personality:
Paul Farris
Dan Roan
Josh Mora
Ryan Chivverini
Pat Boyle

Mac, this isn’t intended to take you directly to task for what you wrote but more so to look at the points you were making.

1. North’s Contract. Could it be that there really wasn’t a deal as lucrative as reported? Between North’s words and actions it just doesn’t add up, even if the amount was 1/4th the previous amount North was reported to have made it would still be far more than what he’s been able to earn since his departure. I can go along with “principle” and money not being everything, but whatever disappointment here falls upon North for not being too astute.

2. Jay Mariotti. A “must read”? Why? Was it his technical writing skills? Insights? Ability to pee longer, further, and in any direction, and to tell everyone that the piss smell associated with him was “quality” expensive cologne?

3. Sustaining your own show’s success: More billboards?

4. M&MMS. Ever consider that your show feeds that show’s success? I know that M&H taking over for North can keep my car radio dial in place for B&B in the afternoons.

5. North & Jiggetts. As much as I enjoyed listening to them in their heyday I don’t find it encouraging that their TV success will somehow raise the water for those in your trade. When North was selling himself (and to an extent being recognized) as the face of Chicago sports opinion, I don’t think it reflected too favorably upon the rest of your trade. Those occasions of seeing (and hearing) him in other markets didn’t impress the locals and on a few occasions made Chicago seem a little less “worldly.” The fact that North has ventured into TV on at least 2 prior short-run occasions doesn’t lend much credence for success this time around. And, considering that the target demographic isn’t likely to be watching TV at that time of day you have to question just how successful this endeavor will be?

Then again, if your show starts picking up on whatever he’s discussing he may have a chance.

I want to know about those times Mac cried with them. Maybe after the Payton death but I can't imagine a time that Mac would cry with Jiggs or North. Maybe it went something like this with Jiggs.

Jiggs - Hmmmm. Did you take the last chicken from the spinnin bucket?

Mac - No, Jiggs. I didn't take the last chicken from the spinnin' bucket.

Jiggs - Hmmmm. Well, who took the last chicken from the spinnin' bucket?

Mac - North.

Jiggs - Mother fucker.

Maybe this is when Mac cried with North.

Mac - How much did you get?

Pappy - 1.5 million per year for 5 years.

Mac -

You know Terry is gonna take subtle shots at Mac today.

Dan - Welcome to the show, I'm the boorish Dan Bernstein.

Terry - And I'm the dominated, boorish Terry Boers.

"the city's second highest paid sports yakker"...I got that one!

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

Technical Writing skills? Yes
Insights? Yes
Only writer in the city worth reading? yes
Only writer in the city that isnt a fan of any chicago team? yes

If he's betting on North and Jiggets to save the sports media landscape, I think he's in for a sorry outcome. The North issue has been talked about ad nauseum and if (when) he can't keep his inflated ego in check there will be problems. I think Jiggs is in it for the check and that's it.

Mac, by making that statement, you are also putting creedence in the abilities of Jen Patterson to produce a good show. This is a train wreck waiting to happen.

"Monsters of the Morning"...Train Wreck!!!

NANCY...22 yr old pregnant woman who goes by SHARK

SHARK calls it as he sees it...All day, all night!

SHARK also complains about it, all day and night.

_________________
"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

Touche, Darkside...That's the idea.

Don't worry Nancy, I'll never forget what you've done here this week.

_________________
"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014