Beardown wrote:
Unwittingly, of course. But he brought him down nonetheless.
Think about how this happened. Spiegel tweets out a valid criticism about the Broadcasting ability of a CSN reporter.
Bernstein, always looking to get under Spiegel's skin, had to respond to him with something that he thought would offend Spiegel. Bernstein loves doing that. Couldn't resist. So Bernstien takes a sip of his wine and does it. Thinking it will make Spiegel mad. Spiegel was probably drinking to and said "what the hell, I'll join him this time."
Still, Spiegel brought him down. It was Bernstein's overwhelming need to troll his nemesis that got him. If Spiegel wasn't the guy to go after Berntein for years, this would have never happened.
Bernstein's hubris got him. But it was Spiegel that ignited it.
Close, but it was both Bernstein's contrarian nature and his feelings of superiority over Spiegs that got him,.
You see, Spiegel was trying to take the intellectual road and actually lead off with what purported to be a technical analysis of the reporter's apparent lack of skills.
Well, Bernstein, not willing to indulge a guy who he believes is beneath him, completely zagged, thereby refusing to intelligently debate him on the matter.
By going sophomoric, Bernstein was able to appear to have his own simple take on the matter, which unique angle was mandatory, lest he actually - GASP! - publicly agree with and validate Spiegs as a sports mind! He effectively, if only momentarily, reminded Spiegel that he is not worthy of engaging in intellectual intercourse.
At the same time, he thought, by offering his crude comments, that he would appear to have something in common with the layman who so despises his every utterance- but the whole venture completely backfired on him.
That's good.
It's key that it happened in a response. It wasn't in Dan's timeline where he's more careful and thought out. He just got lost because he was engaging, like you said, somebody he deems inferior. Like I said, his nemesis. He didn't realize it was the same as posting in his timeline. Maybe he did, but just couldn't help himself at that moment. He was in the mood to show his superiority and/or to get a rise out of Spiegel. "I'm gonna get fat boy here." At that moment, this need trumped his better judgement. And I'm sure 4 or 5 glasses of wine played a role as well.