Lost at Sea: The ESPN Story

[Setting: A fancy boardroom at ESPN headquarters.  The occupants are tapping their feet nervously and checking their watches.  Enter Tom Jackson].

Tom Jackson: Alright people, you know the score.  We’ve got less than a week so I want to hear ideas.

[Papers are straightened; someone coughs; a cricket chirps]

Jackson: I’m serious.  The NFL Playoffs start this weekend and if we can’t come up with an angle it will be the single worst playoff experience of our network’s long and illustrious career.  We don’t have the Cowboys; we don’t have the Jets; we don’t have the Patriots.  I mean, if anyone watches more than ten seconds of one game next weekend I’ll be fucking shocked.

Emitt Smiff: Who is in the playoffs?  I haven’t checked yet, but those are the only three teams I’ve heard of.  And if they’re not in–I’ll just say it: I’m stumped.

Jackson: [looks at notes] This weekend we have the Atlanta Falcons playing the Arizona Cardinals–

Emmit: They have a team in Arizona now?

Jackson: Of course they have a team in Arizona.  They moved there from St. Louis in 1987.  Didn’t you see Jerry Maguire?

Emmit: I thought that was a made up team like on Any Given Sunday.

Jackson: You finished out your career in Arizona.

Emmitt: I did?  Damn.

Tony Kornheiser: Why don’t we just write stories about how Tony Romo’s handling his disappointment and talk nonst0p about Brett Favre’s future in the league and Matt Cassel’s options as a free agent.  Hell, we can talk about whether he can be the next Tom Brady or how much tension there is now between he and Tom Brady.  And everytime we mention Tom Brady we can use that picture of him with Giselle where he looks like James Bond.  That sells.

Michael Wilbon: Hey, what happens if Cassel starts dating a supermodel like Tom Brady.  That would be great because then we could do a week long comparison series.  Nobody’ll even notice that the Patriots aren’t in the playoffs.

Chris Mortenson: That’s not bad.  I’ve got one or two stories I’ve been sitting on that compare Brett Favre to Jesus Christ.

Boomer Berman: Did you steal those from Peter King?

[high fives, snickers around the table]

Chris Mortenson: Did you steal your New Jersey Jets line from Greggggg Easterbroooookkkkk?

[gasps!]

Boomer Berman: I’ll knife you, cocksucker.  I will put a blade to your throat.  You think you’re the only one who’s hurting?  I had thirty or forty new nicknames I wanted to try out for Matt “The Last” Cassel.  If he got sacked, I could call him “The Paper” Cassel.  If he got bloodied up, I could have said he looks like an extra from CasselVania.  So many missed opportunities.

Wilbon: Can I throw out a dumb idea?

Jackson: No idea is too dumb right now.  Nothing is off the table.  We’re at our most desperate moment.

Wilbon: Why don’t we give the Cowboys and the Patriots a sponsor’s exemption.  You know, like in golf.

Rick Reilly: He’s right, they do do that in golf.

Wilbon: I am right.

Reilly: I know.

Wilbon: Me too.

Jackson: We can’t give out a sponsor’s exemption, there’d be too many teams and the matchups wouldn’t work.

Emmit: Then let’s drop Arizona and San Diego and put in Dallas and New England.  Problem solved.

Jackson: Anyone else?

Mortenson: Well, what if we had a separate playoffs for the other teams.  We can have a 4 team playoff between Dallas and Green Bay for the NFC and New England and New York for the AFC.  That way the important teams will get represented and no one will be bored with the playoffs that are being aired on the networks.

Wilbon: Whoa, whoa, whoa…Green Bay?  I think you mean Chicago.

Kornheiser: Always with the Chicago.  Who cares about Chicago?

Wilbon: The entire Midwest.

Kornheiser: The last I checked all the Midwest cared about was high cholesterol food products and Brett Favre.  Green Bay’s in, Chicago’s out.

Mike Ditka: Tony is right about the food.  If we do this, Tony could call the Packer game with Tirico and Jaws. I could call the Pats and Jets with Golic and Greenie and any other guys named Mike here at ESPN. I love that gimmick because it involves me.

Jackson: This isn’t the worst idea I’ve ever heard.

Kornheiser: We can air our playoffs up against the other playoffs.  We can have our own Super Bowl.

Mortenson: We can sell commercials.  You want me to scoop this real quick, even before it’s confirmed?

Berman: We’re going to run into some anger from fans of the teams that actually made the playoffs.

[blank stares, silence]

Berman: You know, fans of the uh…[checks notes] San Di-ago Char-gers and the uh [checks notes again] Bal-ti-more Rav-ens.

[blank stares]

Berman: I’m not making these names up.

[blank stares turn to smiles as the other analysts anticipate a punchline].

Berman: Seriously, there could be a backlash.

Reilly: I can write a tear jerker of a column that will talk about the nature of competition.  Think about the sacrifices these guys will have made to have a second opportunity to win a championship.  It’ll have people gnashing their teeth.  It’ll also help silence the opposition.  People would rather perform a root canal on a Great White Shark before criticizing our motives after I’m done tugging at the public’s emotional heart strings.

Jackson: So as a recap we have the following suggestions—endless stories about the teams that fans really care about; sponsor’s exemptions; and a separate playoff for America’s teams…

Mike Tirico: I have a suggestion.  What if we just cover the teams that actually made the playoffs?

Mortenson: It’s a good thing Tom said, “no idea was too dumb” because that was dumb.

Emmit: You retarded or something?

Tirico: It would save us a ton of time and effort.  We wouldn’t have to worry about alienating our fans in other markets and we wouldn’t have to cover the teams that didnt deserve to be in the playoffs in the first place.

[blank stares]

Jackson: Umm…

[blank stares]

Kornheiser: So we’re all agreed on the alternate playoff then?

All (except Tirico): Aye.

Jackson: Motion passes.  Nice work, everyone.