Barbaro Hype

There only a few things in life that really gross me out; olives, black jelly beans, and the word "boil".

But above all, the one thing that really as Peter Griffin would say, "grinds my gears" is the disgusting concept of media hype.

Media hype is gross and it drives me nuts. It is especially prominent in the sports media. Whether it be Michael Phelps hitting a bong, Rihanna getting haymakered by Chris Brown, or Alex Rodriguez shooting up with some PEDs, the media loves taking a newsworthy topic and running with it for about 3 months of non-stop coverage. I like to refer to this as the "Barbaro treatment" aka beating a dead horse. (Hopefully I didn't offend any animal lovers or tree huggers with that)

ESPN is particularly famous for the Barbaro treament. Famous examples of ESPN getting their Barbaro on include the following:

A) The Kobe Bryant rape case in 2003
For about 5 months straight, every SportsCenter broadcast featured an interview from George "Live from Eagle County" Smith and/or ESPN "Legal Analyst" Roger Cossack.

B) Terell Owens Sometimes I feel as if ESPN should just devote an entire channel to this clown. It'd be a lot easier, but then again it might put Ed Werder out of a job. The coverage that T.0 gets on a daily basis is absolutely disgusting.

C) Barry Bonds/A-Rod

Just when I thought I would never have to see Pedro Gomez and his salt and pepper hair again...Alex Rodriguez has now replaced Barry Bonds as the daily baseball story on ESPN. Is it really necessary for an hourly update of who drove Alex home from spring training? Or for the media to report every single dumb quote that comes out of this guys mouth and try to sensationalize and spin it in a negative way?

Disgusting...