The Legend Killer

No, I'm not talking about the WWE's Randy Orton. I'm talking about the tendency of the overprocessed, reactionary, relentless, overexposing attitude of the media to destroy greatness.

Its no secret that the media has an inferiority complex, as well as most of this nation. Thats why everyone hates the Yankees, and the Patriots and locally in Seattle, everyone hates Bellevue High School. Down in California everyone hates De La Salle. Its why the Seattle Times and the Pac 10 teamed up to destroy the University of Washington football powerhouse and the Pac 10 is trying to bring down USC now.

Its a loser attitude, envy, jealousy and insecurity team up to hate the Yankees. You ask why and someone will respond, "They try to buy championships", even though they haven't won a title since they started on their spending spree and the four titles they won in the 1990's contained a roster full of homegrown talent, savvy free agent pickups, and great coaching. The Patriots have a system, thats what got them their titles, coaching, and a system.

The crime is, everyone hates these teams because "they win all the time", when everyone should actually be studying what they do and emulating it.

But, thats not what this is about, we live in a media processed culture that operates like the oldwcw. Push the hell out of a team, player or story, to the point where everyone is sick of them, and tear them down ruthlessly and without remorse. The media pushes the hell out of stars, legit players, players that should be appreciated to the point of repulsion, society ends up hating these very athletes instead of savoring their talents.

Its shoot from the hip, reactionary journalism, you see it all the time on message boards, espn and sports talk radio. Harsh opinions are voiced with no accountability and when they are proven wrong, it is completely ignored.

The Seahawks, without a qb, an offensive line, or a wide receiving corps were 4-12, and all of a sudden, Mike Holmgren couldn't coach. People ignore the fact that the Seahawks beat the Jets, and were in games against the Redskins, the Patriots, the Cardinals, all with guys off the streets. They played disciplined, competitive football, and no one lauded Holmgren and his staff for the achievement of getting five offensive linemen who never played together to not just compete, but play well, they bitched about the loss, the lack of a blitz pickup.

We bitch and we bitch and we bitch about athletes and coaches, never enjoying the time they have given us. Expecting perfection in an extremely difficult game. Sports fans spout what they hear on the radio and tv, passing these ideas off as their own, completely blind to how these sports actually work. Why the hell is Edge NFL Matchup on in the wee hours of the morning but ESPN's First Take is on right after Sportscenter.

The NFL Network has blown their chance to be the best network in the history of sports, instead falling victim to showing NFL Total Access 10 times a day.

Knowledgable commentators are told to dumb it down and stick to the "storylines" that apparently keep the casual viewer interested. The last time I was drawn into the "storylines" was when I was about 10 years old. What happened to letting the pure beauty of the game display itself.

Nobody knows how the triangle offense works, they just hear the term "triangle offense" and throw it around to sound intelligent.

We have an entire generation of great players that people rip on. Few appreciate Peyton Manning, they get sick of him and don't like him because he's in a lot of commercials, instead of appreciating the mind games he plays with the defense and his unbelievable accuracy.

I fall victim to this as well, one of the first thing I noticed about Tom Brady is that when things don't go well for the team, and a loss is eminent, he tends to overthrow his receivers, letting his anger get the best of him and occasionally he gets a little statuesque in the pocket. Instead of appreciating the fact that he has one of the most underrated arms in the game and has ice water in his veins, and his mechanics are near perfect, I noticed one of his few flaws.

Few appreciate how great a passer Lebron is, that he has unbelievable court vision, they just like his dunks, and some people don't like him for playing in Cleveland.

Its sick.