Everybody Sucks But Me, Day 5: Around The Horn...What Happens When A Piece Of Shit Station Craps Out A New Piece Of Shit

Let me begin today by just giving a tip of the hat to all of you bloggers who do so on a daily basis. Between work and pretending that I actually have a life, finding anything to talk about for five days in a row is a daunting task. Hence, the cop out yesterday.

Today, however, I want to give detailed insight into a piece of pop culture that aggravates me so much that it's actually the reason I started Everybody Sucks But Me in the first place. Let me begin by saying that I'm not a very good male because I think ESPN is an absolutely useless waste of television airtime. I really don't need to hear two guys who were probably picked last in every sport they ever played tell me what to think about the world of sports. How people can sit in front of Sportcenter for hours at a time is completely beyond me.

But of all the crap shows on ESPN, Around the Horn makes the rest look like insightful Pulitzer Prize nominees. For anyone unfamiliar with this show, Around the Horn features douchebag host Tony Reali as he takes four equally douchey, but excessively more pathetic, sports writers to give their take on current sports headlines. The twist is, however, that Reali serves as a mediator/judge as these four losers compete for more time to speak through several rounds of topics. After each round one loser will prove his loserdom by being eliminated for having the least number of points. Points, by the way, are given out by Reali himself, who is apparently utilizing the criteria of which of these idiots can be the most obnoxious, who makes the most inane references, and most likely whoever gave Reali the best reach-around within the last month.

By far, the most irritating part of this show is Tony Reali, who started his ESPN on-air career as the "stat boy" for another masterpiece, Pardon the Interruption. In this case, I think "stat boy" derives from the typical requests he must have gotten to "Shut the fuck up...stat!" But now he's the host, and he's going to milk his position of power for every last fucking drop.

I defy you to find me a face more worthy of having a brick thrown at it.

You can tell he absolutely savors the chance to make these sorry assclowns dance for him as he sanctimoniously dictates the show, muting panelists whenever he feels like it and throwing his worthless two cents in at every corner. He seems like that guy in college who joined a frat within 10 minutes of moving and ate shit from the upper classmen for 3 years until he became a senior and forced freshmen to toss his salad for initiation to prove that they are gay. He is just a worthless human being, and I can't keep talking about him lest I risk vomiting blood.

But really, who's worse, the guy who fucks with people for an entire show or the people who actively let themselves get fucked with for the chance to be on TV? These are all established sports writers from large-market newspapers, and they're letting this weaselly man child treat them like children. It's just too sad. And why do they do this? What could possibly be the brass ring these guys are reaching for every show? The "prize" is 30 seconds of uninterrupted airtime to talk about whatever topic they choose. Wow. So you have your own sports column which I can only assume is read by thousands of people, and you're verbally fighting tooth and nail in order for the privilege of talking for less than a minute. For shame, fellas.

"Yo, broheems. I'll give an extra 5 seconds of airtime to whoever sends me a picture of their dad's foreskin."

I'm not sure how great of an idea this whole Everybody Sucks But Me marathon was, but it was worth it if just one more person knows just how awful Around the Horn is. These guys are pretty much the epitome of everything that is wrong with sports journalism, television, American male culture, and just human beings in general. And anyone who's going to try and tell me that there are far worse things in the world than a harmless sports opinion show, go watch five minutes of banter between Tony Reali and Jay Mariotti and then come back to me. I think you'll admit that McCarthyism wasn't so bad in comparison.