SAGE STEELE MAGNOLIAS

A couple updates on the Dana Jacobson entry below:

-- It was Tim Prister of "Irish Illustrated" who asked Charlie Weis the question about the "Mike & Mike" roast. I should have known. Prister always asks the most direct and insightful questions at CW pressers and I think it's because he operates on the simple basis of, "What do I want to know?" He never couches his question as to whether or not it will make Charlie uncomfortable, but just on whether there is an issue that needs further explanation. Prister does a great job.

(By the way, if you're looking for the ND writer who almost seems to delight in asking questions that will upset Charlie, it's my good friend Mike Rothstein of the Fort Wayne Journal-Gazette. I swear every time Rothstein gets the microphone in his hand, Charlie begins to smirk.)

--By leading with the Bill Maher anecdote, I failed to specify my point properly. Commenter DQ inferred that I believed this was a case of reverse sexism. And I can see why he did. No, I just think it's more about hypocrisy and that is what Charlie was attempting to point out. Granted, Charlie is a much higher profile person than Dana Jacobson (whom I have met and who was extremely nice to me). DQ's most valid point, I believe, is that if this were a bigger name at ESPN, they might just be gone.

--Not that I expect them to, but the suits at ESPN might want to look in the mirror on this one. The next time a high-profile person screws up, and they will, will SportsCenter run that footage? Of course they will. But being the major player that it is in sports journalism, ESPN shapes how people feel about sports issues. Which is to say that if the Dana Jacobson tirade--which was YouTube'able for a bit--had played on SportsCenter, and then been debated about on "Rome Is Burning" and "Around the Horn" and "PTI" and even on "First and Ten", well, she might be working in Ogalalla, Neb., today.

But they didn't and so she isn't. But some athlete/coach/on-air person will say or do something that will get them in trouble in the future, even if the only recorded evidence of the event is via someone's camera phone. When that happens, and if ESPN runs the clip ad nauseum, well, aren't they just huge hypocrites? If you're going to devote two-plus hours of each broadcast day to bloviating, as ESPN and ESPN2 do, and yet you ignore when your own people make news, that ain't cool.

--For the record, I do not own a "Muck Fichigan" t-shirt. (Ms. Jacobson's alma mater, and hence the source for her comments).

--If you're at the "Lighten up, Francis" point of reading my comments on this, I understand. Dig, I don't think that Jacobson should have to lose her job and we all make mistakes. Certainly I do. Especially when I'm tipsy. I'm just a little surprised at how glossed over all of this was.

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