Sports Illustrated

I couldn't pinpoint why I thought Rick Reilly was a douche bag until this "Riffs Reilly" thing came out on SI.com, wherein he pokes fun at painfully obvious targets. Ooh! Paris Hilton is a whore, I hope that doesn't get back to her! Every once in a while, I'll read a special report in Sports Illustrated that will blow me away with its rhetorical style and depth of thought, but too often they instill their reports with melodrama. There was a profile on the Diener family last year that began with some bullshit like, "The Optimist saw it happening this way." Did 'The Optimist" see Travis Diener wearing a fucking white tophat whenever he went out on the weekends at Marquette? Then there's cutesy word-play riddled bits by Steve Rushin. We get it. Pedro can throw a no-no. I still love Dr. Z because he's funny and hates cliche, and is so unimpressed with everything. I used to like Peter King a lot more, until he started throwing in his two cents about cultural issues, like "there is no place in cable for filth like 'Nip/Tuck.'" I never thought someone would actually approach the level of tool that the guy in "Best In Show" exhibits when he says, "Now I'm more of a double-chai latte kind of guy," but PK easily beats it with his insipid "Coffeenerdness" section in Monday Morning QB. And, House is indeed not the best drama in TV. Deadwood beats it, easily.