Two of the biggest and brashest ESPN personalities of the past 20 years are once again bickering like schoolchildren. Former "SportsCenter" host Keith Olbermann is feuding with Bill Simmons following a joke the popular ESPN writer made comparing the Los Angeles Lakers season to the Kennedy assassination:
The Lakers were playing in Dallas, Dallas is where Kennedy was assassinated, Dealey Plaza is where -- look, it's not funny even if you know the particulars. Fact of that matter is that Simmons swung and missed. It's bound to happen when you write hundreds of thousands of words a year about sports. I'm not going to hold myself out to be the biggest fan of The Sports Guy, but if making a lame crack on Twitter was against cyber law, nobody would have an account. (Except @suss2hypens. That guy is gold.)
Keith Olbermann wasn't offended by the lack of humor, but by the fact that Simmons dared make light of the Kennedy assassination:
After spending far too much time wading through Olbermann's timeline it still wasn't clear whether he was upset with Simmons for taking material from a national tragedy or in using a "stale joke." Either way, he was riled up about it, got his followers to feel the same and ultimately accomplished his ultimate goal of bringing Simmons into the fray.
And wasn't that the point in the first place? Olbermann is a professional provacateur. He has one million fewer followers on Twitter than Simmons. He also has a TV show debuting next month on a network you either don't have or don't realize you have. It doesn't take much to figure out why he was punching up at Simmons. If you believe he thinks a Kennedy joke is off limits then you probably believe Donald Trump thought Barack Obama was actually born in Kenya.
Olbermann and Simmons got into a spat last year in a similar situation when the ESPN writer made a ridiculous comparison between Tiger Woods' infidelity and Muhammad Ali's conscientious objection to Vietnam. The ensuing back and forth had all the maturity and intelligence of a scuffle at the swing set. Olbermann likes to poke at easy targets and Simmons, with his thin skin, has proved to be just that. Like clockwork, Simmons responded to Olbermann's tweet and gave him the attention Olbermann wanted all along.
There's two lessons to be learned here: 1) Every piece of criticism doesn't warrant a response. 2) Never mine a national tragedy for laughs when there's almost always a quote from "The Wire" that will suffice.
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