Welcome to The Roger Cossack Era

This is My Time

On Monday, Barry Bonds was due to turn himself in on perjury and obstruction charges at a San Francisco courthouse. I was in the office back doing that whole “work thing” again, but my guess is one increasingly-familiar personality likely managed to find himself on the tube (and/or the airwaves) at least a few times during the day. Couple the Bonds proceedings with the recent news of Michael Vick saying hi to the feds a bit early and chances are our boy was, in fact, all over the ESPN family of networks. Welcome to the Roger Cossack Era.

That’s right my fellow fans. Not only are our games getting wimpier by the second, but the commentary that goes along with it is becoming borderline unbearable. First, it was the digression of SportsCenter, a cultural icon, into a show seemingly devoid of highlights and consistently infused with nonsense such as the infamous “Who’s Now?” Now, the athletes themselves aren’t doing much to help the situation.

In fact, the likes of Tank Johnson, Derek Jeter, Rick Ankiel, Jason Williams, Brett Rhomar, Steven Jackson, Michael Vick, O.J., A-Rod, Tim Donaghy, Rick Tocchet, Barry Bonds and countless others are contributing to the opening up of even more airtime to talk of the most exciting aspect of professional sports today – legal issues! You know, the implications of weapons, drugs, gambling, extortion and tax evasion charges, state versus federal jurisdiction, jury selection, mandatory jail terms and evidentiary protocol…

What does it all mean? Well, we could probably pontificate on how such trends potentially speak to a broader detirioration of values in our country, our out-of-control obsessions with athletes/celebrities gone awry or the lack of responsibility sports stars care to embrace….However, we choose instead to find solace in the one thing that is certain…all of this means more Roger Cossack for you and me!

Not that we’ve got anything against Rog. He’s actually pretty decent in breaking down legalese into plain English and seems to get the sports side of things as well. That said, it pains me that a generation of sports fans may not know of ESPN personalities such as Tom Mees, Dan Patrick and Rich Eisen, but they’ll be able to point Cossack out of a lineup in a heartbeat.

Of course, ESPN isn’t solely to blame. Media just seems to gravitate more towards the crap these days, and away from anything inspiring. And, assumingly, they’re responding to their respective publics…which doesn’t say a whole lot for the collective “we.” But, since coverage occasionally must extend beyond the sidelines, it’d be nice to see a little more time spent on the “good stuff.” Because I for one can never get enough J-Mac or Team Hoyt (if you are not one of the 7M+ who’ve watched the video, click on this now), which brings us, finally, to one more recent example.

By no means am I comparing a former NFL athlete to the individuals above, and it’s clearly at least a little bit of a PR stunt on behalf of Martin’s AXA employer, but that said, in this weekend’s NY Post, between news of tax evasion, steroids and perjury, there was an update on former NY Giant George Martin’s “Journey for 9/11.”

Granted, this got a bit of national airtime at the outset, but we’ve heard little since. It’s a story that deserves to be told again and again. In brief, the 54 year-old Martin is walking across the country in an effort to raise $10M for the familes of 9/11 first responders. It’s a voyage that’s epitomizes what “giving back” and taking advantage of your notoriety for good is all about. Read it here.

While you were checking out that piece, some ESPN radio or TV anchor just uttered the following words: “Now, we welcome our ESPN legal expert, Roger Cossack…”

In the words of a famous French maitre ‘d…I weep for the future.