Colin Cowturd on Sean Taylor

[MTK]

Just in case there was any doubt as to how much of a douche bag this guy is:

Colin Cowherd on Sean Taylor - D.C. Sports Bog

One of the dominant questions sports opinion types have grappled with this week is this: Was Sean Taylor's death a surprise. Famously, Michael Wilbon and Len Shapiro both said no. This struck me as a needlessly provocative and confrontational way to approach the story in its opening days, and frankly, I don't believe that they weren't at all surprised. I mean, really, someone told them that the day after a big Redskins loss in Tampa their best player had been critically shot in his bedroom in an upper-class neighborhood Miami, and they weren't at all taken aback? They weren't at all like, "Whoa!," not even for a few seconds? I knew Sean Taylor's history, and when I got off that plane from Tampa and this Skins fan named Robert came up to me and told me what happened, I was damn sure like, "Whoa!" I know there's violence in Iraq, but if I learned that a high-ranking administration official had secretly traveled to Baghdad and been killed, I'd be like, "Whoa!" at least for a few seconds.

The counter argument goes, if you were told a Redskins player would be shot last weekend, wouldn't your first guess be Sean Taylor? Yeah, I guess. How about this, though: if you were told a Washington Wizards player was going to quit basketball next week, renounce all his material possessions, dress in rags, become a raw-food vegan, join the Peace Corps and move to Tanzania, 100 percent of you would guess it would be Etan Thomas, right? That wouldn't mean the action itself wouldn't be shocking and surprising.

And now people are firing back at the initial round of "not-a-surprise" columns: read, for example, Mike Freeman, who writes "can we all take a breath, remove our CSI badges, and see Taylor as he is: someone who suffered a horrible death? Can we all be human beings for just one second? A second. That's not so much to ask, is it?" Or read David Steele. Or check out this City Paper blog, which quotes Wash Times beat guy John Mitchell calling Shapiro "a racist conniving dog of a skunk."


Fun stuff. Anyhow, not surprisingly, ESPN Radio's Colin Cowherd has been far ahead of the pack in stomach-turning 'baggery. From the beginning, he argued that this could not be a random act, which is fine, but he insisted on doing so in the most obnoxious, self-serving and ruthless manner possible. The audio clips of his Sean Taylor stuff are prominently sprinkled about his page, allowing him hopefully to at least make some coin off of throwing barbs at a dead guy. From yesterday's show:

Serious grown-up talk here. If you can't handle grown-up stuff, then turn the radio to another channel right now, give you about five seconds. We're going to talk about Sean Taylor's death...If you can't deal with that, I have no problem with that at all, none. Right now turn the radio to Oldies 107.8 or another station....All right, now it's just grown-ups, we've gotten the kids out of the room, let's proceed.

If you actually want to have a serious discussion, this has immediately disqualified you. This is pure drivel, meant to do nothing but incite.

Sean Taylor, great player has a history of really really bad judgment, really really bad judgment. Cops, assault, spitting, DUI. I'm supposed to believe his judgment got significantly better in two years, from horrible to fantastic? 'But Colin he cleaned up his act.' Well yeah, just because you clean the rug doesn't mean you got everything out. Sometimes you've got stains, stuff so deep it never ever leaves.

Stains? Spitting and a DUI arrest that was thrown out are stains so deep they never leave? T.O. has spit. LenDale White has spit. Chris Samuels claimed that Antonio Smith spit. Charles Barkley spit on a young girl. Roberto Alomar spit at an umpire. Lot of people have stains, I guess. Wouldn't be surprised if any of them die, I guess. Seriously, there is one prior public incident in Sean Taylor's life that causes serious concern in this case, the one involving guns. It sure isn't the fact that he spit on a player or had a DUI charge that was dismissed.

My gut feeling with this story, and we said yesterday, yesterday was not really a day to go out, yesterday was sort of a day, you know, grieving, but we're past the memorial part. It's grown-up time, ask yourself realistic questions....Just because somebody cleans the rugs doesn't mean there aren't stains. No matter what those commercials, OxiClean, tell you on cable TV, some stains you can't get out. And if you have bad judgment for 23 years of your life, even if you clean it up, your judgment doesn't get great over night.

I suppose this is true enough, in general. How it relates to this case, neither I nor Colin Cowherd has any idea, since we have absolutely no idea how Taylor's judgment related to what happened to him. Cowherd is just throwing stuff like that out there to stir passions among his listeners. It's nasty stuff. There is no possible justification for using "stains you can't get out" in what you're claiming is "serious, grown-up talk." That's media jackal talk.

I want to know the truth. I want to know the details. It's not pretty? I don't care, I'm a grown-up. I can handle not pretty. A lot of people can't in the media, a lot of people can't, 'Oh, wah wah wah, sensitivity, he's a great person, wah wah wah.' Hey, I don't care, that's fine, he died, let's get to the truth. We're all about the truth. We always say on this show, we're not always good, we're always honest. Just give me honesty.

Colin, you're a brave soldier for journalistic freedom and investigative verve. All of us innocent souls who chose not to use the phrase "stains you can't get out" in the first few days are, as you said, "sheep...like 95 percent of the media." But you're a grown-up. You can launch random, loaded phrases from the truth-seeking depth of your soul, because you, my journalistic hero, can handle it.

So that was yesterday. And then I'm listening today, and Cowherd quotes Antrel Rolle's remarks and then, I swear, gloats over the fact that his "gut feeling" has been proven correct, that Taylor's death was surely not a random act. It's hard for me even to know how to respond to someone who would publicly gloat over something like this, and my attempted tape recording of the program didn't come out well, but I can tell you that he talked about CIA profiling and diversity and, well, this:

I didn't grow up African American. I grew up middle class. I wanted Stephen A.'s perspective on the story. And during this story I leaned on Stephen A., Michael Wilbon and Jason Whitlock for a perspective I don't have. You walk around ESPN, it's in the halls, on the posters, Diversity, Capital D, big letter. You know why Diversity's really important at ESPN, a big company? Because it gives you more people with unique perspectives. And if you're a growing company, you want to stay fresh, you need to have a 23-year old Hispanic gal or guy tell us what's going on in your community. Asian, white, black, Hispanic, everybody, new voices, young voices, old voices. You walk the halls of ESPN, it's the United Nations. It's great. Canadians, Hispanics, Europeans. They give us a perspective we don't have.

Ok. Awesome. And then he concludes:

No, all the information's not in. But I feel pretty confident that my gut feeling, like any of yours, by the way, is right and was right.

Well, again, congratulations Colin. You, indeed, are the big winner this week. Enjoy your success.

[GridIron26]

Wow, just speechless to this article.. I just don't understand this man.. I am just glad that we Redskins fans know the real Sean Taylor..

[BleedBurgundy]

Some people are willing to sell their soul for a dollar. Prime example.

[freddyg12]

Everybody right now is writing stories & talking about it based on virtually no evidence that is known to the public.

What I like about Whitlock's article is that he states that it is a pattern, whether true or not, that Sean died by the hands of another black man, and that he's essentially willing to bet that it was. He then gives his reasoning for it.

Cowherd, as he always does, simply says I know this is the truth & damn you if you think otherwise. Whitlock is a pro journalist, Cowherd is an entertainer (and yes a douche bag as well).

[GMScud]

What an unbelievable POS. I'd love to smack that guy.

[Paintrain]

As I said the other day about him, he's what's wrong with the media.. He's a pompous, talentless talking head who gets paid well to spew negativity to generate ratings and buzz..

Dan LeBetard (who BTW is furious with how Taylor's past is being thrown into every story about what happened) says all the time on the radio down here that society feeds on the media's insistence to define someone by their worst public moment. Having that kind of power is a responsibility that is taken far too lightly by the media culture today.

[mheisig]

The problem isn't really WHAT Cowturd is saying as much as it's WHEN he's saying it. Right now all we know is that Sean Taylor is no longer with us. We know nothing about who killed him, how he died, whether it was related to his past or not. Concluding otherwise is ridiculous.

Cowturd may very well be right. This might be someone who had it out for Sean over some longstanding problem or vendetta that's been present in Sean's life for some time.

At this point, however, why speculate and offer up pure conjecture? Let's grieve and mourn the loss of a human being who appeared to be getting his life straightened out.

IF it comes out that Sean was killed by someone from his past and it's all related, then we can discuss it when the facts present themselves, but why now? Why so much speculation? Just let him rest in peace until the facts come out.

[MTK]

Originally Posted by Paintrain

As I said the other day about him, he's what's wrong with the media.. He's a pompous, talentless talking head who gets paid well to spew negativity to generate ratings and buzz..

Dan LeBetard (who BTW is furious with how Taylor's past is being thrown into every story about what happened) says all the time on the radio down here that society feeds on the media's insistence to define someone by their worst public moment. Having that kind of power is a responsibility that is taken far too lightly by the media culture today.

Sad but true.

[GhettoDogAllStars]

The two things that offend me the most:

"And if you have bad judgment for 23 years of your life, even if you clean it up, your judgment doesn't get great over night."

- 23 years, huh? So he was born with bad judgment? If so, who isn't?

"I didn't grow up African American. I grew up middle class."

- So there are no middle class African Americans? You're either one or the other? Didn't Sean grow up middle class? I fail to see how his race has anything to do with this.

These two items suggest to me that Cowherd has a bias. He thinks Sean Taylor always had bad judgment -- from the day he was born. And, it also tells me that he is racist, and/or has a bias concerning race (which is basically the same thing).

Therefore, nothing he says regarding this incident has any credibility.

[SmootSmack]

What frustrates me most about him is that he has such a broad distribution that his outlandish comments and behavior are often seen as the voice of all media. Too often, broad strokes about the media are painted based on one's reaction to Cowherd.

It would be akin to calling out this site because of the comments of one member.

Unfortunately Cowherd tends to thrive on the controversy. So the more he get people agitated, the more he will belabor his point.

He's not easy, that's for sure.

[Dlyne8r]

This is the reason I no longer tune in to this insensitive moronic idiot. After listening yesterday on the radio to the rant you qoute in the beginning of your post, I knew exactly where he was heading but chose to listen anyway just to verify my perception of Cowturd. It was a defining moment for me and I decided to exercise my right to "turn the dial" as he dared. And I did. For good. I also knew today that he would be crowing about Antrel Rolle's comments as validity to his skewed viewpoint. So, I again tuned out. Personalities such as Cowturds are usually derived from an upbringing without love or nurturing that creates an undying need for attention to overcome great insecurities. But, he no longer upsets me as I no longer give him the opportunity to be heard.

[VTSkins897]

he's just a little pissant.. good responses to his comments.

[FRPLG]

This is what gets me so much about all of this. From all acounts when he was drafted he had a spotless record.

He makes a few poor but completely irrelevant choices, missing the rookie symposium, spitting, working out on his own, being distant to the media. All irrelevant in just about any way.

He gets tagged for a DUI that got thrown out. Not just a 'technical' throw out but a 'sounds like he didn't reven do it' throw. Basically irrelevant.

And the gun situation involved people who he believed STOLE from him. He didn't go after random people.

So most of this bad behavior that symbolizes his thug lifestyle is BS and the one thing that wasn't at least has some context.

But people act like he was a complete thug.

[70Chip]

If he's so brave, one wonders why he felt the need to shield himself from the inevitable charges of racism by bloviating about how ESPN is the United Nations. This line is particularly bizarre:

"It's great. Canadians, Hispanics, Europeans. They give us a perspective we don't have."

Wow. Canadians AND Europeans. We just don't get enough Dutch perspective when tragedies like this occurr. And, who can argue with the idea that Canadians offer a unique perspective on life in South Florida.

Here's what Cowherd was really saying in that last paragraph:

"There's a good chance that someone may accuse me of racism over the statements I've made the last few days. So, not wanting to end up like Don Imus, I'm going to mention a black guy that I know and also offer a first draft for ESPN's next sensitivity training manual. I'm totally down with the whole PC thing and if anyone doubts that, you're probaly suffering from a lack of Australian perspective, which you would have if you worked at great place like ESPN, which has long been in the vanguard of promoting workplace diversity. Did I mention the black guy?"

[SteelandSkin]

Originally Posted by GridIron26

Wow, just speechless to this article.. I just don't understand this man.. I am just glad that we Redskins fans know the real Sean Taylor..

He sounds as idiotic as pencilneck collinsworth is analyzing football games.