Good news for those who can't stand WIP

[ice grillin you]

he didnt get fired hes leaving on his own to start some other online venture in the city

[SunMo]

i don't care, i just don't want to hear him on the radio ever again

[ice grillin you]

oh i didnt think you listened to wip and you were just happy that he lost his job

[SunMo]

the one show i would listen too would be middday and now that he's gone and macnow is replacing him i will start to listen to them again.

[ice grillin you]

martarano is way better than macnow...not that i dislike him hes just boring


is he the full time replacement or just temporarily

[SunMo]

i think fulltime, Ike Reese is supposed to be getting his own show after howard, i'm sure he'll have a co-host though

[ice grillin you]

ike is decent but no way can he handle his own show even with a co host

[Beermonkey]

For those who get their news from papers they find under train seats, this may not be new. I found this ironic until I read the part where Cataldi comes clean about his journalistic approach.

Angelo Cataldi on his Obama Interview & the Media Leeches

Thirty years ago, I confided to my advisor at Columbia University that my career goal was to be a sports writer. He nearly died.

Columbia produces foreign correspondents, network anchors and best-selling authors. In the Ivy-covered fortresses of the world's best journalism school, sports is trivial, and becoming a sports writer is akin to contracting a terminal illness.

That day, my advisor made me promise that I would cover sports the way the best reporters covered the White House. He told me to help build a new journalistic path from the frivolousness of sports to the gravity of the real world. I agreed.

For all these years, I convinced myself that I had at least partly succeeded. Then last week happened. On March 20, 2008, I was reminded sports has been nothing more than a refuge from reality for me, a way to avoid an uncompromising world.

I interviewed Sen. Barack Obama on my 610 WIP radio show last week. That's right, I spent seven minutes and 45 seconds talking to a man who may soon be the leader of the free world. That the opportunity would fall to me and my co-hosts was inconceivable because we only occasionally deal with life outside of sports. That we would then all become embroiled in the national crisis of the day was downright surreal.

During a softball interview (sorry, Columbia), Obama referred to his white grandmother as a "typical white person" who would be intimidated if she walked past a black man on the street. The context was clear. He was by no means saying she was a racist; he was merely depicting the mindset of that generation. Obama was trying to show the way people once thought about race — even the woman who helped to raise the first truly serious African-American presidential candidate.

Within hours, we were besieged with questions from the media. At each stop on the media tour, I tried to explain the context of the remark, but the only reporters or pundits who believed me were those with no desire to punish Obama. It was the lead story that night on "The O'Reilly Report," "Hannity & Colmes" and countless other right-tilting broadcasts.

CNN provided the most revealing moment. My WIP co-host Al Morganti agreed to make an appearance via satellite, which included a telephone pre-interview. When asked how he felt about Obama's remark, Morganti said he didn't think it was a big deal at all. The woman on the other end of the phone said that opinion would not fit well into the broadcast. He was never called back.

So what did I learn from this surprise visit to the world I left three decades ago? I learned I'm probably not much better than these media leeches seeking the daily blood of controversy. In many ways, I do the same thing. I come up with a strong opinion, and then I look for facts that will support the bias — discounting contradictory evidence.

The difference is, I'm commenting about sports. My opinion may be uncomfortable for a coach, player or owner, but no one is going to raise taxes or go to war because of it. I've never been more relieved at my career decision 30 years ago than I am right now.

It's pretty clear I never fulfilled that promise to my advisor. I have bridged no new paths. Sports has become nothing more than my shelter from a real world that is too real.

The story had one final twist a day after the interview, when we learned that Obama had booked his appearance on our show because he wanted to make his picks in the NCAA Tournament.

There I was, obsessing over a visit to his ruthless world, and all the senator really wanted was a few minutes of refuge in mine.

[Cerevant]

Indeed - instead of Cataldi raising the bar for Sports Journalism, we see how far "real" journalism has fallen.

[ice grillin you]

cataldi isnt a journalist and hasnt been for almost 20 years

[Sgt PSN]

Cataldi:sports journalism::Stern:DJ's

[Cerevant]

Who said he was a sports journalist?  His prof wanted him to be one, but he never bacame one.

The farging point is that the mainstream media has followed sports journalism down this hole of sensationalist bullshtein.

[ice grillin you]

yes he did become one...he wrote for the inquirer before going on the radio

[SunMo]

why do you expect him to be well informed on anything?

[Cerevant]

Like he wasn't a hack back then too...you people are farging ridiculous.

Who said he was a sports journalist?  His prof wanted him to be one, but he never bacame one.

The farging point is that the mainstream media has followed sports journalism down this hole of sensationalist bullshtein.