More from The List

You may remember from earlier this year, we introduced the first few members of our list, those people that we would banish if we were in charge, for no other reason than we wanted to and could because we were in charge. This list is limited to sports figures, as clearly there are more evil people in the world that would be banished long before any sports figure.

We start at #5 -- Colin Cowherd -- ESPN Radio blowhard
I spend a lot of my free time reading, talking, watching, listening to, and thinking about sports. i spend a lot of my time that supposed to be spent on other things thinking, watching, and reading about sports. I don't understand how people who are paid to do the same thing I do for fun get their facts wrong on such a regular occasion. I understand that radio talk show hosts are trying to provoke listeners, and unpopular opinions are one of the best ways to do that. But please back up your opinions with some evidence. I also understand that a national host doesn't follow teams as obsessively as fans or local beat writers do, but spend a little time doing some research, or get one of the multitude of flunkies working for you to look things up. Cowherd is just one of many hosts to have the same problem, he stands in for the entire group due to the plagiarism issues in his past and a recent show discussing college football when he claimed that "Penn State had handled Michigan pretty well" in the last few years (they are 1-9 in their last 10 meetings).

6, 7, 8) Jim Delany, Mike Slive, & Roy Kramer -- Godfather of the BCS and its current champions
I'll admit that my distaste for Delany is not in my team's best interests. Delany's (and Slive's and Kramer's) support of the BCS is what is in the best interests of the schools in the Big Ten and SEC that they represent. The BCS keeps those two conferences rich, along with the ACC, Big 12, Big East and Pac 10, to a lesser extent, and is the biggest single thing that keeps programs like Michigan on top of the college football heap, money wise.
But like most college football fans, I want to see a playoff. And Slive and Delany, and the universities they represent, are the biggest roadblocks to that.

The List

Everybody has a list, even if they don't call it that. You know, that list of people you would just assume go away and never come back: The late night infomercial guy; the annoying co-worker who never pulls their own weight; the teen idol with little to no discernible talent other than their physical attractiveness to 13-year old girls that keeps showing up on your TV; the addle-minded ex-player-turned-color-commentator who is searching painfully for a catch phrase and keeps missing horribly; the third-grade bully who tormented you and keeps reappearing in your nightmares every August right before school starts again. Whether we realize or not, if any one of us were king (or queen) for a day, we'd have a whole host of people we'd love to banish.

I would like to present, from time to time, some excerpts from my list. Call it my "Guantanamo List", or "People I'd banish for no reason other than the fact that I'm in charge and don't need a reason."

There will be no order for these names, just post them as I think of them.

1) George Steinbrenner -- Ever since I was a little kid I've hated the Yankees, mostly because of the Boss. He is brash, arrogant, and not afraid to exploit the inequities in revenue created by being based in the nation's media market. I've always said, if the Yankees went 1-161 one year, I'd fret about the one that got away.

2) Terrell Owens -- Get over yourself already. I just wish this guy would go see a shrink, deal with his self-hatred due to his suppressed sexuality, and come out of the closet.

3) Barry Bonds -- A spoiled brat (read about his time at ASU) who got upset when he wasn't the center of the baseball world, he decided to cheat and steal baseball's most cherished record.

4) Jim Tressel -- True story, I could have gotten rid of him already, but chose not to. In May of 2006 I was at a work conference that was held in Columbus on the campus of OSU at the Fawcett Center, which is right across the road from the Football practice facility and offices. One day as I was leaving the conference for lunch I was stopped at a stop sign in the parking lot when a somewhat slight older gentleman wearing glasses and a very stylish sweater vest walked in front of my rental car towards the conference center. Turns out once a week during the off-season the football team eats lunch together down the hall from where my conference was being held. When I realized who was cutting across my path, I looked down at my foot pressed firmly against the brake. I would be lying if I said I didn't think about what would happen if I removed my foot and hit the accelerator. By the time I got done calculating how fast I would have to go to do real damage, what my chances of getting caught were, and how much I'd crap I'd have to hear on ESPN about what a saint he was, he was long gone, and the car behind me was blowing its horn. Oh well, he probably isn't worth 20 to life, especially when I'd have to spend it in an Ohio prison (imagine how many ex-buckeyes I'd run into). Of course, If I were king, I could simply banish him, with no consequences ;-)

more names later