by Kent Sterling
Must admit, Seahawks looking like more of a threat to New England in the AFC than Denver is right now.
— Skip Bayless (@RealSkipBayless) August 18, 2013
Oh boy.
Everyone makes mistakes, but given that the Seattle Seahawks migrated to the NFC West more than ten years ago, it’s a little odd for a guy like Skip Bayless to not recall what teams are in which NFL conference. He’s paid a lot of money to know stuff like that.
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Especially when the Seahawks made it to the divisional round of the playoffs last year, losing a very exciting 30-28 game to the Atlanta Falcons.
Knowing everything is hard. I need to look things up periodically because being right is important to me. I want readers and listeners to believe that I know what the hell I’m talking about, and one mistake can erode trust very quickly. That’s especially true when the person who errs is as pompous a performer as Bayless is.
I made a fairly big mistake once when I wrote that Dwane Casey sent an Emery envelope to recruit Chris Mills, and was punished for it. I was right that Casey was penalized, but he subsequently sued and won a settlement because he never actually did the deed. Thankfully, Casey contacted me and corrected my error. Yikes – not a good day. No one is perfect.
When the picture on your twitter home page features a sign that reads, “Why doesn’t anyone ever admit I’m right?”, you need to be factually correct as you espouse occasionally strange opinions – especially in a forum as transportable as Twitter..
Bayless is a flamethrower who obviously doesn’t always believe what comes out of his mouth. He is a professional arguer who is equally adept at presenting either side of a debate with feigned passion.
Eventually, people catch on and realize that the moral compass that defines the feelings of most hosts is simply not any more present in Bayless than it is in a paid mouth like Jay Mariotti. That will prompt those who don’t care much for that style of performance to share and share and share the tweet with their negative assessment of Bayless.
Bayless will survive this lapse despite allowing the tweet to continue to live on his feed 15 hours after it was posted because despite his role as a noisemaker opposite Stephen A. Smith on ESPN’s First Take, he’s a very gifted writer.
The people who dislike Bayless will see this as a confirmation of their feeling of ill-will, and those who like him won’t pay any attention to a brain fart.
In the meantime, Bayless needs to make sure he’s accurate, or as Herm Edwards consistently advises, “Don’t press send.”