I can’t stop hate watching ESPN’s First Take

9.59am – 13^th January 2015

I wish I could lie to you and tell you I was doing something far more substantial before I decided to commit another two hours of my life to Skip Bayless and Stephen A Smith. But the truth I was I was lying, (but upright lying, you know, the type where you trick yourself into believing you are doing some work) on the couch desperately trying to think of something to write for the day when First Take was about to begin and I was struck with a sense of creative urgency.

Just know that, this is not what I wanted, this is not what I intended, this is not what my parents wanted for me but here we are. It’s 9.59am on the morning of the 13^th of January and I’m going to watch the full two hours of ESPN’s First Take.

10.00am

‘Say what, say what, what’s wrong with all these haters’? A poignant question to start proceedings but I’m not able for that level of introspection just yet.

So much ‘hater’ talk in the theme tune. They know their audience pretty well it seems.

Is Stephen A late here? He seems to give zero fucks. Good for him. I don’t think anyone could argue that Skip has got to be a giant pain in the ass to work with.

A quick visit to rap genius tells me that Wale recorded this song specifically for the show. Is having your career and creative output connected to Skip Bayless a thing now? Did I miss that?

10.01am

This guy.

This hooting and hollering beforehand is funny. Obviously First Take have some sort of hype guy and a poor unfortunate P.A whose sole job it is to get the crowd cheering before the show starts but they all seem genuinely into it. In fact, last week I saw some guy kissing a cardboard cut out of Skip’s face…I shit you not. I guess the allure of being on live television will make you do crazy things.

And we’ve started. Stephen A is browsing his laptop. He’s so nonchalant. It’s his thing. That’s why people love him.

Carrie is welcoming everybody and professing her love for the audience. My bullshit meter has already been activated.

On that point though, this will be a Cari bashing free zone. She’s great. A smart, sophisticated, professional who’s just doing her job. Any cringe worthy comment she makes are symptomatic of the show’s set up. What we will be doing however, is counting the scorching HOT TAKES.

Skip is being hailed as a conquering hero, “SKIP, SKIP, SKIP” the crowd roars. If you go to a recording of First Take, fine, who am I to judge, hell I’m sitting here analyzing it like the Zapruder film. But if at said recording you yell ‘SKIP, SKIP, SKIP’, I will immediately assume you have a low I.Q.

This is how Stephen A. reacts to his introduction. Check out our Seahawks boy in the background.

10.02 Cari just told SAS to shut up because he interrupted her intros. It took her saying ‘hold on’ about eight times as he attempted to shout over her but still, it’s an alarmingly positive start.

10.04. Here we go, Skip’s up first.

10.05. Not the scorching hot take we were hoping for but Skip reckons Mariota shouldn’t even be drafted in the first round now? I’m no college football expert but I’m willing to guess a quick Google search or two would probably discredit this assertion. But that’s Skip’s way, he’s just out there alone on an island with his sideways and fearless look at the sporting world, that are invariably proven to be absolute horse shit.

I'll say it AGAIN: Give me RG3 over Luck - any day, any night, any year, any career.
— Skip Bayless (@RealSkipBayless) October 15, 2012

Skip claims he doesn’t want to be a prisoner of the moment….should probably pack up the suitcase full of Mountain Dew and head home so Skip.

He’s now claiming he doesn’t want to overreact. We’re less than five minutes into the show, I mean, WTF. You’re a professional over reactor Skip, the entire world knows this.  Shit, I’m getting annoyed already.

Skip’s now pulled out the ‘in all my years of covering sports’ line. One of his patented favorites. Skip will never tire of reminding you that HE HAS COVERED PROFESSIONAL SPORTS FOR A VERY LONG PERIOD OF TIME.

I hope this turns into a rational, calm debate soon or else we’re staring at 10,000 words people.

10.06 Ok Skip said something I agree with. The fact Cardale Jones just won a National Championship is pretty amazing.

Skip’s going eye test. If we do eventually develop a reliable cure for AIDS, it will never be as strong and definitve as the Skip eye test. That’s just a fact.

Skip mentioning all the people he talks to around the league. How many people ‘around the league’ do you think communicate with Skip on a professional level? I’m setting the over under at 2. And that’s generous.

10.08 Stephen A’s chance to respond. Quick side note here, it seems clear that Skip does actually know a lot more about football than SAS. Stephen A. is a fantastic bluffer, and great at shouting but he rarely says anything of substance.  

GONG! First hot take of the morning. Stephen A ‘you don’t teach 6’5’’, you don’t teach 260 lbs, you don’t teach the ability to run the football;’ #analysis.

10.09 Stephen A. ‘What does he do in his very second game’? What? Little known fact about First Take. For all the needlessly extravagant words that Stephen A. likes to use as a way to impress the viewers, he regularly screws up basic grammar and sentence structure.

10.10. Stephen A. ‘There is nothing wrong with being critical of him as it pertains to prognostications about how he is going to do.’ This took numerous rewinds to accurately transcribe. He also fumbled and stumbled his way through it. Dude, just say ‘it’s ok to wonder about how Mariota will do in the NFL’ it’s clearer and you don’t come across as trying so damn hard to impress people.

10.12 Skip’s Mariota bashing again. Is Mariota just his new Luck/Rodgers/LeBron?

10.13 GONG! Second one on the board. Skip ‘JAMEIS WINSTON WAS BORN ACCURATE’. He didn’t really shout it but it feels like everything Skip says naturally translates to all caps.

Skip’s gut is telling him things, we’re warming up now folks.

10.14 Stephen A. doesn’t think Jimbo Fisher is Urban Meyer. Clears up a question no one was asking.  

10.15 GONG! Skip - ‘JAMEIS WINSTON HAS A HIGH FOOTBALL I.Q”

10.16 GONG! We’re rolling now, Stephen A. “The NFL is a true man’s game.” He prefaced this with some twaddle about salary caps, or not salary caps, or guaranteed contracts, or not. He gets so many things mixed up, it’s comical. But back to the hot take, he loses points for not saying ‘THE NATIONAL.FOOTBALL.LEAGUE’ while hammering the desk.

10.17 Stephen A. is reiterating the point, ‘go inside an NFL locker room, these are men, bro’ So far what I’ve got from SAS is a bunch of stats about last night’s game, the fact that Jimbo Fisher is not Urban Meyer and that men play in the NFL. 

10.18 Cari again proving she’s above the hot take environment of the show. While throwing out Peyton Manning’s post season record and him having lost the most playoff games, she points out the obvious, that to be in a position to lose the most playoff games you need to be make it to a whole lot of post seasons, win a whole lot of games and in general have a pretty amazing career. This secondary point was almost certainly not on the script. I’m almost sure it would have read something like this ‘PEYTON MANNING LOST MOST PLAYOFF GAMES EVER = NOT CLUTCH = NOT TEBOW’ Discuss.

Ughhhhhhhhhhhhh, Peyton Manning ‘legacy’ debate coming up. I’m beginning to regret doing this.

10.20 Skip’s mind is blown by a team losing at home against another team. They could have had (and probably did have) this exact same debate last year, word for word.

Skip is describing Peyton Manning’s post season losses as an ‘incredible phenomenon’ No Skip, the ‘Door to Hell’ in Turkmenistan is an incredible phenomenon, not a man losing a certain amount of football games. Seriously, check that thing in Turkmenistan out, it’s ‘mind blowing’ as Skip would say.  

10.22 The simplistic binary of wins and losses as a way to define a player’s career is one of the most annoying things in sport. It is rivaled only by the ‘quarterback A lost to quarterback B, therefore quarterback A is superior to quarterback B’ narrative. SAS is currently using this as a way to prove Andrew Luck is better than Peyton Manning. There are lots of ways to discuss the possibility of Luck being a superior QB to Manning, the result of a team game is just a small portion of the discussion. On First Take, it IS the discussion.            

10.25 Skip’s back to discrediting Manning’s super bowl win as it came against Rex Grossman. You’re right Skip, Peyton should have refused to play unless the NFL came up with a suitable opponent so as to have more ammunition when it came to his ‘legacy debate’ years down the line.

10.25 SAS has managed to bring his man crush Floyd Mayweather into the discussion and is now waxing lyrical about him and his unblemished record.

They should cut this show and have two hours of somebody shouting win loss stats instead. Black screen with rolling text of stats complete with a booming voiceover. Done and dusted. 

10.27. Oh fuck. Aaron Rodgers discussion next. Skip’s takes here will drive me to pre 12am drinking. I have a commercial break to prepare.

10.31 GONG! First desk hammer of the day by Skip. He was roaring ‘THAT WAS A CATCH’ as pounded the unfortunate desk. I don’t need to explain what he was referencing here.

This guy in the hat and glasses is loving it.

10.33 SAS just did a Rick Flair impression.

10.35 I think this set is just a huge warehouse type contraption. The acoustics must be terrible. First Take have some really quality soundmen.

10.36 SAS is uttering one boring platitude after another about Rodgers.

Incredibly, they’re back on the topic of Floyd Mayweather.

And so begins the Aaron Rodgers trolling of January 13^th.  Skip talking about Rodgers legitimately puts me in a bad mood. I need to revaluate my life.

Skip using the fact that Rodgers has the sixth highest QBR on the road this year as some sort of negative?……ok. By the way, that’s eight road games that included trips to Seattle, Buffalo and Detroit. You know, three of the best defenses in the NFL.

10.37. Skip admits he will be rooting against the Packers this weekend because they ‘robbed my Cowboys’ and then within two seconds he uses the phrase ‘in all objectivity.’ Come on Skip, this is getting too easy.

10.37. Stephen A. ‘which brings me to my point that I want to illuminate’ 

10.38. Stephen A ‘I’m so disgusted with some of these ignorant fools’ I’m with you there SAS.

10.41 SAS wants to put something on the public record. ‘He’s Aaron Rodgers’ Criticize him all you want but Stephen A. doesn’t pull punches when it comes to knowing who some people are. Jimbo Fisher, Urban Meyer, Aaron Rodgers etc.

10.42 Stephen A. is counteracting Skip’s desk pounding with some good ol fashioned shouting, desk slapping and finger pointing of his own. It’s about time.

Skip hammering home his argument with the ‘Aaron Rodgers’ QBR was only 70 on the road’ point. You know, a figure higher than 23 of the other qualifying quarterbacks total QBR, which includes home and away stats. Masterful debating tactic.

Another commercial break, phew.

10.48 We’re back with some KG Dwight Howard discussion. Basketball, so we should be in for some prime Stephen A. pontificating.

10.50 First Take is such classic ‘MTV’ television. Not only is it filled with low common denominator content, it also assumes we have the attention span of a two year old. This isn’t specific to the basketball talk, but I’ve seen the altercation between Garnett and Howard four time already and we’re only two minutes in. That’s not including the tease before the commercial break. It’s like they know there’s nothing worthwhile being said so they constantly cut away to some moving pictures to keep the couch dwelling masses entertained.

10.51 GONG! We have the first mention of Stephen A. knowing a basketball player. We didn’t get a ‘I know him personally’ or a ‘_______ _______ is a very good friend of mine’ but it’s something.

10.53 We’re now at seven replays of the Garnett Howard incident.

10.53 Eight. And this time they didn’t even cut back to the studio. Finished the one replay and rolled on straight through to the beginning of the next one.

10.53. Nine. Straight through again. Not making this up.

10.54. Ten. Woohoo, double figures.

10.55 Stephen A. ‘KG is a warrior of the highest order,’ like a samurai?

10.55 Eleven. I’m going to be seeing this in my sleep tonight.

10.56 Twelve. They cannot go more than 20 seconds without showing this clip. They’ve also shown the KG blowing in David West’s face six times within two minutes. I barely know what’s going on in the studio anymore.

10.57. Thirteen. Jesus.H.Christ.

10.57. Fourteen…………….

10.58 THEY ARE FINALLY MOVING ON!!

11.03 Skip is comparing his opinion to the opinion of the entire NFL.

11.04 GONG! EYE TEST ALERT!

11.05 Stephen A believes in Adrian Peterson. That’s the Adrian Peterson who pleaded no contest to the charge of recklessly assaulting his four-year old son.

11.06 GONG! Stephen A. ‘The NFL is a man’s game’ Maybe there’s a contractual agreement in place whereby SAS has to state this at least three times a show?

SAS’s heroes seem to be people who could easily kick the crap out of other people. He seems most excited by Floyd Mayweather, KG and the general tough guys in the NFL. Is it possible he was bullied as a child and has some sort of delayed Stockholm Syndrome?

11.07 – 11.11. Surprisingly calm and some what rational discussion about Ezekiel Elliot.  WHERE ARE THE SCORCHING HOT TAKES??!!??!!???

 #Skipgurnface

11.11 Cari is bemoaning the lack of crowd excitement. I’m no expert but if you ask me, the lackluster crowd might be directly related to the scarcity of hot takes.

11.16 Patriots talk.

11.17. We’re now entering the section of the show where Skip constantly refers to SAS by his complete name. What is up with that? What sort of egotist do you have to be to want people to use your entire name when they mention you? The pedestal these guys put themselves on, and in turn put each other on, is pretty amazing.

11.18 They’re now using some sort of soft, instrumental rock music over clips of running backs. It’s odd, but again, a distraction technique I guess.

Skip is basically reiterating the ‘fact’ that Tom Brady just won the entire game against the Ravens on his own.  He used his ‘WILL’ and ‘REFUSED’ to lose.

11.20 Stephen A ‘communicates all the time’ with Robert Kraft and he ’loves him dearly'. Now, I don’t know if this says more about me or Stephen A. but loving someone dearly is pretty strong stuff. There are six people on this earth I can say I love dearly and they’re all either related or legally bound to me. Stephen A. is a loving man.

Does he realize the more he gloats about having friendships and loving relationships with the athletes, owners and coaches he’s supposed to be commenting on, the less seriously we take his opinions and analysis? I don’t suspect he does.

11.23 SAS is shouting about Gisele Bundchen now. I’m losing the will to go on.

11.24 SAS -Jonas Gray should have been ‘slapped upside the head’ He loves him some violence.

11.26 Huge point for Skip! He shoots down any talk of Gisele, saying ‘I don’t cover her, I cover football’ Bravo Skip, bravo.

SAS manages to turn it into an opportunity to remind people he’s wearing expensive clothes. The crowd, inexplicably, loves it.

11.30 We’re back with ‘Cari’s court’ Pro tip: When thinking of a name for a segment, just use basic alliteration. That way you don’t actually have to come up with anything creative or interesting.

11.31 Joe from Houston asks SAS a question about LeBron. SAS responds by saying, ‘if Oregon had worn those colors last night, they might have won’, Skip nods in fervent agreement saying ‘I agree.’ Then this happened.

 

Now, it’s not actually clear what SAS meant by this but I’m almost certain he meant to belittle Joe from Houston. I’ve seen him do this before, he treats the audience with complete contempt and it is the most dislikable part of his personality. Anyway, Cari missing the camera cutting back to her and popping back up mid way through the shot was amusing so let’s carry on and see if SAS can avoid coming across as a self important, mean spirited, egotistical, loud mouth for the rest of the show.

11.32 SAS says that Cleveland will be better with LeBron but uses 4,238 more words than he needed.

11.33 Michelle from Arlington stumbles through her question and is clearly a bit nervous. Skip responds with some courtesy and respect. I’m beginning to think SAS is the real villain of the piece here.

11.35 SAS, in the most self important of self important tones, declares that ‘the  Dallas Cowboys would be my pick to go to the super bowl next year.’ And the crowd love it. They absolutely love it. Skip claps his approval, the crowd gasp and cheer in euphoria. And then this guy

As if it means anything. As if it means absolutely anything at all. In some way I don’t blame SAS, if people are going to take your blind pronouncements as seriously as you make them out to be, then maybe you’re on to something.

Cari calls it ‘breaking news’. Fucking hell.

Ugh, I’m done with this show.

11.38 Nonsensical, re-trodden, blind proclamations about the Mayweather Pacquiao fight. Which is of course, nowhere on the horizon. A First Take speciality.

11.39 A young lady pleads with SAS not to beat her up because of her question. I’m not even kidding. I’m hoping she’s aware of SAS’s history and is taking a subliminal shot at him.

The young girl is a journalism major so SAS responds by giving her a lecture about journalistic standards using the word ‘inobjective’. You can’t make this shit up.

11.47 We’re just going over ground covered earlier in the show now.

11.51 SAS is talking about something and using the word ‘pertains’ far too frequently.

11.59 Just when I thought I was done, there’s a ‘best of the week’ I don’t have to watch this do I?

…..

…..

I know, I know. I have to.

12.00 I’m not describing what was in ‘the best of’ except that it seemed like at one point the actual Mayor of Dallas described Skip as being ‘the best there ever was’

That’s it, I’m done with this stupid idea.