You might remember that Jay was up in arms yesterday about Illinois Athletic Director Ron Guenther using the word “idiot” after Warren Carter made a bad pass during a first round loss to Virginia Tech. 

How does Warren Carter feel?

“I made a stupid pass,” Carter said. “My teammates told me that and I told myself that.

“Mr. Guenther is always around the program, and if he wants to cheer for us or give us tips, he has every right to do that.

“I don’t think he should be judged on that. It’s unbelievable to me that we’re even having a discussion about it.”

Jay, I’m sure you figured you were going to be Carter’s hero, using your mighty pen to slay the evil dragon that is Ron Guenther.  Turns out, Carter probably thinks your columns are as crappy as we do.

Carter cool with Illini ‘fan’ Guenther [chicagosports.com]

I think our forum member, Tyrone, said it best when he titled a thread about today’s column from Jay: ”F***tard Writes a Column* About Greg Doyel’s Column* About Guenther’s Idiot Comment.”

It has now gotten to the point where Jay isn’t even pretending to have his own ideas.  Instead, he is just serving as the middle man - directing us to columns that were written for a national site following Illinois’ meltdown last week. 

Nevermind the fact that Jay’s “column about a column” links to something written by a man who picked Illinois to upset Virginia Tech, and then went on an angry tirade about how terrible the program is when they lost.  Nevermind that this guy also takes pride in writing inflamatory, unintelligent articles.  Nevermind that Jay may have found his soulmate.

I refuse to dignify the 1000-word link with an in-depth analysis.

One of the fundamental problems with Jay Mariotti is that he is full of hatred.  His columns are unreadable because they don’t reflect a love, or even an understanding of sports.  Instead they come across as petty, limp-wristed jabs at the athletes whom he loathes.

That has never been as obvious as it is in today’s column dealing with Tank Johnson’s prison term:

The jockocracy… thought it was going to walk into a Skokie courthouse, baffle them with b.s., take some pictures, sign some autographs and slide again. The jockocracy thought it could save Johnson from jail time simply because he’s a decent defensive tackle and the Bears need him playing well to make the playoffs next season.

The jockocracy, for once, was badly mistaken.

The underlying rage apparent in this statement is very frightening.  It almost makes me wonder if it’s safe to keep writing this blog.  Almost. 

Jay’s anger seems to have overcome him.  Instead of caring about the long-term welfare of a human being, Jay seems to be obsessed with the vindictive edict that “justice has prevailed.”

I’m not saying I think Tank Johnson is a model citizen, and I’m not claiming that he doesn’t deserve jail time.  But I do think there are greater concerns than whether or not Tank got what he deserved.  My hope is that Tank learns and grows from this experience.  My hope is that this helps him straighten out his life.  My hope is that somehow this situation will help provide his children with a brighter future.

Unfortunately, Jay is too bogged down by his hatred to see the bigger picture. 

There was only one upset in college basketball yesterday.

But oh, what an upset.

Duke bowed out in the first round to a hungrier, scrappier, more athletic Virginia Commonwealth squad.

And there was much rejoicing.

So it shouldn’t shock anyone that a certain columnist would try to take all the fun out of hating Duke, a time-honored spring ritual:

“It probably isn’t healthy to hate a college basketball team, given all the terrorists and real blowhards out there.”

So ... it isn’t healthy to hate Duke because of terrorism? Is hating Duke what has kept us from catching Osama bin Laden?

Maybe if we sent Coach K out there to teach those soldiers how to hustle and fight “the right way” we would have caught him by now.

As for “real blowhards,” is Jay referring to himself?

Jay then proceeds with some psychoanalysis about how everyone is jealous of Duke because it’s a wealthy, lily-white school that reeks of privilege.

Certainly that plays into it. But Duke is hardly the only institution of higher learning in this country that could be described as such.

The bottom line is, some teams are just fun to hate. It isn’t unhealthy. It’s a perfectly normal part of the good guy/bad guy constructs that make sports interesting.

There are three main factors that make a team deliciously hateable:

1) Winning. There’s a reason people don’t devote much time to hating the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. To become a true, universally hateable team, it takes a sustained period of excellence, preferably several.

2) Media adoration. Duke really excels here. If the media has a habit of constantly droning on and on about a team’s “mystique” and “tradition”, eventually it starts to wear on people. I swear I once heard Dick Vitale propose to Coach K on ESPN.

3) Annoying fans. These teams have fans that think it is their divine right to win a championship every year. Then when they don’t, they act like it’s no big deal because they already have so many. Yankee fans have mastered this.

Here’s a rundown of the quintessential hate-friendly teams in sports:

1) The New York Yankees

The original - and probably still the most universal. I still have my “Yankees Suck” t-shirt from my days in Boston.  The fans are obnoxious. ESPN thinks the Yankees and Red Sox are the only two teams in the majors. And George Steinbrenner’s deep pockets keep them perpetually at or near the top.

2) The Los Angeles Lakers

In terms of winning, no one in basketball is close to the Lakers and Celtics. The Lakers get the nod here because the Celtics haven’t really been a force for most of my lifetime, and those Kobe-Shaq teams were so easy to dislike. Even Phil Jackson, with his motorcycle riding and self-help books, is pretty easy to dislike if he didn’t win your city six rings.

(Waiting for lightning...)

Ok.

3) The Dallas Cowboys. Whenever you are dubbed “America’s Team”, oddly enough, chances are most Americans hate you. Between the Irvin-Aikman-Smith dynasty and the overhyped, if ultimately unsuccessful Parcells-Owens era, no NFL team is easier to despise. Jerry Jones’ involvement doesn’t hurt either.

4) Duke basketball. I think we’re all clear on this one at the moment.

5) Notre Dame football. Even though they haven’t been a genuine force for a while, the media is so conditioned to build them up that we now have to watch them get waxed by a far-superior team in a BCS bowl every year.

Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

That’s my list.  I’d probably add the Detroit Red Wings if hockey was still being played.

Buy high. Sell low.

Jay Mariotti is quite fortunate he has parlayed his snarkiness and general disdain for humanity into a lucrative writing career. He clearly isn’t cut out for the financial sector.

Apparently the time has come for the Cubs to trade Mark Prior. Even though he can’t top 90 mph on the radar or crack the rotation for a team that won 66 games last year. How does it make sense to trade a guy whose stock couldn’t possibly be lower?

It only makes sense if you follow the Mariotti principles of investing.

You see, if a player is clearly the top-free agent on the market and his value will undoubtedly be inflated, pay top dollar for him. Even if you’ll regret the contract in two years at least you’re “making a splash” and “serious about winning.”

Also, never trade someone when his value is high, like the White Sox did with Brandon McCarthy. Instead, wait until they fail to fulfill their potential and then trade them for pennies on the dollar when their value has absolutely bottomed out.

I’m not delusional.  The prospects of Prior regaining anything even close to his 2003 form look pretty slim, and that might be generous. But those chances are far better than the odds of the Cubs getting anything of value for Prior right now.

Mariotti justifies the move with some mystical psychobabble about the Cubs being cursed and both parties needing to move on. A change of scenery might benefit Prior, but giving him away for nothing doesn’t benefit the Cubs. As long as he’s under contract, all they can do is hope Prior snaps out of it.

If he stays in his funk, it’s not like it will kill the team. Even without Prior in the picture there is ample competition for the 5th starter spot right now. His health doesn’t have the same grip on Wrigleyville that it used to. Trading him now wouldn’t do anything to help the team or the fans move on. They’ve moved on already.

I once thought nothing could possibly be worse than reading Mariotti’s sports column. But if he ever gets an investing column, he just might outdo himself.