The Bill Simmons Problem

I have a problem. If Bill Simmons becomes a blogger, I am going to feel the need to argue and mock the columns that he writes. The problem is that I prefer to, and have the objective of mocking real journalists, not bloggers. I think the fact he is a real journalist who happens to blog as an outlet for his 9 year old hurt feelings lets me off the hook.

Here is Simmons' latest blog effort. This is weirdly surreal.

Quick update: I received a slew of e-mails yesterday wondering what happened to my Friday NFL column and blaming me for being lazy and all the usual crap.

I can envision Bill in his living room wearing a Wes Welker jersey listening to Coldplay with Jerry Springer on the television eating some bacon when he wrote this.

I don't know if he would call his reader's interest in reading his Friday NFL column and corresponding with him regarding this fact as "crap," but since he is in the process of being an immature brat to ESPN, I guess the readers are just in the line of fire.

Please know that I handed in that column as scheduled - on Thursday night, on time, like I always do -- and on Friday afternoon, ESPN.com decided not to run the column.

It was their right, as a massive media conglomerate that pays you in the upper six figures to potentially seven figures to put words on a paper and send it to them, to not run your column.

In this whole ESPN/Bill Simmons feud, I am very much split. I actually feel sympathy for him because they can eat him up and spit him out whenever they want to. I also think ESPN has a right to allow their writers access to right whatever and whoever they want to have access to, but ESPN also doesn't have to run what the writers write. They do pay the bills.

If anyone has ever had a job, your company has pissed you off at some point. Most people suck it up and get on with their job, but Bill has a tendency to write to Deadspin/The Big Lead (granted, people ask him questions first and prompt his answer) voicing his disapproval with ESPN's policies in covert messages. It just comes off a little immature to me to leave little hints as to what the problem is, in an obvious attempt to passive aggressively get out of his contract or to express his displeasure with ESPN. I would much prefer he trash them or just say nothing. Going the whole, "things happened and I won't reveal much more, but feel free to talk about it as much as possible on the Internet" route seems a little immature to me.

I think it boils down to, shockingly, Bill has a little higher opinion of himself than ESPN has of him. He may believe himself to be indispensable or have some sort of niche others don't, but this is not true. The advantage of writing from a fan's perspective is that he can relate to others well, and the disadvantage is that it really is not that hard to find a white guy in his mid 30's who can write coherently about his favorite team and throw in a few pop culture references. He may have thought of it first, but it is easily repeatable by others. I think Bill sort of knows he is repeating his same column over and over and he is moderately insecure about the fact that is how he feels comfortable writing.

These are the facts.

Seriously, if you are pissed off, just say it. I think Bill may feel a little trapped in that ESPN has made him incredibly popular but he knows his material has an expiration date to it. That's why he wanted to branch out and do Kimmel and write books. The problem is that as a standalone author or a late night show writer, Bill probably would not want to do it long term. Becoming a blogger who writes books would feel demeaning to his ego. So he just stays where he is and becomes the most read columnist on the biggest sports web site. Not a bad gig, but sometimes he wants to branch out from the formula he uses and ESPN does not want this. Maybe I am wrong. I don't know if he is being held back but ESPN and he knows what works and they are always just going to milk it.

We are on the record.

How dramatic. To the right of this post is a picture of Tim Robbins from "Shawshank Redemption." This is the writing equivalent of an emo song.

Bill Simmons is a talented writer, but the problem again, is that his success really is not due to his writing talents, it relates more to his ability to make pop culture references and write about his favorite teams from a fan perspective. He is getting paid an insane amount of money to do these things as well and really does not want to leave ESPN because they give him the most advantage for long term visibility and success. He is not going to quit, so he just whines. ESPN has him where they want him.