No one gives a shit.

Seriously--this hockey-betting ring "scandal" is what it is: some millionaire hockey players placed bets (on sports that are not played on any kind of ice) through an assistant coach (who also happens to be a millionaire).

Now, is it a story? Sure it is. If you are a sports news organization, of course you are going to report on it. I understand that there may be ties to the mafia here. That is a noteworthy story.

However, the breathless reporting on SportsCenter is half stupid, half vomit-inducing. It is not so much this story, as much as it is that SportsCenter has turned into a nightly retarded cousin of "20/20." All the "investigative" reporting, the corny "interest" stories, the "stories" that are turned into "scandals" by ESPN's non-stop reporting--it's all just too much for me to handle anymore.

I think that ESPN and SportsCenter are making a fatal mistake of underestimating their audience's intelligence. This story is a perfect example: you mean to tell me, ESPN, that professional athletes--*gasp*--GAMBLE??? I am flabergasted. I am flabergasted. These ultra-competitive multi-millionaires like to put action on games. This is shocking.

Is Wayne Gretzky stupid for saying that he didn't gamble and doesn't know anything about it? Yes, of course he is. But is it my business that his wife might put down $75,000 on the Super Bowl? Of course not. Who cares? The guy just made $75,000 in interest in the time it took me to type this sentence. But, by God, ESPN is going to make sure I know about it. And they're going to do everything they can to make sure to catch him if he trips up at all, too--and report on it until I know every last detail about it. Whether I care or not.

It is just so frustrating and annoying to see what SportsCenter has become. Remember the Big Show? Dan Patrick and Keith Obermeyer going through highlights while saying something funny here and there. They even used to show the box score! Yes, the box score--that thing where you find out how the different players did that particular night? Remember that? Now you're lucky to see who the leading scorer was besides seeing what the score was. For that matter, you're lucky to get every score from a given night. Instead, you get to hear that J.J. Redick's feelings are hurt by opposing student sections, and that he writes poetry to release his tensions (that story, which aired last season, was 12-minutes long. 12 minutes of kick-me-in-the-balls bullshit that no one cares about, other than EZT.).

SportsCenter and ESPN are becoming a sad characture of itself, and I hope they fix themselves before the damn channel implodes under the weight of the garbage they throw at their viewers every night.

(Hey, at least Baseball Tonight is coming back soon.)