Q: Are ESPN and MSNBC having an affair?

A: If you get your baseball coverage from ESPN, you may notice something strange near the top of the redesigned recap pages.

Presented by MSNBC.com? I've heard of hardball with Chris Matthews, but this is ridiculous.

Keep in mind, ESPN is owned by ABC (or they're both owned by Disney, whatever). MSNBC is the lovechild NBC had with Microsoft. Also, ESPN is "the worldwide leader in sports," whereas MSNBC can barely be trusted with the news.

This is like McDonalds saying their Playlands were "brought to you by the Olive Garden." Or like Ticketmaster saying their... oh wait, I forgot, Ticketmaster is an illegal monopoly. But why would ESPN look to MSNBC for help in presenting baseball coverage?

Well, they wouldn't, and they don't. The baseball recaps are handled, as always, by the Associated Press. The "presented by" peacock is just part of the kajillion dollars MSNBC is pouring into its new "Fuller Spectrum of News" campaign (see, "A Fuller Spectrum of News" is, like, a play on words, because the NBC logo has a lot of different colors, and because they were worried that if they came up with a tagline that was catchy or memorable, too many people would start watching MSNBC and it might go to Joe Scarborough's head or something).

So MSNBC isn't really "presenting" these recaps, so much as they're presenting ESPN with many, many dollars. I don't have a problem with it, per se — it just seems a little strange. When coverage is "presented by" a news organization, it usually implies they, like, did the actual covering themselves.

NONESSENTIAL POSTSCRIPT: From the aforelinked recap page, check out the video of Jason Michaels' sweet/terrifying catch to seal the game for the Tribe (it's about halfway through).

Q: During what month of pregnancy does a woman begin to look pregnant?

A: September.



Adorable.

The person who uploaded that to various places on the Internet doesn't know how to spell "feud." But it's okay, because neither does ESPN.


It's a veritable shoedown of the tittans.

Q: What is the most infuriating story you'll read in 2007?

A: It's still early, and there's plenty of 2007 left to be infuriated by, but I doubt you'll come across a story more absurdly, pointlessly horrible than that of Genarlow Wilson, the African-American former honor student currently serving a 10-year prison sentence for having received a blow job from a 15-year-old when he was 17.

No, you didn't misread that. Wilson's been in prison two years already.

Journalist Wright Thompson has the whole story, currently parked front and center on ESPN.com (and getting the bejeezus dugg out of it on Digg -- for the second time in as many months). Read it and weep.

It's about time this story is drumming up the attention/indignation it deserves, and you have to believe/hope something will be done to grant Wilson his freedom, and soon. But until that day, all the coverage in the world can't possibly provide due consolation for a young man so ruthlessly hijacked by the justice system.

RELATED: I first discovered the Genarlow Wilson story last month in the New York Times, via this tangentially related Daniel Radosh post on the fascinating complexities of kiddie porn laws.

I've been meaning to bring these topics over to T.A.M.S.Y., but they're such a Pandora's box can of worms (see: the crazed long-windedness of my response to Radosh) that I kept putting it off. Misguided sex laws drive me absolutely insane. Now that I've brought this up, expect me to never shut up about it ever again.

Q: Are Mets fans silent, deadly?

A: No, they're loud, obnoxious and deadly. But it's QUIET funny that you mention that, because the Mets and Cardinals are in the middle of QUIET a battle.

ESPN.com told me so QUIET recently.

OH SNAP EMBARASSING TYPO!

[NOTE: My blog is slowly becoming the crazy old man who writes daily letters to his local paper listing punctuation errors. DEAL WITH IT.]

Also, Endy Chavez just made what will probably be --especially if the Mets win -- considered the greatest catch in postseason history (suck it, Willie Mays), to rob St. Louis' Scott Rolen of a two-run homer.

Of course, T.A.M.S.Y. hates all teams from New York, but it really was a snazzy little catch. Congratulations to Endy, baseball player and huge fan of The Answer May Surprise You.

ALSO: Sexy Teenage Susie recently linked me to this kickass New Yorker story about clumsy kajillionaire Steve Wynn and his enormous drunken elbow. Very entertaining.