You know what’s Crazy? I’ll tell you what’s crazy.
How big the ESPY’s on ESPN has become.
What are the ESPY’s?
They are the Grammys for sports. They are the Golden Globes with a jock strap.
The ESPY’s have evolved into a celebration of great athletes, great teams, great moments in sports.
This year it’s set in L.A. There’s a red carpet. There are limos and high octane dresses and long luscious legs.
The audience is a walking six pack and bulging biceps. If a Superbowl or World Cup breaks out, this audience is ready to participate.
Unlike some awards shows, this one opens with energized highlights and a memoriam of athletes who have passed away.
Even George Steinbrenner is included. Spot Awards show, eh?
Then the show really begins and it starts with a comedic beat down.
SNL’s Seth Meyers is the host and he bangs it out of the park.
He had me laughing from the start, talking about Paul the octopus. Remember the German marine creature that became a soccer-oracle correctly picking all 8 world cup matches. That’s right, the eight legged fortune teller squirted his ink on a team’s emblem and that is how he chose.
There’s Erin Andrews all dolled up from Dancing with the Stars. No peep hole jokes please. There’s Brette Farve looking like the oldest man in the world. He’s coming back for another season don’t you think? There’s Terrell Owens saying his tuxedo is from the GAP or Barney’s or some such place. He says he’s coming back too, he just doesn’t know what city wants him. There’s Danica Patrick. She can’t find a top ten finish in NASCAR, but she looks pretty good in a tight pair of jeans.
It’s a night of nights. It’s a place where Super star athletes rub shoulders with super star movie stars. It’s stars on stars. It’s like dumping a shot of wiskey into a beer and guzzling it down whole. It’s the television version of an old fashion boiler maker.
There are a lot of presenters, but few funnier and more eclectic and unpredictable than Tracy Morgan. The 30 Rock star ambles onto the stage and begins jammering away.
Instead he goes off during a crazy skit where he imitates Morgan Freeman and the movie Invictus.
Tracy Morgan is alone on camera pretending to be at a screen test as Nelson Madella.
Off camera, someone asks him if he read the script? In his wild style, he says “no.” From off camera; someone asks “Do you know the story?” Morgan replies cock-sure “no.”
“I’m just going to wing it,” he says.
So he begins screaming: In-victus! In-Victus. Hey Jason Borne I am coming for you. Less apartheid he says. More together-tied.
It is freaking funny.
Then he says something most of us are thinking but afraid to say.
“Hey rugby team. if the plane crashes eat me first. eat my head. then you’ll know what I’m thinking. it’s OK. you’ll know what I’m thinking.”
It is comedic gold. I am wiping tears from my eyes.
It doesn’t make any sense, and neither do the ESPY’s. It’s a big made for tv rock video set to modern tunes and slow motion sports montages.
It’s eye candy. It’s no academy awards and feels just as long.
As Seth Meyers said; it’s like sports and entertainment coming together like something you’d see inside a Kardashian Bedroom.
The cameras go to a close up of Reggie Bush who tried to blush but could only hide his smile.
Zing!
He’s there to present the ESPY for “biggest upsets”