Colin Cowherd commits Blog Homicide

[A-Tex Devil]

So I don't know how many of you read sports blogs like Deadspin, the Big Lead, etc., but the equivalent of an act of war was committed today by Colin Cowherd, ESPN's hack of a morning radio guy.

This morning, Colin Cowherd basically incited his listeners to flood a web site to see if they could shut it down. He picked the Big Lead, a long time critic of ESPN because it was "annoying." Well the site is still down as of right now.

http://mgoboard.com/blogmedia/audio/cowherd-tbl.mp3

Anyway, while there is nothing inherently illegal about this, I hope there is a civil suit in there somewhere. The Big Lead is still down and what's to stop Cowherd from doing this to more web sites. He more or less intimated he'd try this tactic on more sites that annoy him. I don't know if this speaks worse of him or his fans. Apparently he has got a lot of minions to pull this stunt, but I don't know any.

The sports blog community has its bad apples, but there are a ton of great websites out there with some great writing -- Deadspin, Kenpom, Kissing Suzy Kolber, The Big Lead, The Mighty MJD, Sunday Morning QB, EDSBS and Burnt Orange Nation to name a bunch. It will be interesting to see how much influence the blog community has on sports media in the coming days because I fully expect some kind of retaliation on Cowherd which will attempt to separate him from his job at the World Wide Leader.

This is all insignificant stuff in the grand scheme of things, but sports blogs (including this one, which is essentially a blog) have provided better writing and analysis than ESPN, the radio and the newspapers lately. This was the first truly aggressive act by the old media against the new media that I've seen. Will be interesting to see if this media war continues and/or expands.

[Channing]

first off, I actually like Cowheard. I generally think hes pretty good, although this seems over the top. I tried to do a very quick and brief search in Lexis and Westlaw and nothing popper up that would indicate any sort of liability here. my intial reaction is that when you put up a website it is sort of like caveat emptor - and if your site can't handle the traffic it gets then it is your fault. If Cowheard had gone on the radio and said "I have this really great website and really want ALL my fans to go look at it and see how well done it is and how well written it is" and it crashed from all the traffic would there likewise be a calling for a civil suit?

[A-Tex Devil]

first off, I actually like Cowheard. I generally think hes pretty good, although this seems over the top. I tried to do a very quick and brief search in Lexis and Westlaw and nothing popper up that would indicate any sort of liability here. my intial reaction is that when you put up a website it is sort of like caveat emptor - and if your site can't handle the traffic it gets then it is your fault. If Cowheard had gone on the radio and said "I have this really great website and really want ALL my fans to go look at it and see how well done it is and how well written it is" and it crashed from all the traffic would there likewise be a calling for a civil suit?

There probably isn't much there legally, I agree. But listen to the audio in the original post. It was a malicious, intentional act. It's just frickin' mean. If The Big Lead generates any revenue, I'm sure they'll explore their options (which admittedly, may be none on both counts). And Cowherd's lying if he says he hasn't heard of The Big Lead. I simply don't believe him. He and his staff have been using the blogs for material for a while now.

He's been at odds with the blogosphere before. He's straight ripped material from a popular Michigan football Blog and passed it off as his own (word for word), and then when he was called on it, refused to even apologize or acknolwedge the real authors. Instead calling them "whiners." I'm no writer, but I'm pretty sure people tend to get justifiably upset when there original material is used without acknowledgement by someone with a national following.

Think of this hypothetical. This site rips on Greg Doyel a lot. Doyel likes to use the internet as a tool. What if Doyel said, "Readers -- go check out what the DBR wrote about me today, but go at precisely 4:30 on Tuesday afternoon." Or what if he did it as a guest on a popular national radio show? If the Big Lead can go down (which is supported by AOL Fanhouse), this site can. And it stinks that people with a national listneership would create essentially a denial of service attack on a website they disagree with or that "annoys" them.

[Channing]

i agree it was a dirty move, and if i recall correctly he ripped the whole Vince Young Wonderlik thing from a blog.

[dkbaseball]

How about tortious interference with economic activity. Last I knew, it was a tort in Virginia at least. Didn't the cattlemen in Amarillo sue Oprah Winfrey on some similar theory?

[Channing]

could be . . . apparently there have been some lawyers contacting the big lead to discuss a possible course of action. Cowheard gave a halfhearted apoligy at the end of his show - i think the transcript from it is at thebiglead. He sounded like a kid whose mom forced him to go apologize to the neighbors for being too loud or something - the most half hearted attempt at an apology i have ever heard.

[mpj96]

A Chapter 75 claim for unfair trade practices and a claim for intereference with business relations would be two likely tort claims I could see being brought in NC.

[DevilWolf]

I'm also thinking that doing this action over government owned airwaves isn't going to go over well. That's going to be what gets him, I think.