David Scott reviews the big local sports-media news of the past year, including the way NESN quietly dumped Bob Ryan's show this month:

... The move, initiated by NESN's higher-ups and delivered (awkwardly and clumsily, according to multiple sources) by Joel Feld, the network's executive vice president of programming and executive producer, was yet another sign of an eroding relationship between the Red Sox broadcast unit and the New York Times Company (dba here in Boston as the Boston Globe). ...

Isn't he supposed to be the sensible, rational one over at the Globe? In any case, he claims he doesn't get how people can be so fixated on football today. Huh?

... I'm not ridiculing or downplaying the Patriots, but let's not lose sight of the fact that it's still early September and the leaves haven't even thought of changing yet. Football is the intruder here. It is still very much baseball season, and the Red Sox have their biggest series of the season taking place right now. We don't need football 24/7 to keep us occupied. ...

Would the phrase I'm thinking of be "straw man"?

Through the miracle of the Interwebs, Don lets you watch Bob Ryan's and Dan Shaughnessy's takes on last night's Celtics/Lakers game. His conclusion:

... I wish Danny boy would take a buy-out and start writing for the NY Post or something. Moron.

I know, I know, that's territory best left for the CHB, but Pax Arcana gets annoyed at the way Ryan keeps ripping into Bill Simmons on his blog without actually mentioning his name, let alone linking to whatever it is Simmons wrote online that got Ryan all riled up.

... It seems that Ryan is falling into the trap of playing by print rules on Web turf. I don't advocate using the Web as a platform for slander or ad hominem attacks on other writers - I'm arguing that where print venues once conferred upon columnists the ability to call down the thunder from on high with thinly veiled insults, the Internet requires greater frankness. If you hadn't read Simmons' column already, you may have no idea who Ryan is talking about. Even if you could guess who he was referencing, you'd still have to click multiple times to find it - only to be disappointed that you waded all the way over there for what amounts to a minor schoolyard dust-up. ...

Here is what got Ryan's knickers in a bunch.

Could Bob Ryan be blogging about this Curse Boy train wreck of a column when he writes the following?

Have we no institutional memory? People are beginning to act as if something odd is going on in the Celtics-Hawks series, as if we've never seen this before.

If so, that would be so cool.

Bob Ryan got librarians all riled up by writing that Tom Brady would never date "a homely librarian." Ryan responds to all the librarians who wrote him to complain by saying he has no doubt there are library babes but that the key was "homely," not "librarian:"

... I insist that instead of getting all huffy about a very apt reference, all these "offended" librarians should have had a laugh. I cannot believe the lengths some of them went to defend the profession. They apparently think that we think they're all geeks. I don't. No one is more committed to the concept of the printed word than I. ...

Red Sox Chick goes thbphtbt to Ryan and his Red Sox Alert System:

... The Globe reporters have all these stories at the ready about how Red Sox Nation is suicidal and all hope is lost! What will they write about now? ...

David Scott has the deets on the sportsy cat fight, which so far actually seems limited to Ryan howling about Bill Simmons and Simmons just sitting there, not saying a thing (Media Farm wonders if it's all just a ploy by Ryan to make himself relevant again - hmm, isn't that Shaughnessy's thing, you know, pick a fight for no particular reason?). The alleged central issue: Whether the Celtics should fire Doc Rivers as coach.

That compliment having been made, however, it was odd to read him today complaining about the amount of wasted newsprint and verbiage on Manny's All-Star No-Show, because his entire column was about, well, Manny's All-Star No-Show.

Over at Boston Sports Media Watch, Bruce Allen summarizes what he's learned about the local sports media in the four year's he's been following them. Among his observations: Local sports radio panders to idiots and Bob Ryan is a glorious exception to the rule that local sports writers are petty and thin skinned - especially his colleague, the Curly-Haired Boyfriend:

... [Shaughnessy] emailed me, demanding that I call him, so, not knowing any better at the time, I called. His first words to me were "Did I sleep with your wife or something?" the conversation went downhill from there, and I believe it ended up with him insulting me and hanging up the phone. Since then, I vowed never to talk on the phone with the guy again. He's tried. He's demanded that I call him, he's mocked me, telling me that I'm afraid to speak with him. Not true. I simply know that it would be an unproductive conversation where he would shout me down, insult me, and hang up. ...