Re: Art Thiel's response...

[William Bird <birdwl@earthlink.net>]

> From: Jim Metz <JBMetzEA@AOL.com>
>
> on 5/31/01 6:57 PM, OzerskyJA at OzerskyJA@cmog.org wrote:
>
> "...platitudinous sportswriters,.."
>        ****************
>
>    Technicaly, he might be correct, "but in our hearts we know you're
> right.".

Actually, he is not correct, technically or otherwise.  While I don't 
agree completely with Josh's analysis of the original article (I didn't 
think it was _totally_ idiotic, for example), he used the word 
"platitudinous" correctly, if he meant to characterize Thiel's remarks as 
trite, dull or cliched, which is a safe guess.  Just goes to show you 
again why sportswriters (with some notable exceptions) are, by and large, 
not master wordsmiths, by any stretch of the imagination.  Far from it.

(What's the deal with defining "platitudinous" as "having the 
characteristics of a platitude" or "full of platitudes" anyway?  It's like 
defining "crappy" as "having the characteristics of crap" without 
explaining what "crap" is.)

What I found really interesting was this portion of Josh's last paragraph 
of his first reply:

"what isn't relevant are platitudinous
sportswriters, whose dislike of the league they cover is palpable,
and not disguised in the least by pseudo-cyncism or empty put-downs."

If one substitutes "[some] listmembers" for "sportswriters" and "Boston 
Celtics" for "league" you get a pretty good characterization of some 
people who post to this list.  (Well, it was interesting to _me_, I'm sure 
Josh didn't intend that -- he probably meant what he wrote, and not how I 
bastardized it, surely.)

Oh, and I almost forgot -- the crack about being a "lightweight fan" had 
me rolling.  As if getting paid for covering sports and writing what 
amounts to opinion-based puff-pieces with little (or no) research, thought 
or analysis makes some yahoo more of a "heavyweight" fan that someone else.
   You bet.  I do not find most sportswriters to be very relevant at all.

Back to your normally scheduled draft predictions.

Regards,

(The Celtic "Tird",
  Celticus "tirdius")
mailto:celtictird@yahoo.com