Dan Patrick and Colin Cowherd host competing sports radio talk shows. Cowherd, on ESPN’s mothership station from 10am-1pm EST, and Patrick on DirecTV Sports from 9am-12pm EST. A sports fan has a choice during the day to who to listen to, or who to listen to and WATCH as both shows are simulcast on their respective company’s TV stations.
These two are in a fight for ratings and in a fight for integrity. It all started in 2012 when Dan Patrick called out Cowherd for stealing his work when Kurt Warner was on both shows on the same day. Warner and Patrick have a friendship outside of the broadcasting world, so when he was on the show he talked in full candor how he didn’t want his kids playing football because of fear of concussions. Warner’s comments immediately made headlines in the sports world.
Then an hour later, Warner was on Colin’s show and Cowherd began the interview like this:
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“You know Kurt yesterday on the tragic death of Junior Seau one of the first things I thought about was the effect it’s going to have on the game long term and mothers and fathers saying, you know what, I’m out. There’s no way I want my kids playing this game. You’ve got kids, where do you fall on that Kurt?”
There was no reference to Warner’s interview with Patrick earlier that same morning where he addressed this same topic.
Then Patrick commented the next day to Cowherd: “You were lazy yesterday and you know that.”
Every sports website and radio show (including ESPN) were crediting Patrick’s show for the Warner comment. Except Cowherds’.
That started off a twitter war that Patrick stopped a week in.
Then, almost 3 years later, this week Cowherd shot back, claiming that Patrick doesn’t have a work ethic and that he, Jim Rome, and Skip Bayless are the hardest working people in sports. And Patrick needs 25 producers to fill a segment.
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Patrick fired back in amazing fashion. Watch it here:
I admittingly listen to Patrick because I feel he’s the best interviewer in sports and really jumpstarts important conversations, like he did with the Kurt Warner interview. Colin Cowherd is brilliant as well because he bascially talks for 3 hours all by himself without a sidekick(s) like Patrick has.
For me, Cowherd is the Rush Limbaugh of sport radio, as Patrick is the Howard Stern. Colin looks for angles and controversial conversations that will create buzz. He has very strong opinions which works great for today’s social media platforms. Patrick is the master of being light and treating sports like they should be treated, but is not afraid to touch on topics that perhaps are needed to be talked about without worrying how many hits/views they will garner. His shows during the Penn State controversy a couple years back were brilliant, as Cowherd kind of avoided most of it.
In 2012, Cowherd stated that Patrick isn’t even on his radar in terms of ratings and who to worry about, but I guess that’s now changed. Patrick’s shows stand the test of time as he looks at topics from a big picture perspective. Cowherd just focusses on the topic of the day and his shows are never remembered two days later.
So in conclusion, I’m on team Patrick!
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Matthew Toffolo
Filmmaker of over 20 short films and TV episodes, Matthew Toffolo is the current CEO of the WILDsound Film and Writing Festival. He had worked for the organization since its inception in 2007 serving as the Short Film Festival’s moderator during the Audience Feedback sessions.
Go to http://www.wildsound.ca and submit your film, script, or story to the festival.
Go to http://www.wildsoundfestival.com and watch recent and past winning writing festival readings.