FanHouse Ernie Johnson

Here is a quick list of excuses to explain where The Dugout has been: our website is producing a code that angers Google and now nobody can look at or operate it properly, we got "busy with life stuff," popular video game or television show is addictive, we had softball practice, we realized baseball was boring and decided to change The Dugout into an endless blog about mixed martial arts, our favorite teams were all eliminated (in my case, "eliminated in April") and therefore we lost interest, our wives had babies, our grandmothers died, our pets reproduced via binary fission, and the most believable one, "we got distracted watching baseball."

Regardless of the excuse you believe, we're back, and tonight we play catchup by over-analyzing everything that has or could happen between now and the end of the season. Who's bullpen will be stronger? Will Guerrero bust out his wonky danger slide again? How many singles will Thome get in the 8th inning? All this and more in our intense playoff blog... thing, after the jump.

Through his time on Inside The NBA, Kenny "The Jet" Smith has become one of the most respected media voices in the NBA. Prior to that, he was a championship point guard with two rings. Prior to that, he was a four year starter at UNC. So the guy's kind of got a history of success. And judging by, yes, his Twitter, he's open to trying to succeed at the next level.

RealGM.com picked up on a tweet from Smith last Friday saying "Yes coaching or management is next... Will be super difficult to leave TNT when that happens!!"

The TNT "Inside the NBA" guys -- Ernie Johnson, Charles Barkley and Kenny Smith -- always have funny little postgame gimmicks (provided you think "crappy photoshops" are "funny") but last night they busted out a remake of the famed Cleveland Tourism Video (note: it's fake people) which included little bits mocking the various analysts. And if that wasn't enough to get me on board, they also poked fun at Kyra Sedgwick.

Via NESW Sports.

Ernie Johnson and Charles Barkley can't avoid the playful jabs of Saturday Night Live any longer. Actually, it's ubiquitous house ads that earn most of the scorn here, along with ... Ray Allen? The sketch has Allen getting injured in today's Game 7. Methinks some SNL writer doesn't care for the Celtics. (Sully would have never let this happen.) Video hat tip to Awful Announcing. (Anyone else excited about Mark?)

Another day, another NBA Twitter story. This time, it's not a story about a player on Twitter, but the league and its broadcast partners utilizing Twitter to promote this year's NBA playoffs. According to a report on Mashable.com on Wednesday, Turner Sports (TNT and NBA TV) plans to have its team of commentators start tweeting throughout the playoffs.

I know what you're thinking ... Charles Barkley on Twitter. Well, not quite. Kenny Smith, Craig Sager and Ernie Johnson will all be tweeting, but there's no mention of the the Chuckster on the list of Turner personalities getting Twitter accounts. Turrable!

For once, he was silent. Charles Barkley paused for what seemed a lifetime, then took the deepest and bravest breath of his 46 years, clenching his fists and briefly meditating on national TV. This was a Charles we'd never experienced, knowing him as the rude, crude, decorum-be-damned analyst and basketball legend who threw down drinks as easily as he took down anybody who ticked him off or invaded his philosophical space.

Suddenly, he was vulnerable Thursday evening. Suddenly, he was in pain. Suddenly, Good Time Chuck was a human being.

Okay, so I've spent a lot of time over the last two days watching playoff baseball on TBS, and while there are plenty of things I'm not too thrilled about with their coverage, for the most part it hasn't been half bad. The studio show with Ernie Johnson, Dennis Eckersley, and Cal Ripken is a bit unwatchable at times, but they're still getting the feel for each other, so there's a chance for it to get better.

A quick fix would be to replace Ripken with Charles Barkley, but I'm pretty sure that it would be impossible to get him away from whichever golf course/craps table he's frequenting at the moment. So I guess I'll just have to deal with Ripken and cross my fingers he gets better. The one thing I know I can't take much more of, though, is Mr. Dick Stockton.

How does this man continue to get work with networks? The man butchers names on a regular basis, and half the time I'm not even sure he knows where he is. Dick was working the Cubs and Dodgers game on Wednesday, and before the first pitch was even thrown he'd already made two mistakes.

When describing how historic a matchup it was to have the Dodgers and Cubs playing a postseason series, he said "to say this is a big series would be an understudy." I think he meant to say understatement, but with Dick Stockton, who knows for sure? Maybe he really meant that it would be a great series that TBS can move to the primetime slot when they don't have a Red Sox/Angels game to show.

A minute later he referred to Cubs starting pitcher Ryan Dempster as Bryan Dempster. It's a tiny mistake, I know, but it's the kind of error Stockton makes on a regular basis. If TBS wants to make their baseball coverage better, the first move they should make is finding a replacment for Stockton.

This is some of the greatest television you will ever watch. Ernie Johnson pulled an Anchorman on Charles Barkley last night, editing the teleprompter to read "I'm a dumbass" while Charles was filming a T-Mobile commercial in the TNT studios. Charles did not realize it until after he'd said it. Actually right about the last syllable of the sentence, you see this amazing look of recognition come over his face.



To Barkley's credit, he doesn't get angry. He just seems amazed.

H/T: Foul Balls

Kenny Smith and Ernie Johnson had some fun parodying Kobe Bryant's car-jumping commercial, but it was a little bit predictable, no? Kenny signs off heading into commercial by remarking, "YouTube is going to be going crazy now," but if they actually spent a little time on YouTube, they'd know this joke is about 10 days old, which in internet time is something like 12 years.

That said, the shoes in the road were a nice touch, as was the slow-mo replay of Ernie driving the car, building just enough on top of the comedy pyramid to escape accusations of completely lifting material from the internet.

(via Odenized)

Philadelphia and Allen Iverson obviously have a special bond, as shown by the welcome the fans in Philly gave him when the Nuggets played the 76ers on Thursday night, and also by Iverson's sentimental press conference following the loss. But it slipped under the radar (thanks to The 700 Level for catching it) that Iverson came prepared to give the city of Ill a shout-out, as he rocked a pair of shoes that say "THXPHILA".

Following Lakers-Jazz, Ernie Johnson and Charles Barkley talked about Iverson's return. Two things stood out for me: first, Barkley said he "doesn't know Allen Iverson as a person" (really? how is that even possible?) and after chiding himself for only getting seven rebounds in his own return to Philly, he said he was still drunk from the night before. Which, um, kind of detracted from the emotional video they showed of Iverson kissing the floor and hugging Maurice Cheeks for the previous five minutes.