FanHouse Mark Schlereth

ESPN recently issued a new stance for its employees regarding social media (the full policy is after the jump). Presumably, Twitter and Facebook are the primary causes of the edicts coming from on high; and ESPN immediately received a substantial amount of backlash regarding the new policies.

That's logical of course -- anytime that ESPN sends a company-wide memo around, the standard course of action is to freak the mess out and blame them for being a corporate monolith that just doesn't get it (if I recall correctly, there was a similar dismissal of blogs, which means Twitter has yet to fully jump ye old dorsal fin). But the policy -- which was ironically "broken" by ESPN employee Ric Bucher -- isn't all just ridiculously inane corporate behavior. There's some thought process behind it. I think.

That didn't take long. Jay Cutler has been a member of the Chicago Bears for approximately three hours and the local media are already questioning his leadership skills. From the Chicago Tribune's Rick Morrissey:

Steelers safety Troy Polamalu created a stir this week when he said the NFL is turning into a "pansy game" by fining players for hard hits. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell shot back, saying his only interest is in protecting players from injuries. But one player who knows something about NFL injuries says Goodell is full of it:

That was Mark Schlereth, a former NFL offensive lineman who had about two dozen knee surgeries and is now an ESPN analyst, explaining that the league isn't quite as concerned about player safety as it likes to let on.

ESPN football analyst Mark Schlereth was an NFL player for 13 years, including one year as a teammate of Matt Millen's on the Washington Redskins, when they won the Super Bowl in 1991. And Schlereth had some interesting things to say about Millen today on Mike and Mike in the Morning.

Schlereth prefaced his comments by saying he personally likes Millen. "He's a guy that I respect," Schlereth said. "A guy that I love." And then Schlereth unloaded.