FanHouse Myron Cope

Clay Travis is a Titans fan. Ryan Wilson is a Steelers fan. With Tennessee and Pittsburgh kicking off the 2009 season tonight, they decided to mock each other over e-mail.

Ryan: First off, congratulations on Patrick Ramsey making the 53-man roster. Pretty good chance he'll play before Week 6, and, really, the road to Miami goes through a former Tulane graduate who Steve Spurrier once pegged as the Redskins' future.

Earlier this week, JJ pointed out that Titans cornerback Cortland Finnegan admitted that defacing the Terrible Towel wasn't "... what this coach is about, that's not what our team is about. You do it in between the lines ... the rest of it is unacceptable."

He was referring to this, when teammates LenDale White and Keith Bulluck went to town on a Terrible Towel in the closing minutes of their Week 16 beatdown of the Steelers. Myron Cope's spirit was not amused. Tennessee would lose to Baltimore in the divisional round of the playoffs, and Pittsburgh would win their sixth Super Bowl in team history.

Last week, word leaked that the Ravens asked the league to not consider them for a prime-time game in Pittsburgh next season, presumably because they're 0-3 under such circumstances, and if pressed, would prefer to lose in front of a regional audience instead of national one. Fair enough.

As we remember Myron Cope it's easy to remember the distinctive accent, his knack for nicknames and making up words to suit his broadcasting style. He was a showman who had no problem dressing up like MC Hammer or Flavor Flav to make a joke work.

But before he became the voice of the Steelers, it's worth remembering that Cope was also a helluva writer. He wrote for Sports Illustrated, where he quickly became known as one of the better sports writers in the country. For an example of Cope's gift with the written word (which may have been even better than his gift as a radio broadcaster) check out this piece about Roberto Clemente from Sports Illustrated in 1966. For all the talk of Roberto Clemente the hypochondriac, Cope dug deeper:

For all his exertions, Roberto is perpetually unfit, because, as Dr. Busó goes on to explain, he has a low threshold of pain, which causes him to take minor ailments for crippling debilitations. "If his back hurts he worries," says Dr. Busó, "and then it becomes a vicious circle, leading to more things. If he has a little diarrhea, he worries that he has a serious stomach difficulty." Roberto is endowed with an exceptionally supple musculature that enables him to race full speed into a base and then stop cold on it -- which he likes to do instead of rounding it. But even he pulls muscles, twists ligaments and generally raises hell with his supple musculature that way. "It's his natural style," sighs Dr. Busó.

But he was also good at schtick, as this clip points out.

Myron Cope, the great Pittsburgh Steelers announcer with the one-of-a-kind voice, has died at the age of 79. He had been suffering from respiratory problems and heart failure in the last few months. Here's a look at Cope from a couple of years ago:

Cope became a sportswriter after graduating from the University of Pittsburgh, and his profile of Howard Cosell for Sports Illustrated is a classic.

But it was as the Steelers' radio announcer that Cope made his mark. He's remembered for his screechy voice, his boisterous attitude, his "Yoi!" or "Double Yoi!" catchphrase, and for inventing the Terrible Towel. Cope's voice has been synonymous with the franchise since he started as the Steelers' broadcaster in 1970, and his 35-year run is the longest that any radio announcer has ever called the games of one NFL team.