Last month, I was admittedly excited for ESPN’s new series of webisodes featuring Kenny Mayne, wittily dubbed Mayne Street.  Yesterday, the first episode debuted on ESPN.com (the video above is an abbreviated version), and the early are returns are not bad.  Not bad at all.

Of course, the end result makes me wonder why they just don’t do every SportsCenter with Van Pelt and Mayne, who (along with Neil Everett) comprise the majority (entirety?) of ESPN anchors that shouldn’t be buried alive in wet concrete.  So bravo, ESPN.  Golf clapping for you.  Now don’t let the quality slip, or you can count on hearing about it.

Surprisingly, there are a few nooks and crannies of ESPN that still have some wit and humor — the nooks being where the Disney overlords have allowed some rebel forces to survive; the crannies being where Chris Berman’s sausage fingers are too fat to get into.

One such outpost appears to be the new “Mayne Street,” a comedy series featuring three- to five-minute episodes that will appear on ESPN.com starting on November 11th [Editor's Note: Veteran's Day], then promptly get ripped onto BuzzCuts and DailyMotion so that Awful Announcing and I can show you the content without using ESPN’s commercial-heavy content.  Take that, rich and powerful corporation!  Taste the pain of the blogger revolution! **throws pebble at imposing fortress** That oughta learn ‘em.

With Leather: If you don't mind, I'll move on to my series of jackass questions designed to test your deadpan skills.

Kenny Mayne: Yeah.  On the ones where I can't answer because of politics I'll just give an evasive answer.

WL: That's fine.  I'm not nearly man enough to ask anything too point-blank.

KM: I don't know anything anyway, so if you quiz me on sports I'll probably fail miserably.

WL: All right, so is Progressive really going to save me more money?

KM: That's Progressive's problem now.  My deal with them has ended.  I'm back with Allstate.

WL: Best part of the Kentucky Derby: bourbon or not being in Bristol?

KM: Not being in Bristol [is good], but not because Bristol is so bad. It's just a great event. I know there are — I don't know if you're a horse fan at all — there are so many [media members] when it comes time to do radio [interviews], and you can just tell you might as well be talking about space aliens.  They just have no idea.  [They're] like, "Are the horses going to run in a circle?  And how old are they?"

WL: No, I was actually stationed at Fort Knox [outside Louisville] in the spring of 2001.  So [the Derby] was definitely on the list of things for me to do when I was there.

KM: Oh, wow. [to someone else]  I'm fine, thank you.  Oh, no thanks.  I just have– thank you very much.  [to me] You can parenthetically note that I turned down service there.  Even the mints.

WL: Noted.  So, okay, hypothetical question: pretend an interviewer says to you, "Tell us something interesting." Where do you most want to punch him?

KM: [long silence - he probably thinks I'm insane] I guess just sort of an arm-punch.  My friend Jimmy Sandusky used to tell a joke, and if you didn't laugh, he'd punch you in the arm.

WL: Close, but the correct answer was "the genitals."

KM: Well, close enough.

WL: For the sake of my Web traffic, can you say something about Erin Andrews?

KM: Erin Andrews is an intelligent woman.  And friendly.

WL: What if you were twenty years younger and single?  Would that statement change?

KM: Well… that would make me 28; I'd probably still be too old for her.  She could be my niece, so I wouldn't say anything forward about her. [Note: Andrews turns 30 next month]  I've only met her in person once.  She helped me shop for a raincoat-windbreaker-type thing in San Francisco at the All-Star game last year.  I had an assignment, we were expecting rain.  Turned out to be a waste of coat money, but she was very lovely to have on that trip.

WL: There are millions of sports fans who have fantasized about that specific experience. 

KM: I'm certain that there's all sorts of college kids who are just wishing they could go buy raincoats with her.

WL: [laughs] I'm going to let that double-entendre go. You were actually signed by the Seahawks as a free agent.  Where were you on their depth chart?

KM: It was sort of a mercy signing.  What happened was, Sam [King, who played ahead of him at UNLV] was offered a free agent deal with the Seahawks, and he turned it down to try for the CFL.  My coach called [the Seahawks] and said, "Hey, the guy who was second-string, it wasn't like he was miles behind the guy you already offered a deal to."  So I went up there and I threw for them and passed that exam.  I signed a really bad contract; there was no negotiation whatsoever, just "Here's the paper, sign it."  And when I failed the physical — I had a broken ankle real bad my junior year: fracture, dislocation… but yeah, did I think I was going to be some great NFL star?  I thought I was as good as the other rookies in camp, so maybe I would have lasted long enough to get looked at by somebody else, or go to Canada, or who knows?  But I did have aspirations to play football longer than I did.  Unfortunately, because of my ankle or maybe lack of talent, I moved on to TV, which is where I was going to go eventually anyway.

WL: Well, I'm sure Charlie Frye takes comfort in the fact that you once held his position.

KM: [laughs]

WL: I'd love to ask you more annoying questions, but my readers tune me out after a couple hundred words if I don't post a picture of an attractive woman, so…

KM: [laughs] For me, put in Jessica Lange. 

WL: Jessica Lange?  All right.  She was a looker in her prime, and she still isn't too bad these days.

KM: You know what?  I'm loyal.  I don't care how old she is.

Kenny Mayne has written a book, and he has the website to prove it.  An Incomplete & Inaccurate History of Sport (on sale April 22nd) is written in the same sardonic fashion that propelled Mayne to fame on SportsCenter, and will likely appeal to the Venn diagram of fans who enjoy both Mayne on TV and reading.

In what is either a savvy marketing move or an act of desperation, Mayne has lowered himself to be interviewed by the blogging proletariat, which explains why I got the opportunity to speak to him over the phone last Wednesday.  In part one of the interview, I asked Mayne about the book, partly because I'd been intrigued by what I'd read so far, but mostly because that's the whole point of him granting interviews in the first place.  Hey, I know how to play ball.

The interview has been edited slightly for clarity and brevity.  After the jump, read us talking.

Kenny Mayne: So, did the publisher send you a copy? 

With Leather: I have a copy here in my hands.  I've actually read the first 26 or 27 pages of it.

KM: That's good.  It goes downhill at page 28 or 29.

WL: Okay, I won't get my hopes up.  Before we begin, I should be clear that I don't aspire to be a journalist, and the only thing that's ever resembled an interview on With Leather was when I went to a reading by [former NBA center] John Amaechi, and afterwards we went to a gay bar, so that's the level that we're working at.

KM: [laughs] Perfect.

WL: So, can you just go ahead and give me the standard summation of the book that you're prepared to give ad nauseam as you promote it?

KM: Originally I started out with the intent to make it similar to Jon Stewart's [America: The Book], but it just started turning into something else.  I didn't know what I was writing, but I kept writing. Some chapters really are a fake history, and some I just talk about how Starbucks is charging me too much for coffee [Ed: The chapter on Aussie Rules football swerves immediately and permanently onto the topic of tipping].  My agent, who I've never met, convinced me to write a book, and I ended up believing him.  And I got about halfway into it, and it's like, "You know, it's not terrible. I've seen worse books."  And I thought, "I might as well keep going."

WL: I noticed there are several artwork contributions from your daughters. How much money do you think you saved by [foregoing illustrators]?

KM: Probably a lot.  [But] the girls were happy with their rate of pay, and if the books sells well I'll give them a bonus.  Annie, the younger one, gave two-thirds of hers to children in Sierra Leone; she's very philanthropic.  The church that we go to has ties to Sierra Leone, because — you know the story of the Amistad?

WL: Yes. [Ed: My family watched the movie one Christmas.  Great pick, Mom.  Real cheerful flick.]

KM: And I can't remember if it was before or after their trial, but John Adams was their attorney, and it all worked out for them, and [our church] was sort of a shelter for them.  So Annie just forked over $100 on Day 1, which is pretty admirable.

WL: Wow, that really is.  I don't have a snappy comeback for that at all.

KM: Yeah, it was really charming.  I was like, "You know, you can give five dollars," and she was like, "No, I wanna give the whole thing."  She was probably trying to knock down her taxes.

WL: What is the ratio of photographs to pictures drawn by your daughter [in the book]?

KM: Um, pretty close to equal.  There's no real rhyme or reason.  Ichiro makes an appearance early, and there's no real reason; I just happen to like him.  I put in some players — football being my favorite sport — I put in the holy trinity of Favre and Brady and Joe Montana.  And there's a couple others that sort of match what I'm talking about [in the book].  There's no rhyme or reason to any of it, it's just so people buy the book without any forethought.  People buy other impulse things.  I try to relate it to, I think book prices are kinda high for the average guy.

WL: Yeah, especially in Canada, as you mention [in the book].

KM: Indeed.  But then you compare it to, nobody loses any sleep going out with friends and throwing $20 bills around.  So then you do that one less time, you should be okay.

WL: So if people can give up getting drunk once, they can buy your book? 

KM: Indeed.  I'm not much of a drinker, but it's funny when you actually break it down what we do and don't waste money on.  Same thing when you work for whatever company, and they spend money like drunken sailors on one case, and then cut back on paper clips in another.  But, that's off the subject.

WL: I noticed that most of the book's writing is in short, declarative sentences.  Would you say that you're inspired by Ernest Hemingway, or is that more attributed to the UNLV education?

KM: [laughs] I think I have deeper thoughts than what I express in the book, but I went for an economy of words — brevity being the key to wit.

WL: It's definitely your voice.  All right, do you feel that's enough questions about your book?  Have we plugged it sufficiently?

KM: However you wanna spear this.  It comes out on April 22nd, try to get that in there.

Check back tomorrow for part two, in which I ask Kenny Mayne a bunch of questions that make me look like a jackass.  MORE of a jackass, I mean.

“UFC Light Heavyweight Champion Chuck Liddell’s incoherent appearance on the AM TV Talk Show ‘Good Morning Texas,’ was attributed to illness commented both Liddell and his longtime trainer John Hackleman to The Fight Network this afternoon.

‘I am sick and rundown and need to get back to training,’ Liddell emailed me this afternoon. Trainer Hackleman says Liddell has a sinus infection and took the sleep medication Nyquil at 4 AM to try and get rest.”

Gah, that's just uncomfortable as all hell to watch. However, 300 is going to kick ridiculous amounts of ass, and Chuck Liddell beat the shit out of the guy who's fucking Jenna Jameson in his free time, so I think he gets a pass. Which is why you need to see the douchebag host call out Liddell after the fact.

Seriously, watch that linked video, and tell me it's a good idea to be a balding gap-toothed dipshit making fun of a man with a mohawk and a Fu Manchu. Who kicks ass for a living. I hope Liddell comes back on the show to tear that guy's heart out with his bare hand. And if he's doped up on NyQuil at the time, even better.

(From UFC Mania via SbB) 

Last night's UFC Spike TV special did not disappoint. Sean Salmon (9-2) got knocked the FUCK out by a Rashad Evans (15-0) kick to the jaw. Sounds pretty awesome. I wish there were video of it.

Oh wait…

That. Was. AWESOME. I love that Evans got the extra punch to the face of an unconscious guy before the ref broke it up.

p.s. For all you soft-hearted pansies out there, Salmon is expected to be fine. Not that he deserves to live. "If he dies… he dies."