This Post is Not “Elite”

Fair warning, dear reader: this post is not elite. I spent a good amount of time on it, and I think it is pretty solid. But is it elite? Nah. You best move on.

Oh you’re still here? Well let’s talk about what it takes to be “elite.” First, a little history: the term “elite” became an elite sports cliche a few years ago when pundits began debating the elite-ness of NFL quarterback Joe Flacco.

ESPN talking heads spent hours dissecting it on each of the approximately 72 weekly hours of elite programming the network dedicates to the NFL, which when discussing all of the professional sports leagues, is clearly elite.

Hell, even the most elite presidential candidate of all-time, Donald Trump, got in on the action. And if anyone knows what it’s like to deal with the elite, it’s Donald.

I thought this type of banality was limited only to the NFL and its media lackeys. Unfortunately, sportswriters are a non-elite bunch, and when they see something that prevents them from having to open a thesaurus, they jump on it.

To wit: your daily dose of elite baseball discussion for Tuesday, March 15, 2016:

I passed out from typing that elite inanity, but when I woke up, I started thinking maybe I was being too harsh. Instead of criticizing sportswriters for their ineloquence, perhaps I should sympathize with them: writing on deadline is hard! So, in an effort to feel their elite pain, I went to my trusty Google machine and typed “elite” into thesaurus.com. Here’s what we get if we replace the headlines above with my new words:

Much better, right? That took about five minutes.

It may only be March, but it is good to see MLB sportswriter jargon game has already reached elite levels. It’s going to be a long season.

 

One comment

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.