Every single year, the DSR committee** that selects the entrants in our Worst Detroit Sports Media Personality has the most difficult time figuring out how to handle Lansing State Journal columnist Graham Couch. There is never a question of his awfulness or a debate over his worthiness, it’s just that geographically speaking he poses a quandary.
The tourney is meant solely for DETROIT media personalities and Cracker Sofa is based out of the state’s capital. For instance, that HUGE asshat Bill Simonson would probably be a #1 seed if he had any Motown connection, but since he is Grand Rapids’ problem, he has never been allowed to participate.
The argument has always been: what’s the difference in including someone like Joe Rexrode or Angelique Chengelis since their body of work is collegiate-related and non-Detroit also. That point was starting to fall on deaf ears with me until it was brought to my attention by other committee members that Couch’s work DOES appear occasionally in the Detroit Free Press.
(** — Believe it or not, I am not joking when I say there is a committee. It’s not all my choice alone. There are about 10 to 12 DSR elite members who chime in with their opinions. The bracket is usually revamped a few times before being published based on their input.)
Anyway, Couch really causes quite the conundrum. He has all of the necessary takes that would make him a #1 seed, but that 90 mile jaunt from Lansing to Detroit has always prevented him from “achieving” that high ranking. My question has always been, “Do we really want a guy based out of Lansing winning the whole enchilada?”
This became a serious dilemma last year when MGoBlog’s creator Brian Cook started ReTweeting only the tourney matchups that involved Empty-Headed Futon. With MGoBrian’s loyal, rabid and LARGE following — who universally despise Couch — voting for the dopey Lansing writer, it became necessary for me to remove Couch matchups from Twitter. Couch would have won in a Reagan-esque landslide if I didn’t make that executive decision.
But after the last couple of weeks, I am starting to wonder if this monumental nitwit is worth protecting. How bad is Couch? Cook suggested a bracket of his own a few days ago. A tournament of Couch’s worst 64 takes. It’s a brilliant idea except who the fuck could possibly whittle it down to ONLY 64?
Right off the top of my head I thought of four worthy #1 seeds.
Or the time he basically insinuated that if he were Connor Cook, he’d be doing blow off a co-ed’s tits ….
Or how about this doozy from the DSR archives:
But the #1 overall seed would almost have to be his declaration that kids should have to go to school on Martin Luther King Day”:
Graham Couch is basically Skip Bayless without the six zeroes on his yearly tax return. I mean, the guy is slumming it working for a small paper in Lansing and is still willing to trade in any dignity he might have for a modicum of cheap heat. He’s like a bad guy wrestler whooping it up at local flea market shows or VFW halls.
Well, that’s part of it, of course. The other issue with Couch, in my humble opinion, is that he pictures himself as some sort of intellectual. Except he doesn’t have NEARLY the brainpower to pull off the high-wire act he is attempting.
And nothing personifies his Shemp Wallenda act more than a Tweet he sent out on Friday. But first, a little backstory. As you probably know, three Michigan State football players have been under investigation for months regarding a potential sexual assault. At the end of February, Couch wrote a column where he insanely called that investigation “noise.”
Not only did he cheapen the potential sexual assault of a woman with the word “noise”, he proceeded to basically state that the team’s losing is what’s causing the rape investigation to be a big story. Don’t believe me? Well…..
I hadn’t read that offensive drivel on February 25th when Couch posted it, but thankfully Cook’s (Brian, not the former MSU QB who Couch suggested should be doing crystal meth off a stripper’s ass) second-in-command Ace Anbender caught Couch ReTweeting the column on Friday.
And why was Couch pimping out his nearly two-month-old column again on Friday? Because earlier that day it was announced that MSU defensive end Auston Robertson had been booted from the football team after being charged with third-degree criminal sexual conduct.
And THIS is what Couch Tweeted:
That’s the best screen grab I can provide since Couch subsequently deleted his post. He once again reiterated that “what’s transpiring is ultimately the result of winning and losing.” And what is the what in that sentence? Another Spartan football player being embroiled in a sexual assault case.
WHAT THE FUCK DOES THAT HAVE TO DO WITH WINNING AND LOSING?!!?!?!?!?!?!???!!?!??!?!?!?!? Are ya shitting me. An MSU football player is accused of FORCIBLY having sex with a female despite her allegedly telling him to STOP and Couch takes the opportunity to re-post an article in which the LEDE was:
Forget the other noise for a minute: What Michigan State’s football program is going through right now is, first and foremost, about winning and losing.
Later in that atrocious column, Couch mentions that Mark Dantonio probably made a Faustian bargain by recruiting blue-chip prospects even when they had character red flags in their past like Robertson. And that issue ALONE would have made for a quality column. It’s a salient point.
But sorry, we can’t forget the fact that you called sexual assault cases “noise” and stated that if MSU wins, Dantonio will be safe no matter how many women are penetrated against their will by men three times their size.
It would be like forgiving the Detroit-area doctor who was giving cancer treatment to patients who DID NOT have cancer for his own profit if, after he gave radiation to a perfectly health person, he had donated some of the funds to the Children’s Leukemia Foundation.
Couch wants attention so badly that he purposely murdered a perfectly good column for the controversy of his first nine paragraphs. And of course when the original article didn’t get enough outrage, this knucklehead found an even more incendiary way to draw eyeballs to himself with that imbecilic Tweet.
“This column on MSU works well today ….”
Tell that to the woman who allegedly accepted Robertson’s offer to walk her home to her apartment so she’d be safe and then got raped in the process by Mr. Defensive End From Camelot himself, YOU MONUMENTAL PILE OF HORSE SHIT.
Here’s an idea, when Miles Bridges leads the Spartans to a National Championship next April, instead of burning actual couches in East Lansing, how about you get a bunch of Graham’s columns and light those on fire? Seems a lot safer for everyone involved.
Which leads me to my final thought ….
Does Tom Izzo know that his players are allowed to rape and pillage with impunity?