Top 10 Media Pet Peeve Cliches

Ever listen to the radio, watch TV, or read something in the paper or on the Internet where you really just don't know what the heck they mean?  You hear it said all the time, but it has makes no sense.  Here's a list of my top ten media pet peeve cliches...

10.  "At The Hands Of"

Ever hear broadcasters say this phrase?  Did a team really lose "at the hands of" another?  Or did they just lose?  Does Villanova really fall at the hands of Louisville, or does Villanova just fall?  Or lose?  It's sort of like the phrase "in order to".  Why not just say, to?  Sometimes broadcasters try to get too cute.  When I hear them say "at the hands of", I think that a player fell into the hands of another.  And if that was the case, I'm not sure I'd want to know about it.

9.  "Get on the same page"

Which page do they need to get on?  I always here sportscaster say, these two guys need to get on the same page.  Don't they mean they need to communicate better?  That they need to make sure that they're both focused on the same thing?  Are they sometimes on different pages of the same book?  And who's further ahead?  Are they playing sports out there or reading a book?

  

8.  Football broadcasters that use baseball cliches

There isn't a particular one that's most often used, but you often hear football broadcasters say, "he's a home-run hitter" or "they need to step up to the plate".  Football has a lot of cliche phrases.  Use your own.  Think about how annoying it would get to cross cliches through all different sports.

7.  "Play Within Yourself"/"Don't try to do too much"

How does one do this?  Maybe more to the point, you do you play without yourself, or play outside of yourself?  This is another phrase that I really don't understand.  And how does an athlete do too much?  Other than in golf, where you try to score the least strokes, in which sport do you not want to score the most you can?  Or make the most assists?  Or make the most plays?  In which instance wouldn't you want to do too much?

6.  "That was some kind of play"

What kind of play was it?  Was it a great play?  A spectacular play?  An acrobatic play?  A bad play? An awful play?  It's the media's job to help us fans interpret what kind of play it was.  And look at the phrase.  What does it really mean? What is some kind of play?

5.  "They just wanted it more"

Does that mean that the other team didn't want to win as badly?  The losing team must have said to itself, "you know?  We really don't have to win.  Let's just let them win instead."  Are you kidding me?  In sports, both teams want it just as much.  Both teams want to win just as badly as their opponents.  

4.  "He's a player"

As opposed to, he's not a player?  If he's playing a sport, isn't he by definition a player?  Whenever someone is having a great game, the broadcaster seems to always point out this surprising and incredible fact, "he's a player."  I know.  He is paid to play sports, or he goes to school to play them.  Tell me something I don't know.  Isn't that your job?

3.  "He lets the game come to him"

Mark Jackson said Friday night about LeBron James outstanding performance against the Celtics, "he lets the game come to him."  What does that mean?  Does that mean when he's playing poorly, he's pushing the game away from him?  I've never understood what that means, but analysts always say that.

2.  "You Talk About"

So many analysts, most notably Paul Maguire, before making his point always says the words "you talk about".  For instance, he'll say, "You talk about a great quarterback, Peyton Manning is a great quarterback."  Do we need to say that?  If you're talking about it, you're talking about it.  Why say "you talk about", when we're already talking about it?

1.  "When He Wants To Be"

I heard Mike Salk on ESPN Radio say "Tarvaris Jackson is accurate when he wants to be."  Does that mean that when he sails one over Bobby Wade's head that he didn't want to be accurate?  I've heard so many media personalities say that players are better when they want to be.  Don't they always want to be better?  What does that even mean?

And by the way, on tonight's broadcast of the Titans vs. Ravens on CBS, Dan Dierdorf, while I'm writing this post said, "It would be cliche for me to say it and it's probably one of the most overused cliches in sports, but I'll say it anyway.  These teams don't like each other."  Greg Gumbel replied, "I'm not sure if that cliche even describes it."  Dierdorf countered, "Then what would you say, bad blood?"

Sports cliches are as much a part of sports as the games themselves.