From the Giving Credit Where Credit's Due Dept.

So I've never been a big reader of Rick Reilly (I switched from SI to The Sporting News about 10 years ago), but I can say that for the most part, Reilly's written work for ESPN has been abhorrent.

Therefore, when I was watching an episode of The Colbert Report on Tivo (hear that Pnoles, TIVO!), and saw that Reilly would be the guest, I fired up the ol' laptop and set the keyboard to callously cynical. However, much to my surprise, Reilly was not there to talk about ESPN, golf, Brett Favre, or even sports at all. Rather, he used the entirety of his interview time to talk about the charity NothingButNets, a non-profit UN organization that provides mosquito nets to Malaria stricken parts of Africa.

Maybe there's some sort of sinister reason for Reilly to do this (tax write off, impending divorce, he owns a net factory), but I thought it was a pretty stand up thing to do. Also, Mariotti would never use a guest spot on Colbert for any reason other than to talk about how The Blizzard of Oz is a pox upon the city of Chicago.

So in summary:

Tip of the Hat: Rick Reilly, for promoting a charity when he could've used the time for smug, broad generalizations and lame jokes.

Wag of the Finger: Rick Reilly, for using his columns for smug, broad generalizations and lame jokes.