When ESPN, or the "Enraging Spelling Proficiency Network", falters

I love sports, but I'm not an ESPN nut. It's good to have in my collection of basic cable channels, but every year around this time it airs the Scripps National Spelling Bee, and this bothers me.

From Scripps web site:
"Our purpose is to help students improve their spelling, increase their vocabularies, learn concepts, and develop correct English usage that will help them all their lives."

Where is the sport? Where is the athletic competition? Make the kids climb up a 50-foot ladder to the podium to spell their words. Good God, look at these bookworms, all paragons of fitness, mind you...


Maybe they would be more comfortable in kid-sized Aeron chairs...

The French Open, the NBA playoffs, MLB regular season, world soccer, etc. could be shown instead of these future spelling hall-of-famers. What makes this worse is that ESPN doesn't cover the Tour de France (or Tour de anywhere on this planet) in July (just 60-second blurbs on SportsCenter), and that's just inexcusable. OLN (Outdoor Life Network) TV, welcome to the family...

Yes, I can spell very well. I even won a spelling bee or two back in my glorious grade school days.

"Could you repeat the word please?"
"Yes, your word is 'annoyed'".
"Please use it in a sentence."
"They were annoyed that this event aired instead of the NBA playoffs."
"Annoyed. A-N-N-O-Y-E-D. Annoyed."
DING!

Don't even get me started on ESPN televising poker...