The media learning curve: A recharged charger can electrify a TV audience, even without a wet finger in a light socket

Bypass the NFL this weekend -- four games, no waiting, and still no Cowboys despite a late appeal to the league offices -- and after reading today's newsprint media offering (linked here), these electrifying notes somehow are best suited for this medium:

== Once again, your NFL broadcasters for this weekend:

Saturday:
== Channel 2, 1:30 p.m.: Baltimore at Tennessee (with Greg Gumbel and Dan Dierdorf_
== Channel 11, 4:15 p.m.: Arizona at Carolina (with Kenny Albert, Daryl Johnston and Tony Siragusa)

Sunday:
== Channel 11, 10 a.m.: Philadelphia at N.Y. Giants (with Joe Buck, Troy Aikman and Pam Oliver)
== Channel 2, 1:45 p.m.: San Diego at Pittsburgh (with Jim Nantz and Phil Simms)

== ESPN's version of "Outside The Lines" on Sunday (6 a.m. on ESPN, 9 a.m. on ESPNEWS, with probable replays on "SportsCenter") is the one that recently laid off Dallas Cowboys defensive back Adam Jones insists he's going to sue the network for next week. As the video shows above, ESPN has the dirt on Jones' involvment in a 2007 shooting outside of Atlanta. ESPN ran a portion of it on Thursday, to make sure you know it was on the level.

== Turner Sports says it takes the charges filed last week against TNT NBA studioman Charles Barkley "very seriously" and it won't comment until the legal process takes its course. Even when there are Internet reports taking this course all over the place. We'll side with New York Times columnist Harvey Araton (linked here), who declares that Barkley, even while lacking credibility, won't be fired over this because he means too much to the network and "there is always a place for a genuinely funny guy to be heard -- and not taken seriously." However, it is time "for responsible news media outlets to cast Barkley once and for all as a television clown, not as the conscience of basketball or future governor" of Alabama. In today's USA Today, Michael Hiestand tries to dissect what makes Barkley different from an ex-athlete and more like a Lindsay Lohan sort of being at this point in his career (linked here).

== "NBA League Pass," the subscription on your cable or dish service that gives you a bunch of out-of-market NBA games, is available for free from Monday, Jan. 19 through Sunday, Jan. 25. That's 39 games over five nights.

== The Associated Press (linked here) reports that IndyCar driver Ryan Briscoe and ESPN "NASCAR Now" host Nicole Manske, the one-time Miss Illinois Teen USA title-holder to your right, are engaged. He proposed in Australia over the holidays at a place called Lizard Island (linked here) and the couple is planning a wedding next December in Hawaii.
You see any conflict of interest there?

==In the first column that Jay Mariiotti wrote for new employer AOL, the former Chicago Sun Times scribe does a nice job trashing the newsprint industry, and then boasts about how the middleman has been taken out of the equation when he comes to what's flowed from his creative mind to his computer screen:
"The difference is, the column won't go through the 20th-century, ink-and-newsprint monkey grind where you hope the truck driver doesn't stop at Dunkin' Donuts and the delivery boy doesn't hit your dog on the ass. The column simply will go from my computer to an editor to you."

Afterwhich Newsday columnist Neil Best wrote on his blog (linked here): "Yo, Jay, I just posted that not only with no help from a truck driver but also with no help from an editor. Take that!"

== The new MLB Network will do a live show Monday on the Baseball Hall of Fame selections (10:30 a.m.). In the past, baseball's only live announcement was online at its website.

AND THE CLOSING ARGUMENT:

== Headline and story from this week's Onion Sports (linked here)

January 08, 2009
LaDanian Tomlinson To Play Next Game Without A Groin

SAN DIEGO--Chargers running back LaDanian Tomlinson, who was forced to leave last week's game in the second quarter after aggravating a groin injury, announced Wednesday that he will play Sunday's game against Pittsburgh without the aid of his groin.

"The team will need me against the Steelers, and I can't afford to let my groin hold me back, so the groin is staying on the bench for this one," said Tomlinson, who made the decision against the recommendation of team doctors.

"I would have just bit it off on the sidelines last week, like Ronnie Lott did with his pinkie that one time, but [running back] Darren [Sproles] told me he had the situation under control, and he did. That's one I owe him."

Tomlinson's decision to play without a vital part of his anatomy is being compared to former Lions running back Barry Sanders' decision to play his entire career without his skeleton.