The Media Learning Curve: April 10-17

We're not sure we want to live in a world without John Madden on TV or Harry Kalas on the NFL highlights. But, we must.

One retired. One expired. And living as we know it won't be the same.

We've learned not to take things for granted. Oh, wait. We've learned that long ago.

We've learned to expect the unexpected. Right, another cliche.

About the only real things we learned this week, aside from the obvious, can be capsulated below, just to prove that everything isn't Madden related:

== Why Madden says he did what he did (linked here)

== Why can't Erin Andrews be in the new Madden NFL video game? (linked here)

== What would John Madden think about Stephen A. Smith leaving ESPN soon? (linked here) Or
== Bryant Gumbel's shoutout to Lance Armstrong via "Real Sports" (linked here) Or if Adam Schefter shuffles off to ESPN? (linked here)

== Will John Madden read this month's Esquire piece on Todd Marinovich? (linked here)

== Yes, we appreciate Vin Scully, too. He was once John Madden's NFL booth partner. And he's still alive (linked here)

== Memo to Bob Costas: If you're going to get the opportunity to call the first home run at Yankee Stadium, and people will hear the call forever, you might want to get the player's name right as he rounds the bases ... it wasn't John Madden (linked here)

== Have you seen the new NHL.com website? Why not? And isn't there an NHL player named John Madden? (linked here)

== Is John Madden one of the guys who drools over watching Hannah Storm (real name: Storen) on ESPN now? (linked here)

== We're not sure why ESPN has its own website dedicated to Chicago, but surely, John Madden must (linked here)

== Why does Padres closer Heath Bell dislike ESPN's baseball coverage? Because John Madden isn't involved? (linked here)

AND FINALLY:

== They love them some Eric Karros hairstyle, from last Saturday's Angels-Red Sox telecast on the Fox regional opener (linked here).

"More distracting than a 1,000 FOX robots doing the Thriller Dance in unison."

They then wondered how Karros would look if he had the Disney Concert Hall on his head instead (to see if it was any different):