And you thought we gave Jim "Hollywood Walk of Fame" Gray a hard time

The excerpt from our column today (linked here) on the LeBron James announcement on ESPN included this about one of our favorite interviewers:

"Jim Gray ... somehow continues to believe he's a conduit to important news, having been shoved into this situation before as a sideline (Pete Rose) and ringside (Mike Tyson) microphone holder in previous situations. This time, however, Gray has admitted he brought the spotlight to himself. By begging.

The joke continues to be on the wimpish Gray, a tool of choice by athletes who want their message delivered filter-free. Somehow, he's still naïve enough to think his fraudulent career is one crafted by trustworthiness."

Maybe I was too easy on him.

The Sports Business Daily today had this roundup of criticism about Gray's involvement in the show:

== "(The questions) defied logic, reason, drama and journalism ... (the) inane and extended foreplay was excruciating and tortured, and the veteran journalist was destroyed on social media," wrote Sports Illustrated's Richard Deitsch.

== "(Gray's) deliberate, four-corner teasing cynically dragged out a now-annoying drama ... Was this in the script? If so, shame on ESPN. If Gray winged it, shame on him," wrote the New York Times' Richard Sandomir.

== "(He) shamed himself and every professional interviewer on the planet," wrote the Los Angeles Times' Mary McNamara, "(by asking) five solid minutes worth of such blatantly time-killing" questions such as "How's your summer?" "When did you decide?" and "Are you still a nail biter?"

== "Shame on Jim Gray and ESPN for asking 16 questions -- 16! -- before asking James the only one on anybody's mind," wrote Barry Jackson of the Miam Herald. "(The answers) would have been more substantive, more meaningful, if he had revealed the winning team first."

== "(ESPN) gave up whatever shred of credibility it had with Jim Gray milking this moment with question after question before asking the only one that mattered," wrote the Newark Star-Ledger's Steve Politi.

== "Shame on Jim Gray. He lobbed two dozen softball questions LeBron James' way Thursday night without bothering to ask a single follow-up ... (ESPN delivered) kid-gloved questions and a giant plug for one of James' sponsors," wrote the Dallas Morning News' Barry Horn.

== "(Gray) proceeded to the aural equivalent of a full inning of slow pitch softball, lobbing verbal floaters at James for five minutes before getting to the point," wrote the Houston Chronicle's David Barron.

=="How any 'journalist' sits there and goes along with a script without asking the only question anyone cares about for what seemed like hours was shameful. The bottom line: Gray was not a journalist but a pawn for ratings, stretching out the made-for-TV event as long as he could," wrote Ben Grossman of Broadcasting & Cable.

== "(Gray) either had no sense of the moment whatsoever, or had complete understanding that this could be his next great moment in journalism and was milking every last second out of his own relevance," wrote TheSportingNews.com's Dan Levy.

== "ESPN probably glad they are not paying for Jim Gray," wrote the L.A. Times' Joe Flint.

== "Jim Gray, my pal, I am about to retroactively take Pete Rose's side," wrote MSNBC's Keith Olbermann.

== (Sources say James' handlers selected Gray) "because of his 'special sales relationship' with" (the University of Phoenix, one of the telecast's presenting sponsors)," wrote the New York Post's Phil Mushnick.

Surprisingly, ESPN, and James, didn't use Gray's forehead for more advertising space.

Again, some yahoo at Yahoo! once listed Gray in the Top 50 of the greatest sportscasters of all time (linked here).

Gray appeared on "CBS This Morning" and defended the way James presented his one-hour "The Decision" as a new show:

"I'm not offended by it at all, so you're probably asking the wrong person. I thought it was terrific.

"For crying out loud, President Obama commented on this seven times. We've got oil spills, we've got wars, we've got a lot going on, but he certainly was very interested. I don't mean to be frivolous or flip. He was having a good time. But he wanted to see LeBron James play in his hometown of Chicago, so everybody was interested, from the fans all the way up to the top of our country."

Keep defending, Jim-Bob, and it only keeps getting you deeper into non-usable territory.