Rick Telander of the Chicago Sun Times joins the show to talk about his career as a feature writer, columnist and author. Oh yes, we talk a little baseball too.  And oh yes, Jay Mariotti’s name comes up.

Telander tells it like it is, both in his columns and on this show. When you read his work, you know what you’re going to get. It’s going to be honest – not schtick – and contrary to what he says in this interview, it’s always going to be good. And chalk the interview up to great timing, but we get some pretty interesting insights into the Chicago media scene. More on that later...

Did you know that Telander has written eight books? Eight. We ask him about the balance of holding down a day job as a writer at the same time as writing a book.  He gives a glimpse into the mindset of writing a two different styles at the same time.  If you’ve ever tried to write a book – or done so – you know exactly what he’s talking about here. Great stuff.

We use one of his books, The Hundred Yard Lie, to talk about the BCS rankings (we’re saved) and get his thoughts on the corruption in college football 18 years after his book came out.

We also talk about his time at SI and compare that to being a columnist. At SI, one can dictate the storylines but as a columnist, the storylines are dictated for him. How different is that process of writing and does he ever find himself writing differently – even using different verbiage – for a more colloquial audience? Does one become a different writer when they know their audience more intimately?

We take that example to bring up LA Times writer TJ Simers. Simers is a bully and took his shots at Philly this past week, calling us Angryville (makes. me. so. angry.) and being just an overall pain in Philly’s ass. We know it wasn’t good writing. It was shit-stirring. So we ask Telander if he respects that style of journalism, or if it’s even journalism at all?

Speaking of bullies, we get his thoughts on Jay Mariotti. It turns out, an hour before this interview Telander was in a sauna for the first time in about a decade and who walks in. Jay Freaking Mariotti.

1. “I don’t think it’s fair for me...I’m telling you so much...it’s just surreal. I think if my eyes don’t deceive me, if he’d seen the Yeti or...Michael Myers sitting there, I don’t know, it would have been about the same. But you’d have to ask him that.
   

2. 
   

3. “The first thing out of his mouth, ‘well, let’s just bury the hatchet.’ I had not said a word. Hatchets or anything – I didn’t have a hatchet in hand. Nothing.”
   

That last line was obviously followed by giggling on our party. But it makes for a great visual.

There’s a lot more. Listen to the whole show, or hit the clips on the side (note, more Mariotti stuff in the later clips too). He has some really strong thoughts on Jay as a person, his work, and on media people responding to blogs and facing the music with their own critics and with the athletes and coaches about whom they write.

We delve into sports writers becoming pundits and what he thinks about the medium having been one of the first.  ATH exists because of PTI which exists because of The Sports Reporters which exists because of The Sportswriters on TV, which he was a regular on. Now every media market in the country has a round-table newspaper kvetch-a-thon. Did he help create a monster?

And oh yes, we talk baseball. The Cubs were awful, so we ask what the city thinks about that team - do they even care about baseball anymore Also, which curse is worse, 100 years without a WS title or 25 years without any team winning a title? I think we agree it’s the latter.

We end with a prediction for the World Series.  Well, sort of.  Really great interview and hopefully worth the listen.

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