Ah, the bait and switch headlines that are so easy to write are so…easy…to write sometimes.

We do talk about the Heat (cough LEBRON cough) crying after another last-second loss, this time at the hands of the Chicago “Los Bulls.” Is crying a sign of cracking, or is it a sign of caring? Is there something endearing about an NBA team that cares so much about a regular season loss that players would cry — and the coach who’s clearly trying to save his job after a rough few weeks would tell everyone about it? The Heat really are a transcendent storyline to cover. It’s not all hype.

We use the Heat’s (sorry El Heat’s) emotions as a jump into the college game to bask in the glow of my favorite week of the year…conference championship tournament time. To me, this is actually better than the NCAA Tournament, from the early part of the week with teams fighting for bubble slots to the one-bid leagues crowning champions all making way for the end of the week where the major conference stalwarts fight for seeding and bragging rights and, well, nets to cut down and banners to hang up. It’s awesome.

So that’s the show. Yep, that’s the show. What’s that? Oh, the first eight minutes? Yeah, we should address the first eight minutes of today’s show, too.

I’ve decided to stop doing the show, and stop posting regularly on this site and on the podcast site. Before we started doing daily shows, I talked with both Jamie Mottram and JE Skeets and they both told me it would make me go insane.

It has.

I feel like my brain is segmented in a way that’s unfamiliar. I’m in a weird funk, and the more and more I try to get out of this funk the funkier I feel. Usually that’s a good thing, but in this case it’s just writing on the wall that it’s time to stop playing in this giant internet sandbox for a while.

We started this show what feels like a decade ago, hoping it would turn into something. We are so grateful that it eventually turned into way more than we ever hoped. We do a great show, and try to give the listeners something entertaining and thought-provoking every day (or close to every day).

But I always said that when I stopped caring, I’d give it up. I respect the audience too much to half-ass the show or do it twice a week or whenever I feel like talking. We’ve become a daily part of many people’s lives and it’s not fair to them…to you…to do it half-assed.

Why now? Well, I wanted to get to 600, but I just don’t think I can. So 555 sounds like fun, and it’s far enough away that we can still talk about the NCAA Tournament and the Masters. Plus, if all works out, our last show will be the day before Max turns one.

Max. Look, this year with Max has been great. He’s the sweetest boy in the world and he sure as shit doesn’t deserve all that he’s had to deal with this year and all that he’s going to have to deal with the rest of his life. It’s not fair for me to continue to play in this internet dreamworld of “doing things the right way” which has always felt like as much a cop-out as it did some altruistic reasoning for producing quality work. I can’t play in the sandbox anymore, even if it “furthers the conversation.” I need to grow the fuck up and provide for my family.

So yeah, this is the first step towards that. And it sucks. This feeling, today, sucks. Why is this show going up at noon when we taped it at 6:30 am? Because it’s taken me that long to write this (and get the Muppets music into the show, to be honest).

I feel like I’ve given up, but at the same time I feel like maybe I gave up a while ago and this is just the right time to admit it. My brain is segmented in a way that’s unfamiliar, but the most important segment keeps getting filled with concern for my family who, frankly, deserves more of me than they’ve been getting.

Now, that all being said, this isn’t some solemn goodbye to the internet. We’ve still got over 20 shows left to go and hopefully some of our podcasting and radio friends will have us on their shows every so often (I really hope someone seizes the opportunity and gets Nick on as a regular contributor somewhere). And look, if you listen to this show all the time, or read what we did here or back at Sporting News, you know we’ve unabashedly had a For Sale sign on this show — and our writing — for a long time.

We’re not hard to find. If or or or or and or or or or or, shit, comes calling in the next few weeks…let’s go…we’re ready to work. We just can’t be waiting on someone’s back burner anymore. We just can’t do this every day in hopes that’s the day someone comes to their internet senses.

Or, maybe, we’ve overvalued the quality of our work and the folks we linked to above — and countless others, I’m sure — know exactly how valuable we are. Good work isn’t always worth the time (and money) it takes to produce, which is something I know all too well in this pageviews-first-ask-questions-later digital world. I think I’m actually okay with that. I’m not okay with undoing everything we’ve done by creating a half-assed product to try and stay relevant or keep my name out there.

Thanks, always, for listening.