ESPN Anchor Wigs During Jordan ‘Top Play'

Michael Jordan has a new shoe out, the 2009 version of his long-running and uber-successful shoe line, Air Jordan. And, all told, the shoes are pretty OK. They look cool, I guess. Futuristic. But they're also $230, which seems like an insane amount of money to charge for shoes, especially given the fact that the U.S. lost 2.6 million jobs in 2008 and appears to be heading into something of a recession. Now, of all times, who has the money to pay for $230 basketball shoes? (For the record, $230 would finance one month of our student loan payments. Anyone willing to donate is free to leave a comment under this post.)

What does all of this have to do with ESPN? Well, during the Top 10 segment on yesterday's SportsCenter, ESPN snuck an item at No. 9 about the 2009 Jordans. Not exactly surprising; ESPN is pretty much synonymous with this sort of advertising. Except that this time, anchor Josh Elliott was more than miffed by the breach of journalistic standards. View the video here.

Back? Big ups to Elliot here -- it's pretty insensitive (not to mention journalistically irresponsible) to toss an ad for Jordans in the Top Plays, which are supposed to be, you know, plays. Few ESPN anchors speak out like this, but Elliott did (he hammers his point home), and for that, he gets on the good guys list. ESPN Hollywood? Josh, consider yourself forgiven.