Peter King is a respected journalist.  He has written many columns and appeared on a plethora of shows including The Dan Patrick Show and Football Night in America on NBC.  He usually has some really good insight and opinions on what is going on in the NFL.  Every now and then he ventures into other sports.  Everyone is entitled to their own opinions.  We are all for that.  That also opens you up to criticism as well.  Again something we are all for here at Biglakesports.

Rants are Good

I am all for a good rant.  Also I like bringing up provocative issues.  I am also ok with having a “Big Take” Stephen A. Smith or Colin Cowherd style.  They all have their place in the world of sports.  The issue is when people want to try and switch back and forth between the two.  From the way I see it you can start out as a legitimate journalist and then switch to Big Take person.  You can not start out as big take person and then switch to legitimate journalist.  Well you might be able to but it would be very difficult and then there would still be people that would not take you seriously.

Journalism or Hot Take

You can be switched from a respected journalist to a Big Take person by your readers as well.  It may be something that you meant to be serious but the thought you put into it did not work out.  It may have sounded good in your head.  Or it may have sounded good when you wrote it down.  You thought you were making salient points and you were going to change the world.  The profound post or article you wrote was going t change the world.  You read it over and then once again just to make sure that you have your point just right.  You click the post or send button and sit back and relax and think to yourself.  Wow I really nailed that one.

Peter King Hot Dog Rant Confusing

This is what Peter King did after the Nathans Famous Hot Dog eating competition that airs on ESPN.  This year ESPN also aired a 30 for 30 about the competition.  This prompted Peter King to send out a tweet about kids that are going hungry in the United States and how dare someone air a competition about competitive eating.  I don’t disagree with Peter King that it is extremely sad that we have that many kids in our country going hungry.  It is a serious problem that needs a serious solution.    Calling out a Hot Dog eating competition and saying the Hot Dogs would have been better served by sending them to the starving kids is an absurd statement.

He calls the competitors excessive over eater.  Most of them are actually in pretty good shape.  They train for their events.  On any given competition day yes they do over eat.  By saying that you could also say that players of other sports like Football, Basketball, Hockey over do it on the days that they have a competition as well.  We here stories of football players that cant get out of bed the next day because of the exertion from the game the day before.  For that we pay them millions of dollars.

There are worse ways we waste food

Who wastes more food.  Competitive eating or sports teams.  Athletes eat more to have enough energy. Comparing the amount of food used for teams before and or after a game to the amount of food used in a competitive eating competition would show more food wasted by the teams.  This also makes you think about how much food is wasted per person per day.   The amount of food wasted in the Unites States comes out to about a pound of food per person per day.  Interesting in this study it shows that people that consider themselves to be healthy eaters actually waste more food.

Food Competitions Donate Food

I get the indignation that Peter King has over competitive eating competitions he does not like it for what ever reason so he had to find a reason to rail against it.  That is fine.  He can have what ever opinion he wants to have about it.  With those opinions comes a cost.  The cost here is that Peter King is just spouting for the sake of spouting.  Taking the food from a competitive eating competition would be a one time help to feed some people for a meal.  It would not solve the hunger problem that we have.  In the long run it might even hurt.  Nathans donates hot dogs to New York food banks every year.  One of the reasons they can do this is because they make enough money to do this.  Those donations contribute far more to reducing the hunger problem than getting rid of the eating competitions.  With out the exposure they get from the competition they may not even be able to make those donation.

The way that Peter King formed this just makes him look like a petty little fool that did not do his homework.  I have a solution for you Peter King.  If you don’t like it don’t watch it.  It is really simple.  Calling them names and your fake outrage does nothing.  To me it looks like Peter King has decided to go the rout of the hot take person and leave journalism in the rear view mirror.  Stick with Football Peter King, Please.

NOTE – we say this knowing that we are not journalists either.  We are or strive to be hot take person.  After all our tag line is Opinions Not Facts   While we will throw some facts in at times.  We do not do extensive research to support the opinions that we make.