By David Scott
Boston Sports Media Watch

WEEKI WACHEE, Fla. - I miss the Funai Media Tent and I can not lie.

I also miss the (as yet, unsponsored) Bench for Pressers outside the clubhouse and I miss GlennTercom Geffner wiggling into every camera shot taken of that famous bench and I miss Brewzer the Camera Dog.

In addition, I miss the lanai deck, the Japanese satellite compound and bizarre announcements from Sox PR guy John Blake that include such previously unuttered phrases as “Bobby Scales is now available” for interviews.

I’ve never been through de-tox, but I’m thinking these are the shakes you’d get if you were just cut from your drug of choice cold turkey. For six days I drank the Kool-Aid of Camp Dice-K to keep my fluids up and for those six days I breathed the air of legends - media, athletes and otherwise. I was the Sox and the Sox were I.

Spring Training may not be the most newsworthy of events to cover, but with these Red Sox, it is certainly the one most overflowing with story possibilities and soap opera drama. When Dice-K arrived, it was July 4th; Curt Schilling’s WEEI Bombshell Announcement was Thanksgiving; and Christmas came when Manny Ramirez, his two handlers as well as the hopes of Red Sox Nation strolled into the minor league complex on Monday morning.

The Sports Guy thought the NBA’s Las Vegas All Star game 2007 was a “hip-hop Woodstock,” Sox Camp ‘07 could very well be the “Rawhide Super Bowl Media Day.” All that’s missing is a dude from Nickelodeon dressed as a super hero.

. . . My three best “rumors” that got whispered more than once among some of the media types were these: Bob Ryan will be involved heavily in the NESN re-launch of its Boston Globe show, which comes on May 8th under the title of “The Globe 10.0”; Bill Simmons has been, at the very least, contacted by Sports Illustrated to fill its vacating Steve Rushin space. Simmons can pretty much name his price at SI and ESPN is expected to try and keep him with a certain amount of vigor. HOWEVER, there are a few ESPNers who have grown tired of the persistent “is he going?” rumors and this could, at long last, be the final days of Simmons and the Worldwide Leader‘s marriage.

. . . We’re also hearing that ex-Boston Herald sports editor, Mark Torpey, has surfaced as the long-awaited sports editor for the Patriot Ledger. That’ll be a tough ship to save, but at least Torpey is back in the game.

. . . Yes, I became obsessed with the Funai Tent and I finally figured out why - it reminded me of those wonderful days of my youth when I would spend hours in the Funai Sukkah at Temple Ner Tamid in Peabody. They might not have actually sponsored that one, but they should have. Next yeat, Dr. Charles needs to go with the thatch roof so we can see the stars and moon.

. . . I don’t see the Dan Shaughnessy-Curt Schilling battle going away any time soon. It will be a recurrent theme throughout the season and there’s just one thing we know for sure: Schilling’s use of some potty-mouthed words in his SOSH posting (done under his “Gehrig38” handle) didn’t sit well with the Sox brass. Petty fights are one thing; calling a media member an “asshole” and a “sphincter” don’t exactly suggest Fenway Friendly to a lot of the buying public.

As one observer ruminated aloud: “If one of us wrote either of those words in our (stories) or in a blog, we would have been immediately suspended.”

That’s likely true, but it doesn’t take away from the fact that Schilling really does have a bit of a flare for writing. He’d be a natural for Page 2 at ESPN - sort of the Athlete’s Version of Sports Guy.

We said it before and it’s worth repeating: we’re dealing with two men whose egos are not so uncommon to their respective professions. In this case, they are two strong-willed, easily recognizable faces and their very jobs depend on them staying just the way they are - hard-headed, opinionated and vociferous. The early rounds have gone to Schill (vulgarities aside), but Big Dan (the sudden blogger for boston.com) is far from done.

. . . CN8 continues its strong march to providing more boxing and quality names (like sister network Versus) as it showcases Evander Holyfield on Saturday March 17. From the Comcast release: “The Comcast Network “sounds the bell” with exclusive live broadcast coverage of Evander “Real Deal” Holyfield vs. Vinny Maddalone on Saturday, March 17 at 10:00 PM/ET. In addition to airing on CN8, the Holyfield-Maddalone boxing event will be made available to all Comcast Cable systems nationwide with an opportunity to reach more than 24 million homes. The match-up is four-time world heavyweight champion Holyfield’s third fight since coming out of retirement on a quest to win a fifth heavyweight title. The event airs live from the American Bank Center in Corpus Christi, Texas.”

CN8’s done a nice job of ramping up its boxing cards and credit needs to be given to behind the scenes guy, Bill McColgan, who is building a destination spot for primetime boxing.

. . . I’ve been getting a load of the Tampa Trib and the St. Pete Press while I’m down here on the Redneck Riviera and it’s nice to know the Boston angles are never far away. Carlos Pena is finding a home with the Rays and so is Casey Fossum.

And why would eating champ Kobayashi diss our guy Dice-K, by visiting Rays camp? Dice-K and Eat-K would have been classic in the Funai Media Tent (last metnion, I swear!).

. . . For those of you BC hoops followers venturing down this way for the ACC Tournament (all four of you), be forewarned that there is not only the Tournament going on that weekend but a PGA event as well. Having been to the Tampa Final Four years ago, we’re pretty safe in guessing that there will be traffic nightmares daily. Enjoy. . .

. . . Okay, folks. That puts the wraps on Shots for a while (barring breaking Boston sports news). We need to encourage you to follow along with our month-long March Madness travels on behalf of CSTV.com, beginning on Saturday at the CAA Tournament in Richmond. We’ll be sharing “Hang Time” Blog duties with a host of folks and our schedule looks like this: Richmond for the CAA; Atlanta for the SEC; Buffalo for 1st and 2nd Rounds; East Rutherford for Sweet 16/Elite 8; Atlanta for the Big Dance.

We’ll try and keep a permanent link up here at BSM, but you can always venture over on your own and check out the festivities. Wish me luck. . . No. . . sleep. . . til April 6. . .