It's mid-July, and Angelo Cataldi sounds like a baby without his binky. Talk radio discussion in Philly is always slow in summer, even when the Phillies are very good, but Cataldi sounds lost without his favorite plaything. In the absence of anything substantial to say about Philadelphia or national sports, all discussions on his highly rated morning show seem to travel back to McNabb.
When the subject of basketball Hall of Fame speeches comes up, the morning team muses about whether Michael Jordan will launch into another self-serving rant before introducing Scottie Pippen. They joke that McNabb would give a similar airing-of-grievances speech, given the unlikely opportunity. "Boy, that's our only chance of getting mentioned in a Hall of Fame speech," Cataldi muses, inflating his importance as McNabb's primary antagonist. A few days later, a caller just back from Washington reports that he saw McNabb's image painted on a city bus. "Was it the same bus he threw his teammates under?" Cataldi asks, referring to an incident which never occurred.
As summer wore on and Eagles camp started, Cataldi became even more intense in his disparagement of McNabb. As for
Kevin Kolb, Cataldi said often that he had "such a great feeling" about the new quarterback, in contrast to the old. In fairness, Cataldi wasn't alone in his McNabb bashing and Kolb fluffing. On rival sports station 97.5 FM "The Fanatic" (an ESPN affiliate) one weekend personality compared Kolb to Joe Montana while callers expressed their joy about a season without "McChoke." It was more than a talk-radio phenomenon. Writers from suburban papers asked loaded questions at training camp, baiting players to make them say something negative about their former quarterback. An unconventional wisdom arose that Kolb would do things McNabb never did -- hit receivers in stride so they can make plays, open up the pages of the West Coast offense that were closed for the last decade. Meanwhile, Kolb was still waiting to lead the Eagles first-team offense to a preseason touchdown.
