If Keith Olbermann can come back to ESPN to work for  a couple of years and Dan Patrick can make a special SportsCenter reunion appearance with Scott Van Pelt, then anything is possible.  But after this tweet about ESPN’s golden boy, Rich Eisen may have made it that much more difficult for him to be welcomed back with open arms.  Because if we’ve learned anything about ESPN recently, the one sacred cow at the network is First Take and Skip Bayless.

Eisen sent this tweet, presumably commenting on Panthers CB Josh Norman calling out Bayless after the Panthers dominated the Cowboys on Thanksgiving.

I get it, and we hear it all the time, “If you stop paying attention to Skip Bayless, he’ll go away.”  While that’s a great thought in theory, it’s a little narcissistic to think that one blog or writer or person can accomplish such a feat, especially when First Take’s faux debates are bringing in record ratings.

No, the only entity that enables Skip Bayless’ B.S. is ESPN.  Not the athletes, not the writers, not anyone else.  It’s ESPN that deserves the criticism, ESPN that deserves the scorn, ESPN that deserves the condemnation for dragging the daily sports conversation into the gutter each and every day in the name of profit and ratings.

Yes, any time an athlete responds to Skip Bayless, that’s what he and First Take wants.  But make no mistake, this is ESPN pulling the strings here.  Hopefully, the more people that expose the B.S. and bring it to light will lead viewers to rethinking their options or the network will come to their senses and realize it’s not worth the overall destruction caused to the ESPN brand.  We can all dream, right?