Big Brown rides hot as a Derby hopeful

In James Taylor's song "Traffic Jam," there's a stanza about how he "almost had a heart attack/ looking in my rearview mirror/ I saw myself the next car back/ looking in the rearview mirror/ 'Bout to have a heart attack." So that's sort of what was going on in the latest Costas Now on HBO, in which members of the sports media talked about the sports media.

No heart attacks, but at least one rather spirited attack. During a segment about blogs, the terrific author Buzz Bissinger (Friday Night Lights) laid into Deadspin.com founder Will Leitch, saying -- among other things -- that Leitch was "sort of like Jimmy Olsen on Percocet" and "you say you don't want to be in the press box because facts get in the way." The problem was, Bissinger's sputtering delivery dulled the impact of whatever points he wanted to make and left Leitch looking like a victim.

On the other hand, the segment on race, featuring ESPN's Cris Carter, Washington Post columnist and Pardon the Interruption co-host Michael Wilbon and Kansas City Star columnist Jason Whitlock, was a spirited, but reasoned discussion that left us wanting more (which Bob Costas said is planned). Whitlock, worth looking up online (he also writes at foxsports.com), in particular did a good job of defusing some statements from Kellen Winslow Sr. in a taped piece, in which he draped his son in the victim cloth for the media coverage of the younger Winslow's motorcycle accident. (Yes, Ben Roethlisberger got called most of the same things Winslow Jr. did.)

ray.frager@baltsun.com