Is Howard Eskin the most self-absored sports persona in existence? I mean, his ratio of relevance-to-self-absorption (the RSA) has to be off the charts. Never mind that Maserati has aggressively shifted its brand down-market, thus removing some of the cachet that came with owning (or renting) one of its luxury cars (I’d currently take any Tesla configuration over a Maserati), what level of narcissism would compel someone with a weekend morning talk show to drive around Clearwater Beach like a king?

On one hand, I genuinely respect Eskin’s hustle, especially the fact that he still attends Philly sports press conferences and games, even though he no longer has nearly a large enough platform to convert his time-spent-covering (TSA) into useful sports reporting. But mesahthinks that his insistance on still attending Super Bowl week, posing for pictures with Roger Goodell, asking national sports figures questions like he actually has an outlet on which to report their answers, and driving around Clearwater like a goddamned faux celebutante is more about his ego than an actual compulsion to inform his audience, given that his biggest platforms are his FOX 29 sports segment, weekend morning talk show and, ironically, Twitter, the platform that has done in personalities the likes of Eskin over the past five years.

Howard is not nearly important enough to wear fancy suits or attend exhibition baseball games in a Maserati, but he wants you to think he is, which, I suppose, is 80% of the battle.