It's official; the world has gone crazy. Cats and dogs are living together. How else can you explain what is going on today? For the first time ever, a major media outlet is covering a fake sporting event. Before I get too much further into this, let's take a trip down memory lane and explain what I am talking about. This story begins with a boy around the age of ten and his discovery of the most amazing sport to watch: professional wrestling.

In the early to mid-1980s, I began watching professional wrestling by watching the World Wrestling Federation (now known as World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE)) on the USA network. I still recall watching the Hulkster take on guys like Paul Orndorf, King Kong Bundy and, of course, Andre the Giant. In 1984, WWE began the tradition that came to be known as Wrestlemania. I remember when watching a pay per view special such as Wrestlemania means going down to the cable company and obtaining an adapter that you put on the cable wire going to your box that allowed you to get the scrambled content. Without it, you could tune in and hear snow while you watched wavy and unwatchable images on your TV. One of the most amazing images of my youth was watching as Hulk Hogan faced off against a man that was eight inches taller and 229 pounds heavier, Andre the Giant. The amazing image in question was when the smaller man picked the larger man over his head and slammed him. It was an awkward slam, but that was not important; the giant had been laid low.

Through my hectic adult life, I have come and gone at different times from this "sport" as time allowed. It was always somewhat comforting to know that anytime I wanted, wrestling was there for me to come back to -- kind of like an old friend that you could always sit down and have a conversation with whenever you had time. With that backdrop, the most amazing thing has occurred this year.

The popularity of the WWE has waned a bit since the halcyon days of the 1990's, when Monday Night Raw was the king of cable broadcasting on Monday nights, whenever it wasn't football season that is. The ratings are well under what they had been during that time, but never did I think that I would see what I have seen recently to deal with those ratings losses. Instead of responding to the ratings losses with an improved product, the WWE has taken another step. It has reached into its recent past to Jonathan Coachman, who had left them to go work for the four letter network, ESPN. As the "worldwide leader in sports entertainment," ESPN is the number one outlet for sports news and viewing. Jonathan Coachman has smartly not denied his past as a wrestling commentator, and instead has embraced that part of his past by talking about his experiences and making wrestling references from time to time. With the arrangement with WWE that has been made by the powers that be, Coachman has been cleared to fully incorporate wrestling into his broadcasts on Sportscenter (ESPN's Emmy award winning sports news show) by having interviews with current WWE stars and having a highlights package as well.

As I sit here writing this and watching Sunday Sportscenter, there I see Jonathan Coachman with live reports from the site of tonight's Wrestlemania 32 and I cannot help but wonder what this means. A serious sports media outlet is reporting live from the site of a fake sport. This would be kind of like the NBC evening news covering the fake presidential candidate press conferences that you see on "Saturday Night Live." Having Brian Williams or Lester Holt on hand would not legitimize those events, so does having ESPN present legitimize the WWE? The answer to that is, sort of.

Having Sportscenter and Jonathan Coachman report from Dallas live during the day for Wrestlemania does not legitimize the WWE as a sporting event. No amount of reporting could do that. The results in wrestling are pre-determined, and every rational wrestling fan is aware of that. Having ESPN on hand does not change that in any way, so having ESPN there does not instantly make the WWE a true sport. What is does legitimize, however, is the strength of the WWE brand as a sports related event. Millions of people will either be in attendance or watching tonight's matches and it is that fact that ESPN is acknowledging with its presence at the event. There is a great deal of overlap between wrestling fans and sports fans, meaning that through this partnership between the WWE and ESPN, many millions of people will see and be exposed to a product that may appeal to both groups of fans. So, as mentioned before, it is pandemonium in the sports world, cats and dogs are living together, and the world has turned upside down.