Weekly Rundown: Kornheiser, Brandon Snyder, John Wall

Weekly Rundown is a combination of links and brief comments on stories and topics that I couldn't get to during the week. If there's something important that I missed, don't hesitate to send an email or leave a comment.

• Jon Gruden is taking Tony Kornheiser's spot on Monday Night Football, which is probably a good thing. Funny guys don't really work in the booth, especially if they don't know that much about football to begin with. Though, to be honest, it's really not surprising that once ESPN stopped bringing in random celebrities to interview during the game and had the announcing trio focus, for the most part, on the game, that the product improved immensely. Anyway, if you think the decision to leave was solely Kornheiser's, you're crazy. The Washington Post's Leonard Sharpiro offers his thoughts on the whole thing. [ESPN]


• If Brandon Snyder keeps hitting like he is, the Orioles won't have a problem finding room for him. [Baltimore Sun]


• World Series and ALCS games will start about 40 minutes earlier this year, so, hey, that's cool. [ESPN]


• Consensus No. 1 prospect John Wall has decided to play for John Calipari at Kentucky. Though Wall will only stay for one season, it's official: Kentucky is loaded. [Rivals]


• Think the Washington Redskins should change their team name? Michael Silver agrees with you. [Yahoo! Sports]


• The Orioles aren't the only team that makes horrible baserunning mistakes; the Mets do it too. [Big League Stew]


• Send Phil Hughes to the bullpen? Not a bad idea. [SweetSpot]


• The Nationals have had a strange season both on and off the field, and now there's this: exploding hot dog buns:
  

  
  "It's just funny to watch hot dog rolls explode and come down on people," agreed James Timmermeyer, one of several fans to comment in this space about the malfunction of Nick's Sausage Shooter during Saturday's matinee, just a few hours before the tarp failed to deploy. "I would actually like to see that again. I'd want it to go awry every time."
  
  The Nats declined to comment on any sausage failure, so I'll go by some first-person accounts. Screech came out on a Segway, as he always does for this promotion, and set up shop down the right-field line. (The sausage shooter is used irregularly, but is a season-long promotion that has occurred before and is scheduled to occur again.) This time, though, hot dogs (wrapped in bun, foil and t-shirt, along with a flyer) weren't soaring into the stands with the majesty of a Roethlisberger bomb. This was the Danny Wuerffel version.
  
  "Every time you would see one fire, you would almost see shotgun pellets of stuff come out of it, stuff would explode everywhere," said Alex Zeese, who was sitting in 222. "You would see bits of hot dog bun lying in the field. A guy in front of me caught one, he opens it up, the whole thing was just crushed, and the sausage casing was pretty much the only thing left. It had been torn down the center, all you saw was little bits of meat stuck to the casing. It was basically gutted. I don't think anyone would eat that. I'm just glad there was no mustard in that stuff."
  
  There was at least one report of a sausage flying into the Phillies bullpen, to great amusement of the residents. One commenter said the grounds crew had to retrieve pieces of bun from the field, and that Garrett Mock was showered with the stuff. That's unconfirmed, but it would certainly fit in with the other reports.
  

  
  Long quote, I know, but it's hilarious nonetheless. What's next, Nationals? Spelling a former president's name wrong on a bobblehead? Apparently, yes. [D.C. Sports Bog]


• This just in: Nick Markakis is really good -- and humble, too. [Washington Post]