MTV Rock and Jock: The #TBT We Need Right Now

Before reality television reigned supreme on every Viacom network, a little unknown channel called MTV gave us the show we deserved. It was called Rock and Jock! And it was good. What it offered was simple, celebrities and athletes in one venue raising money (ratings, really) for a local charity (fledgling and failing network, really). What it gave the few homes privileged enough to have cable though: Peak. Fucking. Blackness. At a time when rocking Africa medallions was the thing to do! How you compete with that?! Although to be real, the first iteration of Rock and Jock clearly had no intention of bringing the hood to the softball park (as denoted by the name of the damn show and having Sammy Hagar and Sam Kinneson (rest his screaming soul) as coaches, with Kevin Costner. The 90s tried really hard to turn everything on its head: people wore their pants backward, “Bitch” became a radio friendly word (shout out to Meredith Brooks), the nerd was the cool person on sitcoms, and a counterculture cable network called MTV was a respected journalistic gem.

The fact that the sentence, “Queen Latifah steals the ball from Shawn Kemp and scores the fast break shot!” even exists is all the reason we need to give retroactive props to Rock and Jock. The MTV Sports spectacle was the primary reason to watch any of the Summer programs. You vibed to MTV Jams, but you were really just waiting for Cam’Ron to beat N’Sync three-on-one and take David Arquette’s ankles home in a pink Burberry tote…