ESPN's Keith Olbermann rips Flyers over Ice Girls

Rrrrr. Look at those savage teeth.

Listen to ESPN opiner/whiner Keith Olbermann invoke the gods of media self-righteousness in railing Thursday night against the Philadelphia Flyers for bringing back the Ice Girls.

And as he decries how demeaning the skimpy uniforms were, notice how many images of scantily clad Ice Girls are paraded for Olbermann's audience.

"It did look like they had been mugged on their way into the arena and forced to surrender their, you know, CLOTHING!" Olbermann intoned, while naming the Flyers one of the World's Worst for this week.

And as I write this, a bare-shouldered woman is hosting SportsCenter on a TV in the office. Olberman, of course, wears suit and tie.

Funny, but in grandstanding about not being sexist, Olbermann sure showed he can stereotype with the best of them, doing an impression of Philly fans as Neanderthals for booing the replacement "Ice Boys":

"Us Flyer fan. Whar Ice Girls? Narn't happy!"

What, no "Me chuck snowboyls at Sandy Claws"?

First up in the clip below, though, is another Philly-related item, with Olbermann ripping the U.S. Postal Service for its new Wilt Chamberlain stamps. Huh? Baffled by whatever point he was trying to make. Making an off-color joke about sex with prostitutes makes one think of Chamberlain's claims to have bedded 25,000 women. Or is he saying the Sixers one should be free?

Seriously, Olbermann does have a point. A Mother Jones article itemized Ice Girl complaints, including "$50 for about seven hours of work on game day" and not being allowed to eat in public ("about as sexist as sports can get," Olbermann says).

But the Flyers haven't even held auditions yet (scheduled for noon Sunday) and the club's been mostly silent about any changes in uniforms, pay or working conditions.

So isn't this a case of premature evisceration?

At one point, Olbermann quips about a coed squad of "Ice Kids" and alludes to a Yahoo! Sports piece ("Flyers handling return of Ice Girls in stupidest possible way") that quotes spokesman Ike Richman as saying merely that men can also audition.

Olbermann's rush to react? "Just makes this whole thing STUPIDER."

Now it's up to the Flyers to show whether K.O. knows what the puck he's talking about.

Contact staff writer Peter Mucha at 215-854-4342 or pmucha@phillynews.com. Follow @petemucha on Twitter.