Running The Numbers

Longtime readers (or even relative newcomers) of Dan Shaughnessy Watch are well aware of Shank's affinity for insulting 31 of 32 NFL teams and organizations by constantly referring to any opponents of the New England Patriots as 'tomato cans'. Journalism school supposedly teaches young journalists not to be repetitive, but this lesson has been lost on the Boston Globe's sole sports columnist. How bad is it? Universal Hub's Adam Gaffin actually ran the numbers:

It's even worse than that if you include the many, many tweets where 'tomato can' was used; you'd have to recalibrate the y-axis to go to 50 or more to capture that.

I don't know how often Adam reads Shank, but it's safe to say if he devotes a post to it and punishes himself by dredging through the Globe archives and adding it up, the 'tomato can' shtick is worn out now. Which means we can expect it for many more columns.