Gossip should have no friends

[June 4th, 2008]

• TOUGH TALK: Jock journo Brad McCray ’s June 1 story on mixed martial arts fighter Kevin “Kimbo Slice” Ferguson was headlined “Slicing the American Dream.” McCray penned the piece for Internet powerhouse Sherdog.com, not his longtime employer, The Oregonian. The largest website in the U.S. devoted to the increasingly mainstream world of mixed martial arts, Sherdog.com features plenty o’ pictures of Team Quest fighters, as well as local legends Randy Couture and Matt Lindland, also a Republican candidate for the Oregon House . The mixed martial arts beat is new for McCray, who acted as what he calls the “weird sports guy” for The O for 14 years. He says he was getting resistance to covering mixed martial arts at the daily newspaper. Why ditch print? “[At Sherdog] I have the power to destroy lives, make or break dreams and build legends,” says McCray, who left The O to become the website’s executive editor May 22. “There’s a reason why newspapers are dying. I think there are more people interested in MMA than in women’s tennis, skateboarding or motocross.”

• LIFT OFF: As first reported on wweek.com, petite powerhouse Tacee Webb , former owner of Red Light Clothing Exchange, current American Apparel store “opener” and Lovecraft Biofuels head, is the brand new owner of Seaplane. The shop’s been an essential outfitter of PDX fashionati for eight years, and Webb plans to expand its reach with a second boutique in Silver Lake, L.A. Webb will also import her Fashion Design Camp, a couture training ground for kids, to the City of Angels. According to Webb, Seaplane’s wonder twins—Kathryn Towers and Holly Stalder —will continue to stay involved and show their work at Seaplane.

• MISSED ENTRANCE: What if they threw an awards ceremony and nobody came? The first Portland Area Musical Theater Awards—assigned by secretive cadre of 11 theater-lovers “anonymous even to one another”—have caused a stir among local actors of late. Everyone wants to know who’s behind the shindig, but scant few of the nominees are likely to attend the awards on June 23. Why? Because its ceremony is the same night as the Portland Area Theater Alliance’s citywide musical-theater audition. Whoops. Portland’s 29th annual Drammy Awards, yes, sponsored by WW, are still conflict-free on Monday, June 9.

• ELECTION DAZE: By the time voting closed on Saturday, 2,674 of you had finished WW’s 2008 Best of Portland Readers Poll. Thanks! Prizewinners will be announced next Wednesday, June 11. Look for the poll results in our Best of Portland package on July 23. Want to nominate something that didn’t fit in the poll? Email your ideas to bwaterhouse@wweek.com by June 6.