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October 22, 2009

Twitter unites two of the best trash talkers (Ochocinco and Dixon) on Krunch-Time call-in show

Larry Winterland

Have you ever had an itch so far, way deep down in the back of your throat you just could not get rid of it?

To me, Les Dixon is that itch.

He likes to stir the pot.

Dixon likes to make sure your juices are flowing every day. He will keep you on your toes with his witty humor. Thanks to modern technology, he has more sticks to stir that pot with.

With Facebook, Myspace, and Twitter, today's athletes and movie stars become more accessible. Just one click can make your favorite athlete, movie star or musician appear right in your living room. Most famous people do not embrace the social networking sites that more of us use.

Some do.

Wide receiver Chad Ochocinco has embraced the “Twitterverse” because he loves the interaction with fans.

Ochocinco and Dixon both like to have fun and push the boundaries for their good times —Ochocinco with NFL commissioner Roger Goodell and Dixon with everyone he knows or comes into contact with.

So a few months ago when Dixon got his new 3G IPhone, he began his Twittering journey. Game after game Dixon wasn’t shy about telling Ochocinco his feelings about how he played, his upcoming opponents, or even asking if he should start him in the coming week in his fantasy league, but he wasn’t getting much of a response — until a few days ago.

Right before I was getting ready to do my daily sports talk call-in show, Krunch-Time, on 101.9, Dixon called me and told me that he got Ochocinco to message him back.

Not sure if he was blocked or not, Dixon sent him a message.

Ochocinco tweeted back, “I would not block you, I use you as motivation.”

The next day it was on.

Dixon told Ochocinco that he was not the face of the Bengal franchise and Ochocinco replied back, “This guy lives under a rock.”

Because the reply was on Ochocinco’s twitter, all 280,000 plus followers could see it, which meant the flood gates were open.

Dixon had to block people who wanted to follow him for no other reason than they wanted to make their opinions known about why they thought Ochocinco was the face of the franchise.

Dixon tweeted a couple of times throughout the following days telling Ochocinco to call in to Krunch-time because he would be the guest co-host.

On Oct. 20, 2009, in London, Ky., a radio station in a small market got a big market feel.

The first 25 minutes of the show went about normal. But I knew that wouldn’t last because when Dixon is on, nothing is normal. We talked about the Twitter war going on with Dixon, Ochochinco, and the fans. That’s when Dixon decided to tweet one more time, “Talking about Chad live call in” and he left the call-in number.

Chad retweeted what Dixon had just sent and followed it by saying, “I’m calling right now.”

Neither Dixon nor I (both followers of Ochocinco) had looked at our Twitter accounts to see what Chad had just tweeted. So you would understand the cautious approach taken when the call screener that night, James McVay, looked at me and pointed to the name Chad.

With doubt, I took the call and welcomed Chad to the broadcast.

“WKFC — Ochocinco is in the house!”

I couldn’t believe that he had called in.

Dixon’s mad Twitter method had worked to success. London, Ky. had five time pro bowl wide receiver Chad Ochocinco traveling though 6,000 watts of radio airwaves.

The air was cleared quite rapidly when Chad talked about the negative tweets Dixon had sent to him. He stated that “It was all in fun and that he was indeed a Bengals fan.”

Chad talked for about seven minutes about the hit from Ray Lewis, the loss Cincinnati suffered to Denver, Carson Palmer, and of course Twitter.

But the crazy night was just beginning when Chad was let go.

You remember in the beginning of this article when I told you Ochocinco had retweeted Dixon’s message? The one with the station phone number?

Well, 280,000 people saw the phone number and a lot of people called in. One right after another thinking it was Ochocinco’s house, or wanting to talk to Chad.

One caller from the greater Cincinnati area wanted to talk about pro athletes getting free passes when they have legal problems. I don’t have an official count, but from the time OchcoCinco was on the line to the end of the show, my guess is the lines rang a minimum of 200 times.

Poor James, I owe him dinner.

And Les, you evil genius you, your planned work, just like you knew it would the whole time.

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