Gonzo: Most entertaining Philly sports figures

There's only been one episode so far, but this year's installment of HBO's Hard Knocks is the best yet. That has everything to do with Rex Ryan.

The Jets' head coach is the anti-Andy Reid: loud and profane, candid and funny. Rex seems to love the camera almost as much as football and crude jokes. If Buddy's boy coached in Philly he'd instantly join his father as one of the most interesting characters to come through town in my lifetime.

In honor of the Ryans' incessant but charming jibber-jabber, Page 2 has compiled a list of the most entertaining Philly sports people in Sports Wit's limited memory. The people included didn't necessarily have individual success or even positive impacts on the city or their professions, but they were all, for various reasons, impossible to ignore.

10. Freddie Mitchell. From the crazy poodle hairdo to the fur coat to the self-generated nicknames, The People's Champ/FredEx never failed to get our attention - even though he often failed to catch passes. If his route running had been half as impressive as his mouth, he'd be in Canton instead of appearing on Bravo's Millionaire Matchmaker. Maybe the show can set him up with some hands.

9. Shawn Andrews. The Big Kid showed real ability for a while, but toward the end, his true talent was an unmatched gift to produce bad music - particularly freestyles about Olympic swimmers. For a time, the Mohawked former Eagles lineman was also a prolific tweeter - a football Buzz Bissinger in volume, if not in outrage or intellect. Here's one of his best: "#imnotattracted to women w/ Bird Claw feet . . . Chirp, Chirp, Chirp, Chirp . . . Fly awaaaayy, Fly awaaaay . . . Ahh, Ahh, Ahh,(hawk voice)." Love the Hawk voice. I need to incorporate that into everyday conversations.

8. Charlie Manuel. The homespun witticisms and "what the hells" are great, but the "why don't you stop by my office" challenge was classic.

7. Larry Bowa. As a player and a manager, he was Philly's kind of guy: small and angry and willing to have a heart-to-heart or a fist-to-face depending on the day. Plus, his antics spawned one of the best Twitter spoofs of all time: @LarryFNBowa.

6. Allen Iverson. Think about how many times you've heard the "practice" audio. His rap career never took off, but Jewelz knows how to play to the crowd.

5. Terrell Owens. As an Eagle, he was a walking headline. T.O. wore a Michael Irvin throwback jersey as a member of the Birds, jawed regularly with his quarterback (both to his face and behind his back), got in a locker-room fight with then-team ambassador Hugh Douglas, slept in a hyperbaric chamber, and, most memorably, held the world's best-ever hybrid driveway workout/news conference. It is, to date, also the world's only hybrid driveway workout/news conference, but that just means he's an innovator.

4. Donovan McNabb. It was time to usher in the Kevin Kolb era, but Donny Drama will be missed. With McNabb around, there was always something to discuss: The game of telephone he played on the Giants sideline, the facial expressions, and - above all - his love for rockin' the air guitar. There will be a lot less turbulence now that the Birds are flying Five free, and you can put away your Super Bowl barf bag, but you can't deny that he made things interesting.

3. Macho Row. Mitch Williams, Darren Daulton, Lenny Dykstra, John Kruk - so many of them could have made the list on their own. Collectively, they were a can't-miss show.

My favorite MR story involves my trip to Florida a few years back. I had just gotten out of the hotel pool when a small child, no older than 4 or 5, materialized out of nowhere and blew his nose into my towel before I realized what was happening. When he was done, the kid looked up and said "you're not daddy." Then daddy came along and fetched him. It was Kruk. He scooped up little Horatio Noseblower and walked off without saying a word.

2. Charles Barkley. He was (and still is) T.O. with charm, Donovan with jokes, FredEx with talent. Athletes aren't role models, but some of them are definitely entertainers.

1. Buddy Ryan. It would have been better if he won something - or anything at all. But between placing a bounty on a kicker, joking about nearly choking on a pork chop, and constantly antagonizing then-Cowboys head coach Jimmy Johnson, there was no one who captured Philly's attention or represented the town's spirit better than Buddy.

One of his best lines, and he had plenty, was when he had the temerity to call his boss "that guy in France." Reid should take note and call Jeffrey Lurie "that guy in Cape Cod."