Pick Six: Lottery or Football?

Has anyone else noticed every sports tv and radio personality using the term "pick-six" this year? It's used when a defensive player intercepts a pass and runs it back for a touchdown.

Maybe it was used sparingly in my football watching years or even before I was born, but I never remember hearing it until this year.

And guess what, it's annoying the heck out of me.

In the past, announcers would normally just say exactly what the player did, "he picked it off and ran it back for a touchdown."

It's not annoying because of anything inherent in the term. I don't care that as far as I know it originated as a lottery game. It's annoying because it's a fad, and every sports personality is catching onto it like H1N1.

You know, people study this kind of stuff, it's called etymology. If they were to study this term if it's still used 20 years from now (I sure hope not), they'll look back and say, "well, it was initially used as a name for a lottery game and then somewhere in the year 2009, it blew up out of nowhere after some mysterious announcer used it in one of his telecasts."

Even sports talk guys I respect have caught on, sadly enough. I hope that some of these guys would get some backbone and stop using it, but I guess by the time they do, it'll be the end of the fad anyway.

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This kid scares me: