LCS Hockey broke it, our own Sean Leahy pimped it and now the Matthew Barnaby-as-potential ESPN hockey analyst news has spread through the Web and into the mainstream media.

(Even if, as The Pensblog pointed out this morning, some sites refuse to give credit where it's due.)

I was asked about Barnaby in Bristol last night on the Team 990 in Montreal, and I think it's clear that he's one of the most interesting candidates we've had for Barry Melrose's old spot on ESPN.

All due respect to Bill Clement, who won our informal ESPN poll, but it's like I said last night: At some point, hockey coverage on U.S. television needs to move beyond the same half-dozen names and faces that have blighted our screens since the 1990s.

Ed Olczyk goes from interesting to blandsville in zero-to-60. The last interesting thing Keith Jones said was in a book with Buccigross. Brian Engblom's mouth moves, but I'm not entirely sure there isn't a Teddy Ruxpin cassette player in his back regurgitating the same uninteresting prattle the Swedish Muppet's given us since the Clinton Administration.

Barnaby has heat with hockey fans right now because he's something different.

He's well-spoken (video), he's got credibility as an ex-jock and he's got a bit of an edgy ego. They're the same virtues that Jeremy Roenick possesses, which is why puckheads have been clamoring for his transition to television for years. (Brett Hull had two of the three, but turned out to be a disinterested bore on NBC.)

But here's the thing: I like Barnaby less as the guy who does 90-second hits on ESPNews than the guy who brings the personality of hockey to the masses. Steven Ovadia had it right on Puck Update: Barnaby as a roving correspondent, interviewing players and coaches around the league, "because people really seem to love Matthew Barnaby."

It's such a simple concept, yet such an untapped idea: The casual sports fan watching ESPN doesn't know jack and squat about a left-handed shot on the power-play point, so why waste an ex-jock with personality as a talking head when an EJ Hradek will suffice? Unleash a guy like Barnaby on-site to offer candid assessments, trade a few war stories, interact with players ... hell, I'd tune in to see him interview that guy with the painted chest in section 417.

In other words, take "The Matthew Barnaby Show" on the road. Or is openly embracing something that may increase the general public's interest in hockey just too jarring for ESPN to handle?