A combination of both. With talent around it was confusing. He did his thing ok.. which was direct traffic. He fucked up a shitload of good bits, and awesome conversations because he couldn't and didn't fit in. He was never funny, lied constantly and was over the top stupid. He was a man in his 40s reading out loud to millions of people.. at a 5th grade level. It isnt so much him being as bad as he is.. there wasn't the cloud of shit he stirred up when he lied about trying to help Ant during the firing. It was just easy to gloss over his bullshit because he was part of a group most of us loved at one time or another.. After that, he was dead to us.. not because of betraying Ant, but because his frauds and lies were no longer being glossed over. His ass was in the wind, and now... we throw bologna at it.

Waaahh waaaahh waaahhhh

Like most artists, their great original, original creative output comes in the earlier years. He thought pretending to fly a blimp to a rival station and drop bras on it was a great idea. That, I think, is his defining bit. The douchiness was always there.

I remember hearing about the Hundred Grand (Bar) competition, spoken of several times over the years in almost mythical terms, as one of the key bits which had defined the O&A brand. When I finally heard the audio, Opie blurts out the payoff in his stuttering gurgle and firmly stomps on any preceding funny. It was so anticlimactic, and Ant's disappointment is palpable in the clip (possibly because the whole thing sounds prearranged and Ope couldn't even execute his own hackery properly).

My theory is that at some point, when Amt started partying hard (when they were first on XM he talked about going to bed at 9), Opie decided he could step up and be funny. And it wasn't good, but once Ant was gone, it was bad, and it was obvious Jim didn't want to be there, and then Jim was gone and his afternoon show seemed to just be a Trainwreck of whoever he could get to show up.

He was hiding his lack of talent and douchiness in plain sight on that show for years. While the funniest men in the country pushed the limits and came up with great material, Opie tried to keep up by doing his best Howard Stern impression.

He'd heard Howard describe how he said whatever came to his mind on the radio every day, so that's what he tried to do. There was just one problem: unlike Howard, Opie isn't witty, smart or funny. So every time he blurted out something, it would either bomb or its lack of humor go unnoticed. Back then I never paid that much attention to how bad Opie sucked. I just figured that if all these hilarious people accepted him, then he must be funny.

It was when all the comedians on the show started going on to other things that Opie started sticking out as an unfunny dork. His lies and phoniness wasn't camouflaged by funny anymore and he continued to sit there unaware of his comedy nakedness. He not only lacked the self awareness to realize that he isn't funny, but he actually had convinced himself that he was the most talented and interesting person in the room. That's when most people really turned the corner on hating him. We finally saw this ugly, unfunny, slovenly leech for the sellout wannabe whore that he really is.

He was never funny, but he was always an asshole so he could say awful, crude things and subject the show's retards to abuse, so that was funny. In the last few years, he cut a lot of that out. And like an old bank heist pro coming out of retirement for one last job, he tried to film Roland shitting and got busted.

The Opie Effect is a phenomenon in which one learns the truth about a work of fiction they previously enjoyed but knew something was wrong with it but couldn't put their finger on. It's like realizing as an adult that you suppressed memories of being molested. Once you realize that, all the memories of abuse just flood in.

At the time, everyone had the same exact feeling when Opie would ruin something or bomb, it just felt like an emptiness you had to get over and move on from instantly, so you buried it and eventually tried to stop noticing it. At first it seemed like the joke was he was underdelivering on purpose. "That's the bit" was the excuse for him way before he ever put that catchphrase into words to defend himself.

lots of words (people will be bothered to read them), lots of words (people will be bothered to read them), lots of words (people will be bothered to read them), lots of words (people will be bothered to read them), lots of words (people will be bothered to read them), lots of words (people will be bothered to read them), lots of words (people will be bothered to read them), lots of words (people will be bothered to read them),

as time goes on, I hate myself more and more for liking him. my cousin was onto his shit long before me and probably thinks less of me (rightly so) for not picking up on it sooner.

Or, maybe your cousin just has a more highly developed / focused case of the 'tism than you and he used to obsess over how much Opie sucked before you did.

I bet your faggot cousin even tried convincing people about this on Wackbag, didn't he?

I think he's biggest problem is the tone of voice he says stuff in. It's got this edgy 13 year old quality to it and just sucks the funny out of everything, if it is there or not

go back and listen. The lack of talent is obvious. Here is a great 10 minutes of the dolt repeating others jokes and completely wrecking the funny around him. He stinks. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3o6caBmFPM