ESPN Rick Rolls Nation

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ESPN starts with the April Fooling. The first match of the day for their pick 'em?

The Vorkuta Rick Diggers
vs.
Norilsk Gold Rolls

It'll be "televised" on ESPN 8 at 11:59 a.m.

Check it out here. Clicking on either team sends you to the famous Rick Roll video.

Seriously ESPN, why couldn't you do something original rather than stealing 4chan's most famous meme? You could have "announced" NHL coverage for the 09-10 season, man, that would have sent the NHL blogosphere into a frenzy.

Anyway, for those new to this meme or who want to know its backstory, here is it.

The Rick Roll is a link to the music video "Never Gonna Give You Up" by Rick Astley. It was made popular two years ago when the video game Grand Theft Auto 4 was announced. The company that makes the game, Rockstar, was going to release a video of the game but due to a server overload, many could not view the video.

As a joke, a few Internet pranksters from 4chan began spamming video game message boards with a "link" to the supposed GTA 4 video. Instead they were greeted by the opening synth beat of "Never Gonna Give You Up." The Rick Roll was born and now it is used as a misdirection joke and is easily the Internet's most famous meme.