Olbermann builds hype for new show with media blitz

As anticipation builds ahead of Keith Olbermann's return to prime time Monday night after his abrupt departure from MSNBC in January, David Carr's New York Times Magazine profile of the bombastic anchor has landed online.

The piece covers the expected bases: Olbermann's fiery split with his former network, his combative tendencies, the prospects for his new show on Current TV and his love of baseball.

As with any good profile, Carr placed the best anecdote in the lede, in which we find the two veteran newsmen at a Yankees-Mets game in late May:

"Switch seats with me," he said pleasantly. "I want to be in the Fox Sports shot of home plate. They usually cut it off right here," he said, indicating the arm of the seat between us. "It's fun to mess with them."

Not only were we inches away from the field, but Olbermann was on television, messing with the heads of his sworn enemies at Fox. It was a wonderful place for him to be, second only to that lone seat in front of the camera. He has missed it.

You can read the rest over at nytimes.com.

Olbermann has been on a media circuit to promote the new show, which will need all the hype it can get seeing as how Current TV's audience is but a fraction of its competitors. The Times Magazine piece follows big Olbermann stories this past week in the Hollywood Reporter and the Wall Street Journal.

The press tour continues tonight when Olbermann hits "The Colbert Report," and he's set to return to the NBC Universal studios Thursday for an appearance on "Late Night With Jimmy Fallon."