Comedian and actor Chris Rock appeared on the Today Show to promote his upcoming film Top Five and he spent much of his time hammering host Matt Lauer by comparing his program to ABC rival Good Morning America. Rock even suggested that Lauer will get cancer to increase the morning show's moribund ratings.  

"We'll show you Robin Roberts!" Rock exclaimed while riffing on the ratings race with GMA. "Matt Lauer's gonna get sick next, watch!"

Rock's reference is to Roberts's public battle with myelodysplastic syndrome, which played out on the air and became a heart-wrenching part of the program's content as Roberts went through extensive therapies over the course of many months. 

Rock also teased Lauer over his "big get" Monday with Janay Rice, abused spouse of NFL running back Ray Rice, who chose the NBC program as her first public interview since the uproar over the elevator video showing her then-fiance knocking her out in an Atlantic City hotel. 

"The 'Today' show is doing well," he said, according to the New York Daily News. "You have Ray Rice's wife. Take that 'Good Morning America.' The 'Today' show has the wife."