Larry King, Piers Morgan trade barbs

Fireworks did not go off, but there was serious needling Wednesday night as long-running CNN host Larry King appeared on his successor's show, "Piers Morgan Tonight," after having called the program oversold and damming its host with faint praise.

"Now, Larry, look, I have spent the last few months saying following you is like following Frank Sinatra," Morgan told King after the two discussed recent events in the Middle East. "I couldn't have paid you higher praise."

Then, referring to an interview King gave the UK's BBC Radio 4 last week, Morgan told him, "You go in my backyard and say I'm an oversold, undangerous."

"I did not," King replied, as the two cross-talked. "Listen, if you read the full quote, I said, 'He's fine.' . . . I haven't seen you dangerous yet. I said you're capable."

"We couldn't come in and undersell me," Morgan protested. "I'm following a legend. You can't follow Sinatra in Vegas and say, 'By the way, I'm not very good and this is gonna be useless.' . . . I've always oversold myself. I quite like doing that."

King had said to the BBC, "I think one of the problems they did was oversell it. He was going to be dangerous, he was going to be water-cooler talk. 'Wait till you see me, I'm different.' He's good," King allowed. "He's not that dangerous. . . . I think they might have been better off starting quiet, and that's not Piers' fault, or maybe it is. . . . He's certainly not bad. He's certainly an acceptable host. He asks good questions, maybe he interrupts a little too much at times."

King said that after those comments, CNN insisted he go on Morgan's show.