ESPN Schreiber: ESPN guilty of teller becoming the tale (T.O./Werder/Cris Carter)

[THUMPER]

"Why is this T.O./Romo/Witten thing even a story? ... Do we not believe that in an NFL locker room, full of 53 passionate, aggressive, competitive men there are not disagreements and arguments? This happens in all 32 locker rooms, multiple times, every year. Especially after a tough loss. This is only a story because it's T.O. and the Cowboys."

Best line in the article!

I don't watch BSPN if I can help it because it represents everything that is wrong with sports journalism today. Short bites and highlights, the focus on controversy rather than the sport itself, drawing attention to the messenger, and the general, overall tabloid feel to it all. It is the "National Enquirer of Sports".

I really couldn't care less what Owens said in the locker room. It has absolutely zero meaning to me as a fan of the Cowboys. What I do care about is why he runs his routes poorly or cuts them off short at times. How about some in-depth stories about those kinds of things?

My favorite segment on BSPN was when Ron Jaworski would break down plays and tendencies. Now THAT is what I am looking for. Even that has become more about the guys throwing the ball around and jawing with each other than about breaking down certain plays.

BSPN sucks! There, that pretty much sums it up.

 

[DA FAN]

GOOD READ. I think we need a 2nd sports station for some comp. ESPN is trying to be bigger then the games they cover and it sucks.

Exactly right.

A perfect example is the start of their show on Sundays. It shows Chris Berman, Tom Jackson and thre rest of the crew kinda walking down/up as they announce the show. It's suppose to be about the NLF and not them.

 

[jackrussell]

I believe that if Werder's sources lied to him that still makes him a liar.

Just like if his sources made a big pitcher of kool-aid and they all(Werder and the sources) drank the kool-aid then niether would be thirsty

you know...since they all drank the same kool-aid...get it?

I've been told several times over the last few years that's not necessarily true.

 

[tyke1doe]

I believe that if Werder's sources lied to him that still makes him a liar.

Just like if his sources made a big pitcher of kool-aid and they all(Werder and the sources) drank the kool-aid then niether would be thirsty

you know...since they all drank the same kool-aid...get it?

Wow.

We need an analogy class in here.

I've seen a lot of awful analogies.

 

[Boyzmamacita]

"Why is this T.O./Romo/Witten thing even a story? ... Do we not believe that in an NFL locker room, full of 53 passionate, aggressive, competitive men there are not disagreements and arguments? This happens in all 32 locker rooms, multiple times, every year. Especially after a tough loss. This is only a story because it's T.O. and the Cowboys."

The sad thing is there are viewers who really don't realize this. They believe dissension is unique to the Dallas Cowboys because the media told them so.

 

[Stash]

Nice to see them getting called out for their obvious lack of integrity. I hope to see more of this sort of thing.

There's certainly plenty of 'material' to choose from.

:bravo:

 

[jterrell]

This article just validates what most already know:
ESPN is not a journalistic endeavor or news source but instead a TMZ for sports.

 

[jobberone]

The problem with Werder is he went with something to clearly put himself and ESPN in the spotlite and steal viewers for ratings. That was journalistic crap. You don't report problems in the dugout/lockerroom unless stuff really happens with names and faces attached to each. You don't take anonymous sources and then spread gossip. He may not have known for certain it was BS but he could have found out by interviewing the principles of the accusations. TO told him to off himself. OK. But Romo, Witten and others would and could confirm or deny it. He didn't bother with that but went with 'the story'.

Even if there's a hint of truth.....it's still crap. CRAP CRAP CRAP as J Jonah Jameson says.

They won't give us what we really want. Rumors and gossip sells so that's what the rest of us have to live with. It's the sports version of As the World Turns cross pollinated with the National Inquirer.

 

[irvin4evs]

Very good read, except she forgot to mention or understand that Owens had been refusing to answer ANY question Werder asked him for over a month. There's an obvious conflict of interest for ESPN to continue to allow Mr. Blue Suit to keep reporting on Owens and that got Mr. Blue Suit interjected into the story.

She also forgot to note that Mr. Blue Suit's 'source' was singular (basically violating journalist standards that you get at least 3 anonymous sources when reporting a rumor) and that anonymous source was 'somebody who regularly speaks to Owens' teammates' according to Mr. Blue Suit. At best that sounds like a really weak source to me and it should be a no-brainer, particularly with the troubles Mr. Blue Suit had with Owens, for ESPN to force Mr. Blue Suit to get at least 2 more sources before writing the article.

And if somebody is a conduit of lying sources and probably knows they are, that pretty much makes them a liar too in most circles.

All of this, along with the Mort and the Raiders story and the Cris Carter story are just typical of BSP...err, I mean ESPN. 'Bout time somebody in the media called them out on this garbage.

YAKUZA

Best post I've seen at this place.

 

[adbutcher]

This article is a day late and dollar short. Good read though.

 

[Yakuza Rich]

The problem with Werder is he went with something to clearly put himself and ESPN in the spotlite and steal viewers for ratings. That was journalistic crap. You don't report problems in the dugout/lockerroom unless stuff really happens with names and faces attached to each. You don't take anonymous sources and then spread gossip.

You're giving Mr. Blue Suit too much credit. He didn't have sourceS. He had A source. One source. A wrote an article reporting a rumor based on A source who "regularly speaks with Owens' teammates."

It was really one of the worst pieces of journalism I've seen in quite some time since Matt Mosely, who coincidentally helped with the piece, told Matt McBriar he was going to be cut because he thought he could read Parcells' lips during the game. (although Mort's Raiders story was pretty bad as well)

Unfortunately, Schreiber is the only person in the media who calls out ESPN on this crap and still missed some glaring facts about the Mr. Blue Suit story on Owens (although she just may have not known that Owens wasn't speaking to Mr. Blue Suit, etc). And unfortunately, most fans take their stories at face value and assuming they are all true.




YAKUZA

 

[RoadRunner]

Well, that's if Mr. Blue Suit's knew or had a good idea that his sources were lying. Sources do lie and sometimes there's nothing the reporter can do about it. But Mr. Blue Suit has been dead wrong on reports about the Cowboys for quite some time, almost at an astonishingly high level of inaccuracy. After awhile (and considering his past history with Owens) I think it's pretty obvious he knew his source was lying and/or he was looking for anything to put Owens in a negative light. And yes, that would make Mr. Blue Suit a liar in my book




YAKUZA

Yep. It was clearly obvious that the Werder story was ran for Werder to get back at TO for his "next question" policy. Werder did not vet the story at all, and went with the first bit of tabloid trash he could find. I'm surprised aliens and Elvis didn't make it into the Werder story.

When you boil it all down, Werder and TO are having a diva fight. Werder should be reassigned to a different team by BSPN.

 

[J-DOG]

GOOD READ. I think we need a 2nd sports station for some comp. ESPN is trying to be bigger then the games they cover and it sucks.

Agree with that statement 100%.
Jason Whitlock went on a rant about this very subject while guest hosting on the Jim Rome show a while back.
Whitlock's main point was that ESPN has lost integrity and Whitlock said a lot of the people who work at ESPN, whom he considers friends, have sold out on thier ethics.
I don't consider Mortenson's slip up of saying the "privilege of running my stories by them" as an innocent thing. I think that is the mentality or mind set of the reporters and journalist's who work for ESPN.

 

[THUMPER]

Agree with that statement 100%.
Jason Whitlock went on a rant about this very subject while guest hosting on the Jim Rome show a while back.
Whitlock's main point was that ESPN has lost integrity and Whitlock said a lot of the people who work at ESPN, whom he considers friends, have sold out on thier ethics.
I don't consider Mortenson's slip up of saying the "privilege of running my stories by them" as an innocent thing. I think that is the mentality or mind set of the reporters and journalist's who work for ESPN.

There used to be more sports outlets (SI had their own channel for a while) but they all got into the same rush for tabloid news and BSPN won out. The NFL Network and HBO are providing some competition but not enough to take any of BSPN's market share away or to make them take a good look at themselves and make any changes.

Sadly, what they are doing sells. :bang2:

 

[RealCowboyfan]

Updated: January 13, 2009, 11:45 AM ET

ESPN guilty of teller becoming the tale

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By Le Anne Schreiber
ESPN Ombudsman
Archive

<snip>
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/columns/story?columnist=schreiber_leanne&id=3828530

I guess why they call it BSPN

 

[ethiostar]

If the cycle ever stopped spinning, too many of us would have time to ponder the basic question: Does any of this matter? Perhaps it does, but plenty of viewers, like this one from Illinois, were left wondering:

"Why is this T.O./Romo/Witten thing even a story? ... Do we not believe that in an NFL locker room, full of 53 passionate, aggressive, competitive men there are not disagreements and arguments? This happens in all 32 locker rooms, multiple times, every year. Especially after a tough loss. This is only a story because it's T.O. and the Cowboys."

Best part of the whole article!

 

[J-DOG]

There used to be more sports outlets (SI had their own channel for a while) but they all got into the same rush for tabloid news and BSPN won out. The NFL Network and HBO are providing some competition but not enough to take any of BSPN's market share away or to make them take a good look at themselves and make any changes.

Sadly, what they are doing sells. :bang2:

Agree.
I remember the old SI thirty minute show they used to show every night.
We have ESPN which shows pretty much every sport now and then to a much smaller extent...Fox Sports network which is regionalized across the USA.
It's a shame the way it is now.
ESPN shapes and forms they way we see much of our sports now.
I purposely go out of my way to NOT watch Sportcenter now because I just do not trust anything I see that is reported.