Chris Benoit and family found dead

I know of two papers that ran it in sports.

 

It was in a few sports sections in Southern California as well as ESPN.com

 

You know ... if this guy killed his family, it makes all those tearful tributes Monday night worth about the same amount as a Ziploc bag full o' piss.

 

That would make sense because seeing the history between Benoit and the Guerreros would make Benoit likely to text Chavo at a crazy time.

 

Local paper here didn't run anything, unless I got an early edition.

Newseum scan shows it got front-page treatment in Corpus Christi, Atlanta and the major Alberta papers. A lot of tease play in North Carolina, which loves its wrestling too.

 

I disagree ... those were people who knew him. I've never been in the position they were in (knowing someone who has committed such a heinous crime) but I'm sure the surviving friends and family don't just shut their feelings off for the person they knew.

As for fans, yes, it changes things. I was a huge Chris Benoit fan, but if the details prove to be true and he murdered his son and wife in cold blood, then that changes everything. But, I can't blame the wrestlers for reacting the way they did.

 

We did. I don't know if there was much discussion about it. Probably should have been, if there wasn't.

 

The tributes, with some exceptions (Edge, Chavo) weren't overwhelmed by emotion like Eddy Guerrero's were. At first I thought it was a combination of shock (it had only been a couple of hours since they found out) and that Eddy was so overwhelmingly popular. Maybe they knew something and did what they could to pay tribute without acknowledging what was about to become public.

 

We briefed it.

 

I think when Hulk Hogan dies, it will have a far greater impact. Not just in the hearts, but the impact on the business.

 

But it's no more a sport than American Idol.

 

I may be a minority on this, and it probably isn't going to be a surprising stance given my unrepentant and long-time fandom, but I'd have no problem putting Benoit's death/murder/whatever in sports. Not because I think wrestling is a sport, but because that's where people looking for the story would expect to find it. It has a tangical relationship to sports (that's why they call it sports entertainment) that it wouldn't be completely out of place in the sports section. Certainly it can be in one that runs dog show stories, which belongs in the sports page about as much as I belong in a ballerina competition.