Hilariously Bad Interview Questions

[Taylee]

I agree with that as well. I've always said I wanted my sources to think I'm dumber than I am rather than smarter than I am. I have found you get better quotes and you can find out a whole lot more when they try to put it in simple terms for you.
Now, I'm not saying pretend you're dumb. But don't let on that you're as smart as you are either. I've caught people in lies this way a number of times.

Acting dumb is one thing; we've all done that. Asking dumb questions, which you said you do in the earlier post, makes you dumb without acting.

 

[ADifferentOkie]

I agree with that as well. I've always said I wanted my sources to think I'm dumber than I am rather than smarter than I am. I have found you get better quotes and you can find out a whole lot more when they try to put it in simple terms for you.
Now, I'm not saying pretend you're dumb. But don't let on that you're as smart as you are either. I've caught people in lies this way a number of times.

Acting dumb is one thing; we've all done that. Asking dumb questions, which you said you do in the earlier post, makes you dumb without acting.

Well, I didn't explain it very well in that post. I explained it better in another post.
And asking a dumb question doesn't make you dumb. Everyone makes mistakes from time to time.

 

[sportsgopher]

It's 2002 and the Bears had just helped New England win by calling a timeout in the last minute as the Patriots drove for the game-winning TD.

Def. Co. Greg Blache is in near meltdown with about 40 reporters standing around him in the locker room. He rants for about 30-40 seconds about how much heart the defense has and blah, blah, blah. He's in PC mode but clearly pissed off at the defense. He ends his excuse-making with "we were just in bad position," to explain the timeout.

Then he stops. No one says anything for what seems like 10 seconds but is probably only two or three, and I, thinking someone has to keep the rant going, blurt "But should you have even been in that position?"

A TV lady behind me actually gasped. Rick Morrisey looked at me like I was the anti-Christ. Peter King choked on his sandwich.

Blache's head spins around Linda Blair-like as he assimilates the ridiculous question (it's the only thing that popped into my head).

He screams, and I mean screams, "You know, maybe you ought to be some kind of big-time writer, working for a big-time magazine somewhere. But no, you work for whoever you work for.* We have to deal with what we've got," before railing on some of his DB's (R.W. McCouldn'tcoveratable being one) and then his entire defense for five or six minutes. He was so mad, he just wouldn't shut up.

It was incredible. Everyone led with the implosion. But I was so mortified by the question, which was stupid to the nth degree, I couldn't enjoy it until about a week later.

I guess sometimes bad questions get good results.

*Since I was stringing for the AP, he had no idea who I was.

 

[Bullwinkle]

R.W. McCouldn'tcoveratable

I bet a lot of Giants fans are wishing they had that one handy.

 

[sportsgopher]

R.W. McCouldn'tcoveratable

I bet a lot of Giants fans are wishing they had that one handy.

It was McQuarters that got beat on the TD, and it wasn't close. We were on the field and about 15 feet from the game-winning catch, and a sports writer buddy of mine -- a Bears fan -- seeing the pass coming with no DB in sight, yells "Where the fork is R.W." David Patten, the guy who caught the pass, hears him and is laughing as beer cups and all manner of shirt rains down from the stands.

 

[Sweetness]

It's not an interview question per se, but an assistant city editor of ours once asked a reporter what an "in-ground pool" was.

The great part was, he's one of those guys who'll pick up the office phone, call someone six-or-seven desks away and speak loudly into the receiver. He was also a pretentious deck, and maybe a dozen people heard him. I had to take a sick day to go home and change my pants.

The guy graduated from Cal fer christsakes.

 

[sgaleadfoot]

If anyone has ever heard UGA football broadcasts, their sideline guy comes up with the most off-the-wall stuff to ask. One time after a game, a loss to South Carolina, he asked Charles Grant since he was from South Georgia if he liked boiled peanuts.

 

[Write-brained]

This isn't a dumb question but a stunning remark that I heard yesterday watching local news ...

John Daly was in Columbia, SC for a celebrity golf tournament ... so he does a recorded interview with the local news and tells them he's happy to be in South Carolina and to have beaten Spurrier in a round.

They then cut back to the sports anchor who says something to the effect of Daly's already "universally hated" and it didn't do him any good to beat Spurrier in Columbia ... ummm

 

[PopeDirkBenedict]

I covered a HS boys basketball playoff game where Podunk's team was basically a big guy (who is a DI-AA starting tackle) and a bunch of outside shooters. Podunk's opponent goes into a zone to stop Bluto and the outside shooters go 1-for-25 from 3-point range -- they bricked everything in sight. So Bluto sees a tight zone all night, ball rarely gets inside to him, etc. After the game, a reporter from a tiny paper asks the coach something to the effect of "Bluto was so great this year, why did he disappear tonight?" The coach looked at the guy in disbelief.

 

[Bullwinkle]

I covered a HS boys basketball playoff game where Podunk's team was basically a big guy (who is a DI-AA starting tackle) and a bunch of outside shooters. Podunk's opponent goes into a zone to stop Bluto and the outside shooters go 1-for-25 from 3-point range -- they bricked everything in sight. So Bluto sees a tight zone all night, ball rarely gets inside to him, etc. After the game, a reporter from a tiny paper asks the coach something to the effect of "Bluto was so great this year, why did he disappear tonight?" The coach looked at the guy in disbelief.

Coach needs to realize there's other ways to beat a zone.

 

[griffin]

An aging former world champion comes back to fight in his hometown for the first time in several years. Though known for a lack of punching power, he knocks out the designated tomato can in the first round. After the bout, a reporter asks the victim about the punch that put him down: "Did it hurt?"

 

[Ike Broflovski]

An aging former world champion comes back to fight in his hometown for the first time in several years. Though known for a lack of punching power, he knocks out the designated tomato can in the first round. After the bout, a reporter asks the victim about the punch that put him down: "Did it hurt?"

You know what? I don't think that's such a stupid question.