Jay Mariotti resigns

The same thing has happened in Denver, NYC and Tampa/St. Pete.

 

Great. Is there still something you're not understanding? I'll try again.

Cooke supported Mariotti. Cooke was ambushed by the Trib with the news of Mariotti's departure. Cooke no longer likes Mariotti.

 

Because like many of us, he was raised on newspapers and loved the rush of making deadline, of seeing people pick up the paper the next day, of connecting with a city through the paper.
Whatever you think of Jay, I know he loved newspapers and cared about having a voice through them. The love died, I guess.

 

I don't know, slim. I think if you walked up to 10 people on the street in Chicago and asked them to name a Chicago sportswriter, 7 or 8 would respond with Mariotti.

After Lincicome and Verdi left, he was the one with the most presence.

 

The love didn't die, ginger. From what I've heard, Deadspin's take was accurate. He wasn't allowed to write about Barack Obama's Cubs comment; instead, Telander wrote about it. Mariotti quit.

 

Sorry, I'll side with the Trib on this one.
Marriotti tries to be a martyr, oh, I'm just jumping off the ship before it sinks.
No, how about before someone stabs your and throws your body overboard because you're not happy unless you are causing trouble. Why should the Trib pretend a beloved member of the family is leaving?
He wasn't well liked - and it would have been an insult to everyone for them to pretend he was.

 

Funny how that love just so happened to die once he quit.

I just don't like people taking shots as they walk out the door.

 

Fair enough. Maybe the love died a long time ago and, as Cooke noted, every time Jay tried to get a divorce, he was talked out of it. Finally the S-T agreed it was time to part, obviously not amicably.
But I've covered many, many events with Jay, and have had several conversations with him about newspapers over the years (dating back to the day when he and another Chicago writer convinced me I should look into getting an internet email address, because it was the wave of the future; yeah, days before the interwebs really existed). And I have no doubt he cared about newspapers for most of his time in the biz.

 

Agree completely.

 

You gots pictures of yer kicks?

 

neither do i. i don't think mariotti's comments, presuming they were legit, were shots -- they were honest.

now cooke, he took some nice-sized shots. moddy, we'll have to agree to disagree here; i think it's out of line for a supervisor to kick a guy in the nuts on the way out, no matter how much you despise the departed.

 

My boys in Chicago never agreed with or liked Mariotti's columns, when they happened to read them. But they rarely were even aware of Lincicome. I think Bernie appealed to a lot of us in the biz -- and maybe to some with higher IQs than my boys, probably north suburbs types -- but he never, ever was seen as a "Chicago" shot-and-a-beer sports columnist. Not really.

As for Cooke, didn't he offer up the big contract extension to Jay? Didn't he permit Jay to rip co-workers in print but then spike Telander's column when he tried to do the same? You might say Cooke got, and felt, burned by learning this news this way. But he showed himself to be a real duplicitous SOB by how quickly he turned. All those times he should have cracked down on Mariotti for legitimate, job-related reasons, but now he goes after him just because he felt left out of the news loop? Sounds like a lightweight piss ant.