Not since Ali unmasked Foreman in Zaire...Telander knocks out Mariotti

buckweaver

you're usually pretty on target... but you're kidding yourself if you think chicago readers give a flying flip about ozzie and the f-word... white sox fans, white sox players, ozzie, dusty baker, ken williams, cubs players and everyone else in the city are totally fascinated by mariotti's ability to rip and shred everything while hiding behind a keyboard. like it or not, that's the story. no one cares that ozzie inappropriately used a word that 80 percent of chicagoans use on a weekly, if not daily, basis. a bunch of high-brow journalists might want to focus on ozzie's use of the f-word, but the fans want to know why a guy in the hometown paper relentlessly beats up on the teams they love without ever confronting a soul. telander points out that mariotti calls everyone names. the fans are interested in this bit of media hypocrisy. there is a great deal of hatred toward the media these days because the public feels like no one polices the media. the public is quite happy that we appear to be policiing ourselves on this issue. as telander stated quite well, jay mariotti is the story.  

 

we love to say that no one is interested in reading about us.... that's a total lie and i'm beginning to wonder if we sell that myth because we don't want to be scrutinized.

thoughts?

 

A statement which, more than anything, speaks volumes about the man who wrote it.

This thread has now JTS.

 

buckweaver

two of my best friends live in chicago, guys i've known for 20 years. they've been asking me questions about mariotti's attack style for years. one is a cubs fan. the other is a bulls/bears fan. they've called me every day since this thing has happened and they're celebrating the fact that mariotti is being called to the carpet. they are not journalists. they're just longtime chicago sports fans and newspaper readers.

you guys are kidding yourself if you think joe blow average sports fan, the guys and girls who read our copy, are surprised or offended in the slightest that ozzie guillen dropped the f-word. they don't care. they care about their teams getting savaged in the newspaper much more than they care about ozzie being an idiot. they expect ozzie to be an idiot. they don't expect their hometown newspaper to savage their sports heroes with little regard for fairness.

and i'm a guy who likes to savage the home team...just do it fair.

 

My only hope on this would be that Telander gave Mariotti the heads up on what he was writing.

If I'm SE at Sun-Times, I ask Rick "You really want to publish this?"
If he says yes, it runs, and if Telander doesn't heads-up Mariotti, I do it. That might seem like preferential treatment because Mariotti's subjects don't necessarily get the heads-up, but that's life.
At the same time, I prefer those who cover the teams not become the news, but when it happens, I think it extremely hypocritical to then make them off-limits for discussion, even if it is someone in your newsroom.

If you have become part of the story, for better or for worse, an SE should not make you exempt from discussion.

 

Telander couches everything in this column... wondering if people not hitting the locker room is now merely the new way of doing things....
THAT's how Mariotti has become part of the story, as I read it.

He never says where he comes down on showing up in the clubhouse or not, does he?

Very pedestrian and overly even.

I think you are stretching things like a va....

Never mind.

 

And Mariotti only has himself to blame (or credit) for this by personally refusing to let this go publicly. Selig took action, Ken Williams is on the record as saying he's told Guillen in effect to watch his mouth, or his tenure will come to a bad end -- what the hell else does Mariotti want? Also, if Mariotti had an ounce of a sense of humor, he could have written a funny putdown of Guillen or a funny piece about why he doesn't go to the locker room, but this need to justify himself and to seek severe justice against the Sox organization is turning this story from a few days' blowup into the turgid tale that never goes away. (And, yeah, how about arranging to meet Guillen one-on-one? Avoid the locker room, yet have a chance for each person to blow up. I personally don't remember a time when there wasn't a severe blowup over something I've written, sports or otherwise, didn't result in a one-to-one meeting with the aggrieved party just to settle everybody's issues.)

Then again, it's been noted on this site that Mariotti eats this stuff up, and the S-T must be loving the attention, so onward this goes...

 

I agree with Whitlock.

The subtlety of the message is far stronger than a rant that you have to go to the locker room.

There are two kinds of commentators these days: Journalists, who go to games, talk to players and any other sources there, make themselves accountable, and generally act responsible and professional, as they were trained to do.

The others are bloggers, which can be any idiot with a computer. I interpret the insinuation to be that Mariotti is no better than your typical blogger.

I think Telander is asking the reader "What do you want to read?"

Where the reader goes - to newspapers and established reporters/commentators, or to bloggers - will answer the question.

Not to hard to decipher where Telander stands on the issue.

 

Jay's father comes to his defense, in a pretty admirable effort -- except it doesn't address the locker room business very much, if at all.

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/today/s_459533.html

 

It all depends on degree. No they don't care about certain little stuff only we care about. But this kind of story the public does eat up, and it usually will when it comes to big-name media people in their own town. Once you cross the line from journalist to public figure - which doesn't stop you from being a journalist, it just means you're a well-known journalist - then stories like this become interesting to readers. Maybe not all the readers, but then again not every reader is interested in the Bulls, and not everybody is interested in the White Sox.

I do roll my eyes when people in our profession say no one is interested in reading about us. But I do disagree with Whitlock in that we're selling the myth because we don't want to be scrutinized. I think that's believing the worst, and that's not fair. Rather I would guess it's because it makes some people feel good about themselves, like they're "above it all" and really in tune with the public. When in fact they're not, at least not on every media issue.

 

The 'we are not the story' doctrine is absurd if you try to apply it to an opinionated columnist. By definition, if it's your opinion, you are an element of the story.

But in degrees.

Does anyone care if an angry owner takes your name off the parking list? No. A player blows off his interview with you? No. You have jetlag and hemorrhoids from too many road trips and bad airline food? No, no, no. Shut up, you are not the story.

But when you're publicly atatcked in print by a player/manager/owner/etc, you are absolutely the story, and the public eats it up. Columnists are local celebrities, especially when they're on TV--Jay is probably more recognizeable than most of the Sox players--and everyone loves a good celebrity cage match.

 

As to whether Mariotti was given a heads-up regarding Telander's column --

Anyone else notice that for some reason Mariotti opined about MJ's new ownership role with the Bobcats?

Was this a one-day reprieve before Jackoff Jay returns with another whiny column?