Oklahoma State coach Gundy blasts Oklahoman columnist

I don't buy for one minute that Reid's mom was spoon feeding the kid or playing the airplane game with him.

My guess is he was in a hurry and his mom tried to give him something to eat before he left, which isn't exactly an unusual scene after a college football game. He either took it and ate it, or ate it out or her hand because he was lugging two tons of shit to the bus and his hands were full.

Ever seen college football players getting on a bus after a road game? Even if they aren't carrying their bags they've go a backpack, IPod/discman/dvd player, a cellphone and who knows what else with them for the ride/flight home.

She either did a shitty job of explaining what she saw or intentionally wrote it the way she did to paint the kid in the worst light possible. I'll assume it's the former but I wouldn't be surprised if it was the latter.

 

Good link, gingerbread. I liked that column. Yes, I think it's hard to look at that video and not see the male-female dynamic playing a factor there.

 

Do you know that as an absolute fact, or are you speculating?

Carlson may indeed have bonafide sources, and I believe they're probably within the coaching ranks. But she inadequately attributed whatever information she had, possibly to shield sources or possibly because she was lazy that day, and had an editor or two who also failed to do their jobs.

As for her followup column being "defiant," she's supposed to back down or scale back? If she's right, if her bosses believe she's right and say "we stand by her," then she has no reason to not have that tone. Gundy has yet to identify what he said was three-fourths false and that was what she asked, among other things.

 

That's what I'd like to focus on, too -- the learning part.

A side issue that Gingerbread touches on, and something that really puzzles me, is the editor or editors' role in all of this. If I'd read that column before it was to run, and I'd like to think editors here would tend to agree, there's no way in hell that runs. It wasn't ready.

It's not the contention of the column that bothered me -- maybe Reid is a brat. As I've said before, the reporting was horrendously shoddy, and the column was extremely poorly written. As I wrote about 15 pages earlier, she should have gotten Gundy on the phone -- or even Reid -- to talk to her. This seems to be a topic you just have to nail.

I'm wondering if part of Gundy's volatile (and, yes, juvenile) reaction was because of the chicken anecdote. I like hard-edged writing and reporting as much as anyone, but it looked like a cheap shot. Then she grandstanded on top of that with the folo column that, as Shotglass just said, didn't exactly explain anything.

I know the Oklahoman has a poor reputation nationally, but they look like real clueless goobers to me. Instead of trying to take a higher road than Gundy -- which wouldn't have been too hard -- they keep dragging this whole thing out, trying to find follow-up stories in something that I still can't even tell was a story in the first place.

Remember, the column appeared before Gundy's (immature) overreaction.

(And, by the way, Gingerbread, her name is Slezak, not Sleaze!)

 

Agree, there's no way you make the 'childless' remark to a man...but I really don't believe this was about the writer being female. If a man had written it, Gundy still would have slung the shit, with a different shovel. The rage would have been the same.

 

If you had read the column, you would have known that his mother was feeding him chicken fingers while he was talking on his cell phone. So I guess anyone who can't feed himself while talking on a cell phone can't exactly multi-task like my 17-year-old daughter, who can talk on the cell phone, IM multiple times on her computer, do her nails and eat a hot pocket at the time same.

 

My first thought after reading the column -- besides she shouldn't have touched the chicken thing -- was that her beat reporter fed her that information. A coach or athletic official is a "source." An "insider' is a media person.

 

The original column only says "chicken."

 

The fixation on the chicken is absurd.

Unless any of us saw it happen, it's impossible to characterize the scene...and the writer really didn't paint a very clear picture. Surely there are other details about this kid/adult's life that speak for his character.

 

Stupid spell check error on my part with regard to Carol's name. I have great respect for her and it wasn't intentional. Sorry!

The male-female dynamic is interesting, though I do think, just from watching Gundy, that he would have ripped a male columnist, too. But I doubt he'd question whether the male was a parent. Just a hunch, don't know him or his reputation at all.

 

Where is this apology by Gundy? I can't find it any where on the net or even a story about it.

 

Nowhere in her column does it say "chicken fingers". It says only "chicken."