Posnanski and the Paterno book

Where has anyone asked that the book be "lavished with praise?"

 

The author will be on Costas on Wednesday night.
http://www.awfulannouncing.com/2012-articles/august/bob-costas-gets-joe-posnanski-interview-for-costas-tonight.html

 

One thing I find to be an enormous hole in the reporting/narrative is the lack of context given for a lot of the "Great Experiment" assertions. To Posnanski's credit, he acknowledges that Paterno's reputation as all that was right with college football might have been overblown - and quotes biographies from the '70s that make his own seem like a Kitty Kelly tome. But there is very little about the overall culture of college football during the various eras covered, just an implied request from the author to trust him that it was putrid, but that Penn State was different. I think there's one quote from Bear Bryant that I've run into so far about how the players were actually athletes first, students second. But other than that, very little about what Penn State was actually up against, other than generalities.

*(In fairness, I haven't gotten to the Fiesta Bowl yet, but Miami wasn't cheating at that point. The Pell Grant stuff came later, and Johnson actually graduated a lot of his players. They just show boated and wore fatigues. The horror.)

 

Did Whitlock and Posnanski have a frosty relationship in KC? They will now.

http://msn.foxsports.com/collegefootball/story/joe-paterno-book-joe-posnanski-more-about-author-ego-than-football-coach-offers-little-insight-082612

A mere 26 pages in and the “journalist” who reportedly had unprecedented access to Paterno, the coach’s family, confidants and football program is reduced to retelling a story spoken by a female football intern at a Paterno memorial service recalling the coach walking into his office, catching her eyes and remarking: “It’s cold out there, heh?”

“He was a legend,” Kait Sawyer is quoted in the book. “And he was talking to me.”

That was the book’s first glimpse into Paterno’s soul. JoePa, an old man, made small talk with a young woman. Imagine that.

As I noted a few posts back, I thought that was a pretty poor inclusion by Posnanski, as well.

Personally, I'm into the Sandusky stuff now. The theme is that Paterno hated Sandusky for a long time, largely because he thought his work ethic wavered. He does give some fairly convincing tea leaves that this was the case, so I don't think it's completely revisionist history by the Paternos. But it's a tough spot for Posnanski because even if it was 100 percent the case, you now come off looking like a family mouthpiece now, because obviously the less relationship that Paterno had with the guy, the better.

 

"A fascinating biography."

http://www.cleveland.com/books/index.ssf/2012/08/joe_posnanski_squares_up_to_pa.html

Beyond his molding of young men, Paterno led a rich, interesting interior life that Posnanski captures here. ... "Paterno" is a testament to Posnanski's access, empathy and perceptiveness about a man embraced for decades as a paragon of virtue, then pushed away as a disgrace. Even as the new Penn State administrators ordered a 7-foot-tall statue of Paterno removed from campus last month, Posnanski has constructed a lasting, more nuanced portrait.

 

And, finally, the most "WTF!?" review of the day.

As for the rest of the bio, the material not related to the Sandusky scandal and its fallout, covering the first 84 years, not the final couple of months, of Paterno’s life: I can’t speak to that part, because I haven’t read it yet. And I’m not sure I will any time soon.

Read more: http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2012/08/23/bad-timing-sizing-up-the-joe-paterno-book/#ixzz24klChD3p

 

Totally bush move (surprise!) for Fox to run that without disclosing a) that Whitlock and Posnanski once worked together and b) Whitlock has long had it in for Posnanski, because Whitlock is a soulless carny who couldn't carry Posnanski's typewriter ribbon.

 

I keep forgetting that Fox Sports and Fox News are the same entity.

 

I meant that they employ Whitlock in the first place and let him get away with awful shit again and again—see his Super Bowl column, written by a four-year-old with crayons—but float whatever boat you'd like.

 

Just as it's been said that people here shouldn't judge the book based on their previous knowledge of Posnanski, I ignored the byline here and put stock in the words.

Can't usually finish his work, and never seek it out, but this particular piece by Whitlock read like one of the more measured takes on the book.

Both the positive and negative have been more than a bit too overheated for my taste.

 

Calling Posnanski a "journalist?" Yep. Measured.

 

I give up. The trolls have won.