SB Nation pulls Daniel Holtzclaw longform piece

He's a peach. I don't wish ill will on anyone (much), but if anyone ever constructs a Mt.Rushmore to Sports Comeuppance, he's in pride of place where Lincoln resides. What a fraud, the worst kind of no-talent hack who triangulated his game till he was denuded. He lives with it, ce la vie.

 

Yeah, I don't hate or wish ill will on anyone either, but I firmly believe karma is a bitch. Never met the guy but haven't heard/read a lot of positives.

 

Stout posted another back-patting post in the Facebook group about how great his new book is. So tone deaf.

"Nothing but good reviews for my latest book, The Selling of the Babe. Please SHARE if you can:"

 

No disrespect to Stout, but I'm a diehard Red Sox fan and I find little interest in reading another tale about how the Sox sold Babe Ruth almost 100 years ago so the owner could finance "No, No, Nanette." Maybe it mines undiscovered tidbits or adds some fresh new angle, but it's a steep hill to climb to drum up interest. His Fenway 1912 book was abandoned after 20 pages bc, again, it seemed like I was reading a pastiche of previously released materials

 

Maybe not my proudest moment, but this guy disparaged everyone else's talent (including, most infamously, one of the best baseball writers ever), so I don't feel too bad about giving him a taste of it.

 

He's supposed to post bad reviews?

Or he isn't supposed to promote his book?

The SB Nation criticism is totally justified, but you're being crazy if you think he should just shut it all down for the rest of his life because of it.

 

He should probably come out and confirm every bad thing ever said about him, especially on journalism message board. That's the ticket!

 

Every person who has ever written a book -- with the possible exception of Salinger -- mentions the positive reviews their book has gotten. Part of it's ego, part of it's validation, part of it is promotion and trying to generate sales because more sales help with future books. Novelists, nonfiction, whatever. It's very weird to criticize Stout for daring to do the same.

Yeah, he was fired and SB Nation Longform had plenty of terrible stories. But it is worth noting again it wasn't because of any classic journalism sins -- plagiarism, fabulism, etc. This goes back to an early post I made on this thread -- there's nothing wrong with writing or running a story on a convicted rapist that raises questions about the verdict. Hundreds of those types of stories have played a role in eventually exonerating wrongly convicted people. This particular story, though, had a ton of other flaws and the dismissal was probably warranted for various reasons. But no reason it should be career ending when it comes to his own writing. The continued editing of BASW, however, is something that is relevant.

 

It's not weird at all. He's tone-deaf and arrogant. We're just pointing that out.

And again, it's amusingly ironic he has no regard in his role as ARBITER OF LONGFORM for the grunts who do the day-to-day chronicling when his entire book career is built off relying on the decades-old work of newspaper writers.

 

LTL, after what happened, I might want to spend some time under a rock. That's all. Instead, he sounds like he's taking a victory lap. I'm not expecting him to post bad reviews. But after you've helped end one writer's career and caused the implosion of an outlet for other writers' stories, it's unseemly to be out promoting how wonderful your book is.

 

His book came out. If he doesn't promote it, it doesn't sell.

I don't understand these last few pages. But it has been a good reminder of the lack of business sense common in journalism.

 

Totally agree on the book thing. He needs to promote it. On the freelance soliciting? Still tone deaf.