Gainesville Columnist hits a new low

[SEC Guy]

http://www.marknagi.com/archive/2011-01/pat-dooleys-questionable-judgment

Makes fun of Beamer for burns he had as a child.

Don't drink and tweet, people.

If you're asking Pat Dooley not to drink and do something, you might as well put him in a cage. He's the biggest drinker I've met in 30 years as a sports writer and that's saying something.

 

[Ace]

I could forgive the tweet -- he obviously didn't know the story. The reply to the blog post and the request to un-follow, that is some weak shirt that his employers should have something to say about.

NO ONE DOESN'T KNOW THE STORY! Jesus, it's the story every time VT plays in a bowl game. If you're a columnist covering sports at a paper that even REMOTELY covers college football, you know the story.

I'm sorry. I watch a lot of college football, but I guess I don't watch enough Virginia Tech, because I had never heard the story until this thread. So I am holding out hope that maybe this guy didn't either. However, his later email reveals him to be a colossal ass, so maybe he did know.

I'm with LTL.

I can forgive a stupid tweet. And I think the Knoxville guy was too harsh in condemning it (if it was in a column, fine, bust his chops) but the response by Dooley really turned me off.

 

[Moderator1]

I can't buy the "didn't know the story" defense. Regardless of how it got there, the man has a scar on his neck. You're going to ridicule him for that?

Again, I don't know Dooley or his history or anything. But if I'm still an SE, I have a very serious problem with one of my guys tweeting something like that even on a personal account. You're a rep of your paper and it makes your paper look really bad.

 

[Big Circus]

Tremendous post by Moddy. As someone who also has had many dealings with Frank Beamer, it's very easy to like the guy. With Bowden gone, he's the college coach who is the absolute best with the media. His assistants stay for years. His players love him. While his teams might tend to under-achieve a bit, the Virginia Tech fans would have him forever if they could. Can anyone name any NCAA rules issues at Tech? With the exception of Michael and Marcus Vick, I don't know of a whole lot of character issues with his players. And look at the ones who make the NFL: almost to a man, they're blue-collar guys with a tremendous sense of team.

Maybe Pat didn't know the full background about Beamer's injury. Hope that's the case. But there might be a lot of fallout for him like this because of how people feel about Beamer.

Not that it's really that germane to the point of the thread, but there was a period of time when Beamer's teams had a lot of pretty scuzzy legal problems. Jim Druckenmiller, Tony Morrison, Jim Crawford and the like. And this article from 1997 on college football arrests mentions "a staggering 18 (arrests) at Virginia Tech", although it doesn't go into detail on any of them.

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/COLLEGE+FOOTBALL+CRIMINALS+%3A+VARIOUS+INCIDENTS+INVOLVING+DIVISION+I...-a083853437

Now, having said that, pay attention because I'm only going to say this once. Frank Beamer, from everything I have ever heard, is a great man. I have nothing but respect for what he's accomplished at VT, and I will raise a glass in his honor when he retires (and then several more in celebration). And it goes without saying that Pat Dooley forked up.

I'm going to go wash my hands now.

 

[Moderator1]

Circus is correct. There was a really bad period there but they put a plan in place to deal with it and it has been minimal since. Not non-existent. No one is claiming perfection here. But minimal. Marcus Vick is obvously the highest profile (Michael didn't have any issues at VT that anyone knows about) and I think if you asked Beamer, he'd agree he probably gave Marcus a bit too much rope. He'd like to have a do-over there.

 

[Big Circus]

Circus is correct. There was a really bad period there but they put a plan in place to deal with it and it has been minimal since. Not non-existent. No one is claiming perfection here. But minimal. Marcus Vick is obvously the highest profile (Michael didn't have any issues at VT that anyone knows about) and I think if you asked Beamer, he'd agree he probably gave Marcus a bit too much rope. He'd like to have a do-over there.

Yeah, that's one of the reasons I do respect Beamer so much. They've been proactive ever since then and cleaned the team up significantly. He obviously took it very seriously.

Any Michael Vick stories I've heard from his time at VT are apocryphal at best, and I'd be much more likely to file them under "urban legend".

 

[BigRed]

Also, pretty douchey move and bad "journalism" for Mark Nagi, whoever that is, to call a journalist out for an inappropriate tweet without giving them the opportunity to comment.

Um, isn't Dooley quoted in that blog? Didn't he respond to Nagi sending it to him? Wasn't that a request for comment?

Nagi posted the item before Dooley had commented. I read it yesterday and his comments weren't there.

 

[Moderator1]

By the way Circus, if another publisher picks up that biography, I'm including your tribute to him as a cover quote. It's on the record now!

I got wind of two of Marcus' dustups when I was about 60-90 minutes out of Blacksburg on my way home. The police guy we dealt with said on the second, "You need to get in the habit of calling me before you leave town." Which I did. "Can I go home now?" I'd ask.

 

[Big Circus]

By the way Circus, if another publisher picks up that biography, I'm including your tribute to him as a cover quote. It's on the record now!

I got wind of two of Marcus' dustups when I was about 60-90 minutes out of Blacksburg on my way home. The police guy we dealt with said on the second, "You need to get in the habit of calling me before you leave town." Which I did. "Can I go home now?" I'd ask.

I knew posting here would bite me in the ass. I'll probably have to turn in my degree now.

 

[Double Down]

Also, pretty douchey move and bad "journalism" for Mark Nagi, whoever that is, to call a journalist out for an inappropriate tweet without giving them the opportunity to comment.

Um, isn't Dooley quoted in that blog? Didn't he respond to Nagi sending it to him? Wasn't that a request for comment?

Nagi posted the item before Dooley had commented. I read it yesterday and his comments weren't there.

Again, as long as Pat Dooley actually wrote the tweet, I really don't care that his explanation came after-the-fact. That's how modern journalism works, like it or not. What if Dooley had deleted the tweet and accused Nagi of making it up? What would have been bullshirt was refusing to update the blog. As soon as he got a response, he updated it. And Dooley's response actually made him look worse.

He made a cruel joke. Whether he knew the story of Beamer is irrelevant to me. Does it make it any less cruel if he didn't know the story? He's still making fun of a guy with burns/scars on his face.

 

[hondo]

http://www.marknagi.com/archive/2011-01/pat-dooleys-questionable-judgment

Makes fun of Beamer for burns he had as a child.

Don't drink and tweet, people.

If you're asking Pat Dooley not to drink and do something, you might as well put him in a cage. He's the biggest drinker I've met in 30 years as a sports writer and that's saying something.

You better have some hard facts before you throw shirt like that around. Are you around every time he's in a bar or media hospy? Are you with him 365? Just because you see someone have a couple doesn't mean what you're saying.

 

[Drip]

Anyone who is saying there's an excuse for what Dooley did please stand up. No one? Thanks.

Pat has been an ass for decades. He is who he is. Generally, he's not a bad person but that asshole streak comes out at the wrong time. This was one of them.