Does anybody proofread "ESPN news services" copy anymore?

I've noticed in the past several days that almost any story appearing on ESPN not written by one of their guys, which usually includes stories with the "ESPN news services" byline, has had some grotesque, glaring grammar error hanging around inside of it.

I understand errors happen, sure. But you'd almost think nobody reads this stuff first.

Consider the story about Jim Kelly saying he's positive the Bills won't leave Buffalo:

Or consider this quote on Chris Simon's suspension attributed to NHL vice president Colin Campbell:

Perhaps Campbell was trying too hard to make himself look honorable and powerful that he completely butchered the sentence, but it's no excuse to spell "vulnerable" incorrectly.

They're hiring all these writers, perhaps they need to look for editors as well.

 

An old, old, old story.

Immediacy trumps precision of presentation, online, even for them.

 

At the big sites, two things to remember: 1) Wire copy indeed often gets processed quickly and B) unlike newspapers, which don't use a 10th of all the copy that AP moves in a day, and therefore have to either reject things or edit everything down to fit -- which just naturally means better editing -- the big sites are 24/7, they run way, way more than 50 percent of the copy AP moves (including all the minor stuff like alpine skiing or whatever), and those editors are also dealing with all of the proprietary copy (which naturally gets closer attention) plus all of the display type. So yes, you're going to get typos. I could click around my site right now and find several in a few minutes.

A study a few years back found that an average full page -- six columns of editorial matter -- in an average paper contained something like eight errors.

I'm not defending typos, but with finite desks, a 24-hour news cycle and an effort to get things up quickly, they're simply going to happen. People come to sports websites for the latest news, they don't want a breaking AP story to get 20 minutes of care, they want it now.

We try to make as few such errors as possible, and we fix 'em when we find 'em, and that's pretty much the best anybody can do in this situation. So nitpicking typos on any site, including mine or the evil ESPN, is kind of silly, to be honest.

 

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/news/story?id=3245936

A source told #SPN.com that there is an air of uncertainty on the staff regarding Sampson's status and whether he'll finish out the season.

Andy Katz prefers the shift key rather than using caps lock.

 

I always liked E$PN, myself.

 

Geez, glad I'm seeing what I'm seeing. Thought this tired old argument was starting again.

 

No, SF ... your post was spot-on.

But, seriously, this one is sort of bad. The "#" sign in the company's name? Really?

 

They're probably too busy watching Chris Berman having meltdowns off the air.

 

. . . and waiting for the next YouTube posting.

 

Yeah, I have to admit, a typo in your own four-letter name isn't the best.

 

ESPN almost invariably ADDS mistakes when it tries to re-write perfectly good wire stories. It's annoying.