ESPN and the Sandusky sex case

Well, I can tell you that I can count on one hand the times there has been overt corporate influence on the editorial process at my place because of the broadcast component, and have a finger or two left over.

 

The question was raised about the journalistic standards brought to bear by a sports broadcast "partner."

NBC News leads with something? Fine. CBS News? Sure.

Let's see NBC Sports do the same. Or CBS Sports.

ESPN takes it on the chin here for coverage that is no better or worse or more or less pointed than the Sports divisions of any other network.

 

That would be a apples-to-apples comparison if ESPN had a separate, non-sports news department that was covering the shit out of this story. Or if there was no NBC news or CBS news, and the NBC sports and CBS sports departments were giving this nothing more than cursory AP treatment to the story.

But none of that is true, and as ESPN likes to trumpet itself as THE authority when it comes to covering sports and sports stories on one hand, on the other hand they don't seem real eager to jump into this story or devote much to it in the way of resources.

Some veiled conspiracy? Probably not. But it doesn't make ESPN look like the "leader" in much of anything.

 

I appreciate your thoughts about your site's internal debates, but there have just been too many cases where ESPN has been caught fudging or ignoring news because of its business interests to think it isn't happening here.

 

I certainly can't deny it's true. I just don't know that it is in this case -- or isn't.

 

Comparing TV sports operations to TV sports operations is apples to apples.

Here's the relevant headline right now on the font page of cbs sports dot com:

PSU bars Sandusky, will pay officials' legal fees

What are they covering up?

 

Not when ESPN doesn't have a news operation, as well, to handle the heavy lifting on stories like this. All ESPN has to cover is sports, and at least for now, is refusing to put much effort or resources into covering this story. I don't even think that's arguable.

Instead of adding other networks into the equation, focus on ESPN and the original question: Is ESPN, which takes pride in and proclaims itself as the authority when it comes to covering sports, giving this story the play and the attention it deserves, given the serious nature of the accusations, the Joe Pa factor, the high-level school officials being charged, etc.?

If you have to answer that question by saying, "But what about NBC and CBS?", then that answer speaks volumes.

 

What percentage of ESPN commercials feature athletes and coaches they allegedly cover? And could the tone of those ads be any more hero worshippy?
It's really difficult to take anything they do seriously.

 

It's on their front page.

Is their headline insufficient?

 

They have an ombudsman. They do enterprise and investigative stories. They have a station called ESPNews. They have a magazine that purports to compete with Sports Illustrated. They do things like bar reporters from co-authoring books in order to enforce journalistic ethics.

Why shouldn't we hold them to some standards?

 

What other entity - news or sports - has advanced the story from where it was yesterday morning?