Murray Chass on Piazza's backne

http://www.murraychass.com/?p=555

I don't want to spoil the point about ProActiv, but it's the most bizarre expectation of a defense I've ever seen from (even) a (former) professional print journalist.

 

Holy crap.

 

As far as I know, Chass hasn't worked for the Times for quite some time. Could have written the acne story at any point following his departure.

But he's finding fault with Joel Sherman for actually writing about Piazza and steroids, and NOT mentioning acne??

 

A paper like the Times is not going to downplay news because the baseball editor is a "big Mets fan." That's silly when said in space; when said by a working writer, it reeks of purposeful ignorance.

 

This sounds like a guy who might have casually noticed something, decided not to write because he didn't think it was important, then got pissed when someone else did.

 

Wait a minute...the Times is conservative?

Someone better alert the idiot fringe.

 

what, exactly, is murray's gripe here? joel mentioned the acne and let us connect the dots -- no pun intended.

good for joel to raise the issue that murray claim he was unable to do. seems to me joel deserved that email from bitter ol' murray regardless.

or am i missing something else here? ??? ??? ???

peraps if casty stumbles upon this matter he can shed some light, considering he, too, pent many day looking at piazza's backne.

 

Anyone read the 'About' part of that site? What makes his site any different from a blog? That he says it's not and that he hates blogs?

 

I'm pretty sure Casty was gone from the Mets beat before Piazza hit town.


And I have been saying for years no big name player in a major market got a bigger pass on steroid use than Piazza.

 

Basically, yeah.

 

pull shit out of the clear blue sky often?

 

I enjoyed Joel Sherman's piece, thought he did a fine job of again asking Piazza the right questions and describing to the readers what Piazza looked like back in the day.

I'm not sure what more any of us could have done to report the story when Piazza was with the Mets. I guarantee you we all asked him, on and off the record, if he was doing steroids. We asked him for years, and I know because I was there, and I asked and I heard others ask (including Joel and Murray), and there were plenty of moments where Piazza would huddle alone with a reporter, and you could be pretty sure that is what they were talking about. Mike had a bizarre way of talking around it, like he did with many subjects.
As noted before, we didn't have subpoenas, and guys weren't shooting up in front of us. What were we to do, write "Piazza, who went 2-for-4 with a walk last night, took his shirt off after the game, revealing a gross back ..."
Yes, we all saw it. And there were plenty of columns and takeout features about Piazza that broached the subject of steroids. We asked the questions, wrote his denials, asked more questions. Ten years later, that's what people are still doing.
If he was using PEDs, it'll only be revealed when his supplier comes forward.