Newsday sports: Don't worry, be happy

OUCH!!!!!

 

I'm still waiting to see some the details of this "awful" policy so I can take an objective position. The Observer writer apparently wants you to take his word for it.

 

I suspect this is the kind of policy that is real but would never be put in writing for obvious reasons. Big bosses don't want anyone criticizing their team, but they also don't want the memo showing up here and elsewhere on the Internet.

 

Surprised no one's mentioned (besides the fact that this is a Dan Snyder wet dream) this . . . but the edict run through the SE is largely translatable to: "Just go ahead and bore the readership to death." The salvation of
sports writing is the loose rein. Not talking about Confidential-level
slander, of course, but the expression of jocular opinion. RIP.

 

I too think it's a little harsh to fault someone for staying on in the job. I personally know at least a half-dozen people who hate what they are doing and the people they work for, but they can't leave because they have a family member with a serious medical condition and the coverage could be put at risk if they switch policies with a pre-existing condition. Try to understand someone else's spot; are they mid-50s with a kid who just started college, knowing they'll never get a job that pays anywhere near this one? Someone with a bad mortgage, child-support payments etc.? So many variables. If it's between getting an operation covered and being able to rip Hal Steinbrenner with impunity, I'm pretty sure which way I'd lean.

It's great that Wallace has been successful enough that he can tell his bosses to take this job and shove it. But for 95 percent of the industry -- hell, 95 percent of the country right now -- it's a fantasy.

 

Note that Wally said that AFTER he got the job, not before.

 

Where was the poster harsh on those who stay? He simply saluted Matthews for walking and taking the stand you would want journalists to strive for in this situation. (The situation, by the way, was described in some detail in that story -- when you can't call Bill Parcells "surly" in a column that should give you an idea of what's going on.)

I'm not trying to blast anyone at Newsday for staying if they need to feed their family, but I need a job pretty desperately and I won't apply there. I don't think the harshness should be directed at those who are scared in an uncertain time, but it should be flung hard and fast at the folks in charge who are putting their employees in the position of losing all their credibility as journalists.

And while the question wasn't directed to me, I'll field it anyway -- hell yes, I'd walk more quickly over an issue of journalistic integrity than one of getting screwed with overtime. So would most journalists I've worked with in my career, because we sure as hell didn't get into this crap biz for the money.

It once was a service field, where you knew you were trying to provide readers with truth while checking those in power. To see the reaction here on a journalism board about a completely unacceptable policy of a major newspaper is just one more sign of how bad things are. I know a lot of us are financially and emotionally crippled by this business and economy but it shouldn't crush outrage at such a severe breach of integrity. There's been little of that here vs. defending a paycheck at any cost or wondering about an individual's motives or whatever else.

I don't get that. There's lots of things people can do for a paycheck and many are not considered ethical. Why the focus is on defending those who need a job vs. calling out the people making them prostitute their principles is beyond me.

 

Note to Boom: Henry Hecht wrote one of the great all-time ledes at the NY Post. Think it was World Series, could have been NLCS. If I recall properly: "It's October and the Phillies stink and what else is new?" Newsday version: "It's October, a lovely month. The Phillies are just a little bit less good than one might hope but that's not entirely unexpected." Punchy. To the point. Cancel my subscription.

 

Heh. Nice.

 

My vote for best Post lede, all-time, goes to Tom Keegan, circa September 1999:

"If Bobby Valentine knew how heartbreaking baseball could be, he never would have invented it in the first place."

That probably wouldn't have made the cut at Newsday, either.

 

Couldn't he have written a story about how hard the Phillies tried?

 

I'm not backing up Newsday here but we still haven't been provided a very clear understanding of what this new policy entailed, so I don't know how we can make these kind of judgments about it.

If there was a decision made to create a clearer distinction between Newsday and the other NYC tabloids, I'd probably applaud the decision. Frankly, I'm OK with avoiding "loaded words" and "name-calling." And speaking of loaded words, what exactly does "softer tone" mean?

Maybe the editors at Newsday are just trying to avoid some of the anger and vitriol that too often substitutes for news on cable television and the Web? I'd like to hear both sides of the argument.