Does Rubin have a problem?

[Guy_Incognito]

The New York media in general, not just Rubin, has a credibility problem. They have helped brainwash much of American into believing that Joba Chamberlain and Phil Hughes are the greatest pitching prospects in the history of the world. This has been going on for three years, stories of how great their potential is. I suppose we'll still be hearing this when they are both on the high side of 30. It really does get tiresome.

This is silly. You make it sound like the Pulsipher-Izzy-wilson days. Hughes was a top-ranked prospect by all of the national outlets (Baseball America, BP etc.), and joba's star grew when he was a brilliant, unhittable reliever on the major league level. The media had nothing to do with this.

All I know is I keep hearing about and reading about these nearly-untradeable great talents tha Yanks have in Hughes and Joba, and this has been going on forever. There are probably 15 or so pitchers around MLB in the same stage of their careers and similar age every bit as good as Joba the Hut and Hughes, i.e. Drabek with the Phillies, but few people know about them because NY media isn't drooling all over them.

No one says it anymore, they're major leaguers now. Nobody knows about Drabek? Bucholz? joba is different, he earned his rep on the major league level. He was the story in Yankee games, they have to cover it. Hughes was the #1 prospect in baseball, and came up in trade rumors every year, the way Drabek is now.

 

[outofplace]

The New York media in general, not just Rubin, has a credibility problem. They have helped brainwash much of American into believing that Joba Chamberlain and Phil Hughes are the greatest pitching prospects in the history of the world. This has been going on for three years, stories of how great their potential is. I suppose we'll still be hearing this when they are both on the high side of 30. It really does get tiresome.

This is silly. You make it sound like the Pulsipher-Izzy-wilson days. Hughes was a top-ranked prospect by all of the national outlets (Baseball America, BP etc.), and joba's star grew when he was a brilliant, unhittable reliever on the major league level. The media had nothing to do with this.

All I know is I keep hearing about and reading about these nearly-untradeable great talents tha Yanks have in Hughes and Joba, and this has been going on forever. There are probably 15 or so pitchers around MLB in the same stage of their careers and similar age every bit as good as Joba the Hut and Hughes, i.e. Drabek with the Phillies, but few people know about them because NY media isn't drooling all over them.

No one says it anymore, they're major leaguers now. Nobody knows about Drabek? Bucholz? joba is different, he earned his rep on the major league level. He was the story in Yankee games, they have to cover it. Hughes was the #1 prospect in baseball, and came up in trade rumors every year, the way Drabek is now.

I think the truth is somewhere in the middle here. Chamberlain drew a ridiculous amount of hype as a rookie. I don't think it's as bad as clutchcargo makes it out to be, but Chamberlain and Hughes did get more hype because they were coming up with the Yankees.

 

[JC]

The New York media in general, not just Rubin, has a credibility problem. They have helped brainwash much of American into believing that Joba Chamberlain and Phil Hughes are the greatest pitching prospects in the history of the world. This has been going on for three years, stories of how great their potential is. I suppose we'll still be hearing this when they are both on the high side of 30. It really does get tiresome.

This is silly. You make it sound like the Pulsipher-Izzy-wilson days. Hughes was a top-ranked prospect by all of the national outlets (Baseball America, BP etc.), and joba's star grew when he was a brilliant, unhittable reliever on the major league level. The media had nothing to do with this.

All I know is I keep hearing about and reading about these nearly-untradeable great talents tha Yanks have in Hughes and Joba, and this has been going on forever. There are probably 15 or so pitchers around MLB in the same stage of their careers and similar age every bit as good as Joba the Hut and Hughes, i.e. Drabek with the Phillies, but few people know about them because NY media isn't drooling all over them.

So the New York media is talking about New York prospects, that does seem odd doesn't it.

Do you think that maybe the reason their prospects are talked about a lot is that the Yankees are always in contention and come trade deadline they are always rumoured to be looking to add help which means trading top prospects? So naturally those prospects names get thrown around.

How many other teams are always in contetnion? I know I have heard a lot about the Phillies and Dodger prospect in the last couple years. We have also heard about all the Red Sox prospects over the last 6 or 7 years.

 

[ServeItUp]

Here's a related question: Is there anything unprofessional or inappropriate about a beat writer asking one of the owners for advice on how to get a front office job?

I don't know what the timeline was but Chris Snow considered Doug Risebrough a confidante; The Jones' story in Esquire February 2007 said he and Risebrough would have long off-the-record conversations about hockey philosophies and such, but I figure you do that every now and then on a pro beat, right? When Snow had offers from ESPN and Yahoo Sports on the table, he called Risebrough to ask some advice, and that's when Risebrough offered him the player personnel gig with the Wild.

Now, I don't know if their conversations ever edged into the alleged Rubin territory ("Hey," Riser says, "You'd make a good executive someday"), but it was clear Snow and Risebrough were friends beyond their professional association when Snow covered the Wild for the Star-Trib. Anything wrong with that?

 

[Hudson_Hawk]

So, how does he cover the Mets now?

Rubin goes to work today just as he did yesterday and the day before. Sure, the atmosphere will be different and Minaya isn't going to be warm to him, but Rubin needs to do the job the way he did before -- minus soliciting career advice.

If the entire organization treats him unfairly, it will reflect poorly on them, not him and blow up even more in its face.

BTW, Daily News also had transcript of SNY's intro to Monday's game where Gary Cohen, Keith Hernandez and Ron Darling (all of whom work for the Mets) showed their disdain for what Omar did and all went to Rubin's defense.

http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/baseball/mets/2009/07/28/2009-07-28_sny_voices.html

 

[Smasher_Sloan]

Murray Chass says Rubin is guilty of a confict of interest:

http://www.murraychass.com/?p=876

 

[Johnny Dangerously]

Everyone on the job has a multitude of conflicts -- and conflicts of interest -- almost daily. They do not usually compromise the ability to do one's job fairly, and granted, they are typically minor, almost minuscule conflicts. But we are human beings, and if you follow Murray Chass' deeper thinking about this situation, and you go as deep into that line of thought as you can, you will inevitably come up against the first sentence of my post.

In this case, I have yet to see evidence Adam was unable to do his job fairly and accurately. I am open-minded enough to be proven wrong, but this piece by Chass didn't do that for me. He used a lot of paragraphs to say what one graf could have said, and the extra words didn't persuade me.

 

[buckweaver]

Murray Chass says Rubin is guilty of a confict of interest:

http://www.murraychass.com/?p=876

He sure seems to be taking every word from Minaya as gospel on this one. Seems to me Omar's got a credibility problem, too, so I don't know why Chass would be that one-sided on this one. There's got to be more to it.

 

[Joe Williams]

Now, I don't know if their conversations ever edged into the alleged Rubin territory ("Hey," Riser says, "You'd make a good executive someday"), but it was clear Snow and Risebrough were friends beyond their professional association when Snow covered the Wild for the Star-Trib. Anything wrong with that?

If the parties at the newspaper -- the reporter, the editors, the reporters' colleagues -- expect to be taken seriously as journalists, then the answer is yes. There is something wrong with that.

The more schmoozing that goes on, edging into "friendship", the less credible a reporter becomes. Whether it's around a ballpark, a rink or Washington cocktail parties. You want to trade objectivity and detachment for access and inside info, that's a challenging call to make. But when you start to stir your career ambitions, hopes and dreams into the mix, then you clearly are over the line, however blurry it is to start.

This is the reason that, for decades, journalists who "crossed over" to PR-type jobs seldom were given an opportunity to cross back. It's the biggest reason, for me, that former players and former coaches who go back and forth from teams to network analysts have puny credibility -- they're almost always filtering things they say so as not to offend that next employer. Even the thought by a viewer/listener that they might be filtering undercuts their effectiveness.

 

[BB Bobcat]

What if a writer has talked to one of the people he covers about doing a book? That's a conflict if interest, but it happens all the time.

 

[broadway joe]

That was a pretty good job by Chass. He actually reported it, talking to Rubin and others, instead of just pontificating as so many others do. The quote from Rubin "they may dig up an e-mail," suggests that this was more than just a couple of casual conversations he had, which is how he originally tried to portray it. I can't say I disagree with anything Chass wrote.

 

[KP]

The New York media in general, not just Rubin, has a credibility problem. They have helped brainwash much of American into believing that Joba Chamberlain and Phil Hughes are the greatest pitching prospects in the history of the world. This has been going on for three years, stories of how great their potential is. I suppose we'll still be hearing this when they are both on the high side of 30. It really does get tiresome.

This is silly. You make it sound like the Pulsipher-Izzy-wilson days. Hughes was a top-ranked prospect by all of the national outlets (Baseball America, BP etc.), and joba's star grew when he was a brilliant, unhittable reliever on the major league level. The media had nothing to do with this.

All I know is I keep hearing about and reading about these nearly-untradeable great talents tha Yanks have in Hughes and Joba, and this has been going on forever. There are probably 15 or so pitchers around MLB in the same stage of their careers and similar age every bit as good as Joba the Hut and Hughes, i.e. Drabek with the Phillies, but few people know about them because NY media isn't drooling all over them.

No one says it anymore, they're major leaguers now. Nobody knows about Drabek? Bucholz? joba is different, he earned his rep on the major league level. He was the story in Yankee games, they have to cover it. Hughes was the #1 prospect in baseball, and came up in trade rumors every year, the way Drabek is now.

I think the truth is somewhere in the middle here. Chamberlain drew a ridiculous amount of hype as a rookie. I don't think it's as bad as clutchcargo makes it out to be, but Chamberlain and Hughes did get more hype because they were coming up with the Yankees.

K-Rod got the same kind of attention Joba got, of course it helps if you are making a significant impact down the stretch and help the team make the postseason.

 

[Johnny Dangerously]

Murray Chass says Rubin is guilty of a confict of interest:

http://www.murraychass.com/?p=876

He sure seems to be taking every word from Minaya as gospel on this one. Seems to me Omar's got a credibility problem, too, so I don't know why Chass would be that one-sided on this one.

Bingo.

 

[mcgovern72]

The apologies thus far have focused on "the forum" in which Minaya leveled his charges against Rubin.

The question is: was Minaya telling the truth when he said that Rubin had lobbied him personally for a job (as well as others), or was he lying?

If it's true, Minaya owes no apology and Rubin has a very serious problem.
If it's false, Minaya should be sued for slander.

(I haven't noticed The Daily News demanding a retraction.)

 

[broadway joe]

Murray Chass says Rubin is guilty of a confict of interest:

http://www.murraychass.com/?p=876

He sure seems to be taking every word from Minaya as gospel on this one. Seems to me Omar's got a credibility problem, too, so I don't know why Chass would be that one-sided on this one.

Bingo.

I don't think that's true at all. He talked to Rubin and he contacted Rubin's bosses, who gave him either no answers or evasive ones. He didn't just accept Minaya's version with no questions asked.

 

[Johnny Dangerously]

But the conclusion he draws shows he believes Omar's version -- which differs from Adam's version.

 

[SoCalDude]

As this thread wears on, I wonder how much different this is than the scribes who have been praised for landing jobs writing for college Web sites.

And there was another one out here recently. The publisher of the LANG coastal papers -- Daily Breeze -- just quit and took a job doing PR for the L.A. Harbor, which was in his circulation area. The guy at LAObserved wondered about the conflict of interest this publisher faced applying for that job while in charge of the news entity that covers the Harbor.
I'm siding with Rubin on this one.

 

[broadway joe]

But the conclusion he draws shows he believes Omar's version -- which differs from Adam's version.

Right, but he drew that conclusion after talking to people on both sides of the story, or at least trying to. That's not just taking Omar's word as gospel or being one-sided. Judging from the facts we know, Murray's view is completely reasonable.

 

[Johnny Dangerously]

If he believes Omar and not Adam.

 

[broadway joe]

You can believe Adam's version and still think that he created a conflict of interest, that going to the owner of the team you cover and asking him about career opportunities in his field is inappropriate. It's not necessarily an issue of one person lying and the other telling the truth.