I read an article yesterday on espn.com by its ombudsman devoted mostly to the state of Monday Night Football, but she made some other good points. It's a pretty lengthy article, but here's the interesting part: Whenever an athlete takes a verbal shot at another player or team, ESPN's pundits are quick to label it "trash talk" and wonder why anyone would go out of his way to make himself a target like that. I wonder the same thing about ESPN's trash talkers. In the past few months, ESPN has enraged vast legions of fans by what seems a steady stream of gratuitous insult. Sometimes, it is couched as humor. More often, it is pure vitriol. • That same month, when LSU football coach Les Miles repeatedly and categorically denied ESPN-flogged rumors that he intended to leave LSU for Michigan, several ESPN pundits repeatedly and categorically called him a liar -- not in the "I think" language of opinion but in flat-out statements. "Les Miles is a liar" was the opening line of Jemele Hill's Page 2 column. No public apologies were forthcoming when Miles renewed his contract at LSU, as he said he would. Something tells me he'll be waiting for that apology for some time.
great stuff from the ombudsman, on the espn site no less. awesome. i don't expect espn to apologize, but it's nice to know that someone who doesn't wear purple and gold thinks they should and puts it in their column. one of the better feelings post championship is thinking about all the people that didn't want this to happen (finebaum, countless people at espn holtz included, jemele hill, that jerkrag at cbssportsline that said miles will be outcoached badly in the nc, guilbeau, etc.) and the fact that we won the national championship would actually cause them some despair on some level. that makes me incredibly happy. not that they'd ever be accountable to their errors but just knowing that in some way shape or form they had to swallow a stinkburger and grimace a little when we won, let's me know that everything is now as it should be.
To paraphrase a UF fan that so eloquently stated on another site: They had to eat the spicy taco! :milesmic:
No better an appology then watching their stunned faces in the parking lot of the dome while forcing the crow down the wind pipe. Caruso was priceless!
IMO what was even worse than the assertions, whether veiled or overt, that Miles was a liar, was what Herbstreit did the morning of the SECCG. Here you had a team on the verge of physical and mental exhaustion, uncertain about the status of their coach, with several players already personally assured that he wasn't leaving, only to have to hear this "scoop" mere hours before the game. Despite his unconfirmed sources he knew what this news would do to the team, the only thing he cared about was breaking the story. He may have apologized to Miles in person, but that situation definitely merited a public apology, especially after how ESPN was embarrassed in front of the CFB world.
