Blogger claiming Yost fired (5/19, Simmons will be named) - Latest: Ned still manager

[Oldcity]

Just so you know, Crew, by and large, it's make their journalists blog. Most writers/reporters hate it. The commands have come from on high.

God forbid journalists work to improve their product. Not sure how you could argue that blogs on newspaper web sites aren't beneficial to readers.

 

[wisportswriter]

If you've got someone designated whose job is to blog, sure. But for a reporter, every second writing in a blog is taking away from work you would otherwise would have been doing.

I guess it's whether you deem that work was important enough. Obviously editors made their decision. Most reporters disagree with it.

 

And be careful with your tone. "God forbid journalists work to improve their product." I read that as an implication journalists don't care about their product and/or are lazy, neither of which would be even remotely true.

[wisportswriter]

Tom Oates of the Wisconsin State Journal weighs in on this whole subject and absolutely nails it.

 

Oates: It's a new, and dangerous, world in sports reporting

[MickeyDavis]

It took Oates 5 days to come up with the obvious. Don't believe everything you read. Gee, no kidding.

 

I love his line "some blogs are witty, insightful and occasionally even break news".

 

Just like newspaper columnists, Tom.

[jeffy]

He knew little about the non-sports blog that "broke" the story, but he had to decide whether it had merit and whether he should acknowledge it.

 

If he ignored it, he could be labeled a Yost apologist. If he reported it, he could legitimize the story.

 

This is a conflict because traditional media outlets operate under long-accepted reporting standards that help safeguard the process of deciphering the truth.

 

He did have the option of waiting 1/2 an hour or so to get independent confirmation or denial from his own sources, before publicizing the "information" reported by the blogger.

[Mass Haas]

Notice that Haudricourt got no quotes from Ned Yost in his game story last night. Adam McCalvy of MLB.com is taking the Washington series off, so a local MLB.com "stand-in" is covering there. In other words, if Ned chooses to "punish" Tom H., then we as Brewer fans are cheated of any Yost reaction or analysis (yeah, for what that's worth), because no other Milwaukee-based outlet covers the team on the road. This possibility was discussed a bit during Haudricourt's audio appearance with the "D-List" Friday AM.

[adambr2]

Notice that Haudricourt got no quotes from Ned Yost in his game story last night. Adam McCalvy of MLB.com is taking the Washington series off, so a local MLB.com "stand-in" is covering there. In other words, if Ned chooses to "punish" Tom H., then we as Brewer fans are cheated of any Yost reaction or analysis (yeah, for what that's worth), because no other Milwaukee-based outlet covers the team on the road. This possibility was discussed a bit during Haudricourt's audio appearance with the "D-List" Friday AM.

Yost's condescending post-game remarks and excuses after road games will no doubt be missed.

 

[uwisfan]

I love how all the "legit newspaper" sources are quick to jump on railing against the blogs. It has always been dicey to "report" what is said in blogs and most paper reporters know better. But as soon as they ran with it and got in hot water, they jumped all over the railing on blogs and BF.net. I noticed the story was pitched as a "blogger from BF.net". The blog doesnt have anything to do with BF.net and BF.net wasnt running with it, JS was. So why, when cornered, do they rail on "all blogs" and "competing online news outlets". Then Oates jumps in with his 2 cents a week later. Way to take stand there big guy.

 

As for the story, I'm not convinced either way yet. "We have no plans to fire Ned Yost at this time" is not exactly a ringing endorsement. Let's see what happens when the road trip is completed.

[1992casey]

I noticed the story was pitched as a "blogger from BF.net".

 

What am I missing? The Oates story mentions BadgerBlogger.

[wisportswriter]

My head hurts.

 

As for the timing, we have no idea why it's running now. Maybe Oates was on vacation. Maybe the WSJ didn't have room on its front page until now. Maybe it's going to run in Sunday's paper, a newspaper's most-read edition of the week. Point is, we don't know, so I don't see the point of railing against it.

 

jeffy: Oates said he believes it was a mistake by TH to publish the blog item before getting his own confirmation. You're repeating that point.

 

uwwis: What?

[1992casey]

Oates' piece looks like a column. This is probably its regularly scheduled day.

[MickeyDavis]

If it had to wait 5 days because it wasn't a "scheduled day" then I guess that points out an advantage of a blog over a newspaper column.

 

But as to the actual column, I guess if Oates nailed it then so did a lot of people on this board and a lot of people on a lot of boards I've read. They've all said the exact same thing (5 days ago).

[jeffy]

Oates said he believes it was a mistake by TH to publish the blog item before getting his own confirmation. You're repeating that point.

 

 

He says: In this case, "BadgerBlogger" was primarily at fault

 

I disagree, TH was primariliy at fault for the story becoming as big as it did. If he does not like the fact that he is held to a higher standard and has greater credibility, then he should quit his job and become a blogger.

 

The statement that:The Journal Sentinel's mistake was that it got caught up in the race...

is followed by a string of excuses, but..., but..., but...

[kramnoj]

If he does not like the fact that he is held to a higher standard and has greater credibility, then he should quit his job and become a blogger.

 

Why would you think he doesn't like that? Haudricort on the D-List said that he had heard of this blog and wanted to respond to it, because it was making news in some circles. These blogs are new ground for the beat guys. They want to be current and active enough to give readers a reason to click there on a regular basis. They are going to make mistakes in how they use them because of that, but I would rather they error on the side of giving us more information.

[MickeyDavis]

Haudricort on the D-List said that he had heard of this blog and wanted to respond to it, because it was making news in some circles.

Interesting if that's what he said on the radio. Because he wrote:

Somebody named the "Badger Blogger," who I am told does mainly political postings (I must admit I'm not familiar with the site) posted a blog late Sunday night claiming manager Ned Yost will be relieved of his duties on the team's off day in Pittsburgh today.

 

So Tommy either lied on the radio or lied in his own blog.

 

 

 

 

[kramnoj]

So Tommy either lied on the radio or lied in his own blog.

 

Actually, that's poor wording on my part. Someone had informed him of this report on this blog, and so Tom responded to it. I supposed I could have used "post" or "entry" to make my point clearer.

[MickeyDavis]

That makes more sense. I didn't hear him on the D-List.

[JumpinMacFlash]

I haven't weighed in on this at all yet. I've tried to keep up with this thread, but it has kind of taken on a life of its own. I'm not going to respond to anything in particular, instead I'm going to voice my own opinion because, quite frankly, I fell behind.

 

I have no problem with Haudricourt writing about the report in his blog. The only thing I didn't really understand was why he wrote about it before confirming the report. As a student majoring in journalism, I understand the importance of being timely and wanting to break information. I work at a weekly paper, if something pops up here, I want to be on top of it because if you miss it you're already a week and a half behind. I mean, BadgerBlogger already had this thrown out and it was spreading before TH made his post. I think he had to report on it at some point. The thing I never understood was, if he had sources to confirm the validity of the report, why he didn't just wait those couple of hours and report the fact that the report was false?

 

The other thing that bothers me is the use of anonymous sources. I completely understand the reasoning behind the use of them. Sometimes it's necessary to get the information that is needed and you don't want to compromise the source's position or security. It just seems that a lot of the articles I read lately, whether they be sports related or not, use anonymous sources. How can people use them constantly and have any kind of credibility? When do they get to the point in their careers that they can? Writing for my college paper, I used anonymous information once, confirmed by three different people who wanted to be anonymous, and my credibility was questioned along with that of the paper. It's like you have to make the choice between getting information and having credibility and you can't have one without the other. Which comes first and why? I would love to see more people being held accountable for the things they say and the things they report. As I gain more experience, my goal is to not use anonymous sources, but at this point, it doesn't appear to be too realistic and that bothers me.

[uwisfan]

you are never, ever going to find someone go "on record" about someone "about to get fired"..those sources must remain anonymous for obvious reasons. Any kind of personnel change won't be on record prior to it happening.