On Sat, Sep 27, 2014 at 3:38 AM, JW <[email protected]> wrote: > > Once again: this occurred during a *podcast*. Not during a news program. > > Not during anything that even looks like a news program. A *podcast*. And > > by someone that no one has ever, *ever* suggested is a part of ESPN's > > news-gathering operation. > > I'm less of a Simmons fan than some people (including whoever titled this > thread), and I found myself agreeing with a lot of what Lipsyte said, if > not his conclusion. > > What's impressive is that ESPN continues to run the Van Natta/Van > Valkenberg investigative pieces even as they suspend Simmons for voicing > the obvious conclusions from them. > > Of course, it's easier to suspend Simmons during the NBA offseason. My > question is how representative the Goodell comments are of the podcast. Was > this a step or two beyond how far Simmons usually goes, or is the "problem" > just that Goodell is the target? As long as the podcast and Grantland fall > under the ESPN brand, the company has some responsibility for their > content. I have to be convinced that this discipline is for more than ESPN > trying to patch up its relationship with the Commissioner, though. >
As I noted earlier, I detest Simmons - I mean I really, really hate him and his whole act. But in this case I think he is in the right, and ESPN is simply getting what they deserve from the monster they created. Simmons was not suspended for 3 weeks because he used profanity in his podcast, he does this with some frequency (the podcast is called the "B.S. Report"). The explicit reason he was suspended was because he called Goodell a liar in violation of "ESPN's journalistic standards". The jokes that could be made about ESPN's journalistic standards are infinite, but suffice it to note what almost everyone else has, which is that BS got a 300% longer suspension for calling Goodell a liar (a conclusion supported if not proved by the little bit of actual reporting the network does engage in) than Stephen A. got for saying that Ray Rice's girlfriend did something to provoke him into punching her in the jaw and knocking her unconscious. What makes the podcast context relevant here is not that ESPN has no appropriate supervision of its content, but that the content on the podcast has long been substantially different than what appears on ESPN's television air, on in columns on ESPN.com. Simmon's himself is much more careful about what he says in his column; the podcast is where he lets it all hang out (and again, I detest what he hangs out, and I would be happy if ESPN just fired the guy and was able to shut down his obnoxious, unfunny voice for good - just not for this). To put it bluntly, Simmons is not a journalist, though he tries to be in his columns, but does not even try on his podcast. Obviously Simmons was not suspended for using profanity, or for calling someone a liar without evidence that would meet the standards of proof in a perjury trial. He was suspended for two reasons: He called *Roger Goodell* a liar (ESPN's billion dollar business partner, and the man that allow ESPN to grab the cable industry and much of America by the short pubic hairs and shake as much money out of them as possible) and - just as importantly, and maybe close to the same thing - because Simmons publicly dared ESPN to fire him, challenging ESPN President John Skipper's authority. Aside from the content that spews out of Simmon's mouth or keyboard, which for the most part is full of banal observations and jokes he and his drunk friends think funny, the real point of his existence at ESPN is to make the public think that ESPN is something other than an uptight corporate machine that prints shit loads of money by carrying the water of the largest and most profitable sports corporations in the world. He is supposed to be an everyman lose cannon who says what he, and the legions of working stiff, Joe lunchbox sports fans (who apparently ESPN thinks are still mostly misogynistic and homophobic) really thinks. ESPN eats this crap up and banks the cash it generates, except on those few occasions when Simmons actually says or thinks something of substance about sports - then they try to shut him up. And every once in a while, I guess to sustain his credibility among his Joe lunchbox public, Simmons feels the need to intentionally drop a bag of dog shit on Skipper's front porch, just to prove he can. The best possible outcome for me here would be that Simmon's quits in a huff to prove his independence, showing what a bunch of hypocrites ESPN is, and then disappears into obscurity, showing what a creature of Bristol he has always been. -- -- TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
