Posted by taint98 on 1/18/2013 10:31:00 AM (view original):
There's another reason for the all the extreme media attention. The media itself got duped. The entire industry is supposed to be built on reporting news and facts, which are all supposed to be true. Although most of us realize sports journalism has devolved into something else, they consistently try to present themselves as legit. Now that it's come out that the literally hundreds of stories they ran on Manti and his girlfriend were all lies and they've all been busted for running stories that nobody ever fact-checked, they are going after Manti and this catfishing story with the fury of a woman scorned. Whatever they have to do to pass the blame and villainize Manti and the hoax conspirators, they will do. ESPN and other sports networks are more focused on damage control and covering their own ***** instead of reporting news. And the lesser sports organizations such as local talk radio stations are jumping on the opportunity to make fun of the big boys within the industry for screwing up so bad.
The fact that Deadspin.com has proven to be a better source for sports-related news than ESPN has got to be burning the ESPN producers up, and I think it's awesome.
That is an interesting way to look at it.... I listened to (part of) the first ND press conference, and between fits of laughter, it struck me how they characterized the hoax as so unbelievably sophisticated, so vast, so many "perpetrators", so advanced, you'd think the old Russian KGB were pulling the strings---rather than just a situation where some dumb kid fell for a practical joke and then was stupid enough to continue as the jokers escalated it along with his fame. ...and then was too embarrassed to tell the truth when he discovered it, and became party to the 'crime'.
Meanwhile, all of the college football establishment falls all over itself trying to explain how their Shining Example could be either: A Moron, or A Hoaxer. I don't think it is really the latter--is a dead grandmother not enough?? I really think he is just as dumb as a rock, and his talent in football shined a light on his life that he was just not built for.