Times the sports media lied for a hot story

[Tarantula]

A couple of hours later, I heard one of our reporters on the set shooting his segment for the news program and he was talking about this player attempting a comeback with the Jays. After he finished his segment, I went up to him and told him "That's crazy, I literally just met his brother last week and he told me about this but I wasn't sure if it was true." He then told me that he overheard me talking about it earlier. Suddenly I realized... I was his source. He never even spoke to me directly to get any details at all, simply overheard a conversation about a guy at a resort and then reported in on television coast-to-coast. That is insanely lazy reporting with zero effort to verify if it was true.

Thanks for the peek behind the curtain.

 

[FerrisRox]

Speaking of which, back in 1998 I used to buy a lot of hot dogs from vendors myself, at Front Street and Eglinton. Only veggie dogs, mind.

Those two streets are nowhere near each other.

 

[tarheelhockey]

This is true, but I have seen some alarmingly lazy stuff reported without much or any effort to verify what is being reported.

I suspected the Kessel hotdog story, for example, was told to Simmons by someone who in turn reported it without finding out if what he was told was true or even plausible.

Once, when I was working at a network that I will not name, I returned from a trip to the Dominican Republic and recounted a story to a few colleagues about how one of the staff members at the resort commented on my Toronto Blue Jays hat and indicated that he was the brother of a recently retired Major League Baseball player and he told me that his brother was coming out of retirement and would be attempting a comeback with the Blue Jays.

A couple of hours later, I heard one of our reporters on the set shooting his segment for the news program and he was talking about this player attempting a comeback with the Jays. After he finished his segment, I went up to him and told him "That's crazy, I literally just met his brother last week and he told me about this but I wasn't sure if it was true." He then told me that he overheard me talking about it earlier. Suddenly I realized... I was his source. He never even spoke to me directly to get any details at all, simply overheard a conversation about a guy at a resort and then reported in on television coast-to-coast. That is insanely lazy reporting with zero effort to verify if it was true.

The alleged comeback never happened.

Great story. To me, that behavior seems a lot more symptomatic of TV reporters where there is far less accountability due to the temporary nature of the medium. Even in social media there's more of a record of past transgressions... TV reports just go out into the ether and nobody seems to remember or care whether they were accurate.

 

[tarheelhockey]

Those two streets are nowhere near each other.

Perhaps he bought one at Front Street and ate it on the way to Eglinton, where he bought a second.

We won't know unless we investigate

 

[The Panther]

Perhaps he bought one at Front Street and ate it on the way to Eglinton, where he bought a second.

We won't know unless we investigate

I was studying on Eglinton, but often went to Front street. I remember two particular hot dog vendors, one on each street, that I frequented.

I hope the forum rests a little easier now...

 

[Staniowski]

I was studying on Eglinton, but often went to Front street. I remember two particular hot dog vendors, one on each street, that I frequented.

I hope the forum rests a little easier now...

I remember the hot dog stands up at Yonge & Eg too.

 

[Nerowoy nora tolad]

I hope the forum rests a little easier now...

Inaccuracies do not rest lightly on our shoulders

 

[Big Phil]

I feel bad for anyone that takes consumes media at face value.

No argument here, from me or I don't doubt many on this board and the sports media is included here

 

[Big Phil]

To put it another way: The OP accuses "the sports media" of coming up with lies but three of his four examples have easily been refuted and the fourth has never been taking seriously by anyone in the first place.

I'm tempted to start a thread with the title "times posters on HFBoards have lied for a hot thread", but that would probably generate almost as little substance as the OP here.

The "sitting of Modano at 1499 games" is completely false though and always gets reported like that. You will see in worded in a sneaky way too as if Modano was about to have game number 1500 but Babcock sat him. He missed a ton of time that year. Modano was not a good player by then, there could be loads of reasons why Babcock - or any other coach - sits a player. The Wings had 104 points that year and were chasing a team like San Jose for the #2 seed. If 1500 games mattered to Modano why not sign for one more year with another team? This is a story that I think is a classic hindsight story.

Look, I just gave examples of lies or exaggerations, I let others throw in their own stories, that's the point of these threads.

There are lies that happen though that people don't even check. This is a current commercial for the Hockey Hall of Fame. Why on earth they feel they even need to lie about this (it doesn't hurt anyone but still) for a great story is beyond me. They can't come up with a great story without making one up? Google the picture, that seat isn't empty and who the heck is the guy in the ad?


It bothers me because now a similar HHOF commercial makes you wonder if this is true as well. Sounds strange, a guy wanting a hot dog with 90 seconds left in the 1987 Canada Cup and doesn't look up in time to see Lemieux score and ignores what would have been everyone else standing up in anticipation? Strange. But they play these commercials all the time.

 

[JackSlater]

The "sitting of Modano at 1499 games" is completely false though and always gets reported like that. You will see in worded in a sneaky way too as if Modano was about to have game number 1500 but Babcock sat him. He missed a ton of time that year. Modano was not a good player by then, there could be loads of reasons why Babcock - or any other coach - sits a player. The Wings had 104 points that year and were chasing a team like San Jose for the #2 seed. If 1500 games mattered to Modano why not sign for one more year with another team? This is a story that I think is a classic hindsight story.

Look, I just gave examples of lies or exaggerations, I let others throw in their own stories, that's the point of these threads.

There are lies that happen though that people don't even check. This is a current commercial for the Hockey Hall of Fame. Why on earth they feel they even need to lie about this (it doesn't hurt anyone but still) for a great story is beyond me. They can't come up with a great story without making one up? Google the picture, that seat isn't empty and who the heck is the guy in the ad?


It bothers me because now a similar HHOF commercial makes you wonder if this is true as well. Sounds strange, a guy wanting a hot dog with 90 seconds left in the 1987 Canada Cup and doesn't look up in time to see Lemieux score and ignores what would have been everyone else standing up in anticipation? Strange. But they play these commercials all the time.

I think that those commercials are pretty obviously jokes, not stories to be taken at face value.

 

[Big Phil]

I think that those commercials are pretty obviously jokes, not stories to be taken at face value.

Jokes they aren't. When you have a picture of Orr flying through the air and you tell people that you didn't see it and that you were in the bathroom and point to a doctored picture showing an empty seat then that is a lie, and doesn't need to be. Our game has so many great moments and so many great stories that this doesn't have to happen. I had to Google it when it first came out because I thought "Have I missed an empty seat that whole time?" when thinking about the Orr picture. Just needless.

 

[Big Phil]

Perhaps, on the other hand Commodore just seems like a guy who wants to be seen or heard in general. How many hockey players posts these kind of pics of themselves?

Evander Kane perhaps? Although he wasn't posing like Demi Moore in "Indecent Proposal" like Commodore is.

 

[JackSlater]

Jokes they aren't. When you have a picture of Orr flying through the air and you tell people that you didn't see it and that you were in the bathroom and point to a doctored picture showing an empty seat then that is a lie, and doesn't need to be. Our game has so many great moments and so many great stories that this doesn't have to happen. I had to Google it when it first came out because I thought "Have I missed an empty seat that whole time?" when thinking about the Orr picture. Just needless.

I don't know what to tell you. I doubt that the company that made the commercials expected people to take them at face value. They are also quite different than a reporter lying.

 

[Big Phil]

I don't know what to tell you. I doubt that the company that made the commercials expected people to take them at face value. They are also quite different than a reporter lying.

But why wouldn't they expect people to do this? It is a Hockey Hall of Fame commercial. You are talking to a supposed regular fan (an actor I guess now that we know the truth?) who not only was at the Orr game but missed one of the greatest goals of all-time because he was in the bathroom. I believed it at first, why wouldn't I? I mean, these things are easy to fact-check. But then I read some comments from others and was just surprised that a commercial that airs over the course of hockey games would be so blatant like that. Maybe it isn't in the vein of a reporter stretching the truth, because I guess no one got hurt here, but why lie about it? You think there aren't 1000s of stories you can tell about hockey without lying? I would say on these boards alone we could come up with a ton, I know I've read them here.

 

[FerrisRox]

There are lies that happen though that people don't even check. This is a current commercial for the Hockey Hall of Fame. Why on earth they feel they even need to lie about this (it doesn't hurt anyone but still) for a great story is beyond me. They can't come up with a great story without making one up? Google the picture, that seat isn't empty and who the heck is the guy in the ad?


It bothers me because now a similar HHOF commercial makes you wonder if this is true as well. Sounds strange, a guy wanting a hot dog with 90 seconds left in the 1987 Canada Cup and doesn't look up in time to see Lemieux score and ignores what would have been everyone else standing up in anticipation? Strange. But they play these commercials all the time.

These commercials are jokes. Those are actors. You get that, right?

 

[Big Phil]

These commercials are jokes. Those are actors. You get that, right?

There is absolutely no indication that they are jokes in those commercials. You are led to believe in watching the commercial that they were at those games.

 

[FerrisRox]

There is absolutely no indication that they are jokes in those commercials. You are led to believe in watching the commercial that they were at those games.

No indication? The punchlines are "I was in the bathroom" or the guy got mustard on his jersey! The one about Sittler has the punchline "There is no TV at Aunt Jean's house, there's just a fish tank. Come on! I'm genuinely surprised that anybody would have taken those commercials seriously.

How would the Hockey Hall of Fame have tracked down a guy who left his seat at the end of a game in 1970? The stories are quite obviously jokes and the entire commercials are clearly tongue-in-cheek.

 

[Bear of Bad News]

There is absolutely no indication that they are jokes in those commercials.

Absolutely no indication? Really?

 

[Big Phil]

No indication? The punchlines are "I was in the bathroom" or the guy got mustard on his jersey! The one about Sittler has the punchline "There is no TV at Aunt Jean's house, there's just a fish tank. Come on! I'm genuinely surprised that anybody would have taken those commercials seriously.

How would the Hockey Hall of Fame have tracked down a guy who left his seat at the end of a game in 1970? The stories are quite obviously jokes and the entire commercials are clearly tongue-in-cheek.

I'm hardly someone who doesn't see the "tongue-in-cheek" in things but sorry, I just don't see it there. The HHOF could have access to tons of people that have stories just like that. A guy who leaves his seat to miss Orr's goal could easily call up the newspapers and there is a nice story with that............if it were true.

The "fish tank" one is more generic. He doesn't specify that he is in a famous picture but that he was in the bathroom and missed it. That one you can laugh at, the Orr one you wonder why they'd even use it.

 

[FerrisRox]

I'm hardly someone who doesn't see the "tongue-in-cheek" in things but sorry, I just don't see it there. The HHOF could have access to tons of people that have stories just like that. A guy who leaves his seat to miss Orr's goal could easily call up the newspapers and there is a nice story with that............if it were true.

And the mustard guy? And the Aunt Jean has an aquarium? What about the one where the kid was the head of the AV department and the picture goes out? These are clearly comical.

You may think you're someone that sees the tongue in cheek, but evidence clearly suggests otherwise. This entire campaign is comedic and offering up silly scenarios where people "missed' the big moments, but its okay cause the Hall of Fame has them all.

I'm sorry, but this sailed over your head and I'm quite sure most people actually "got" the joke.

 

[Big Phil]

And the mustard guy? And the Aunt Jean has an aquarium? What about the one where the kid was the head of the AV department and the picture goes out? These are clearly comical.

You may think you're someone that sees the tongue in cheek, but evidence clearly suggests otherwise. This entire campaign is comedic and offering up silly scenarios where people "missed' the big moments, but its okay cause the Hall of Fame has them all.

I'm sorry, but this sailed over your head and I'm quite sure most people actually "got" the joke.

Perhaps.........

 

[Big Phil]

It wasn't intentional, but I can't believe I forgot this one from TSN. Usually it is Sportsnet or ESPN that are more "TMZ-like" than the more conservative and reserved TSN but not during the trade deadline of 2015. Here is James Duthie explaining this and apologizing for a tweet that claimed Joffrey Lupul slept with Dion Phaneuf's wife - Elisha Cuthbert - while in Toronto. I am not a trade deadline fan, I don't sit and watch it as the day goes on, but for whatever reason I was watching live when I saw that and I had to do a double take.

I have no idea why the ones supposed to be vetting this let that get on air. It was awful.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

Pretty much anything Al Strachan said while a panelist on Hockey Night in Canada. What an idiot. As an example, he went on a rant about how Vincent Lecavalier hated his old coach (Tortorella... so maybe some truth there), and how he also told Lightning management that he hated the new coach, too. Lecavalier actually called HNIC that night, I think, to tell them Strachan was talking out of his behind.

I vividly recall this bullshit rumor from 1993 that Strachan spread, stating that the Kings and Leafs were talking about a Gretzky trade.
GRETZKY RUMORED TO LEAFS

 

[Hasbro]

There is absolutely no indication that they are jokes in those commercials. You are led to believe in watching the commercial that they were at those games.

Crisis actors.

 

[tarheelhockey]

Look, I actually even agree somewhat that it's questionable judgment for the HHOF to produce hoax vignettes.

But comparing that to journalistic fraud... what?

This seems like a lot of reaching to find a "trend" that doesn't actually exist. I'm sure if we absolutely scour the archives we can come up with a bad egg in the bunch. But media by its very nature keeps itself in check as competitors watch each other for mistakes. Hence you have a few discredited outlets which are constantly being exposed as tabloid trash, whereas the rest draw a clear line between editorial opinion and hard-news reporting.