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The Asante Samuel tattoo episode was a dramatic illustration of the Pandora's box aspect of sports media. Once the "Get Paid" meme was out there via Jackie MacMullen's erroneous report, there was no calling it back. Other journalists referred to it as fact.
This surely happens all the time with both opinions and facts. Usually it's just hard to recognize when reporters are playing a game of telephone. So it's interesting to when you can actually spot the DNA of a particular factoid.
A couple of months ago a piece in Deadspin said of BB: "This is a man who is known as "N.E. Coach" in Madden because he refuses to join the NFL Head Coaches Association." I blasted the writer because there is no such thing as the "NFL Head Coaches Association." It existed in one place only...the Wikipedia entry on Bill Belichick. The basic Madden concept was accurate, but the mistake showed that writer had "sourced" his facts solely from a Wikipedia page and didn't bother double-checking. But hey, it's just Deadspin, it's not supposed to be taken seriously...right? So I forgot about it until today, when I was reading an article praised in another thread here and hit this:
There are reports that Belichick is the only NFL head coach who doesn't appear in the Madden video games (it reads "NE Coach" instead) because he alone refuses to join "NFL Head Coaches Association" which markets their likenesses.
http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/news;_y...ug=dw-billbelichick110107&prov=yhoo&type=lgns
Well whaddya know. "There are reports," eh? Sure, Wikipedia...and Deadspin! Now that Yahoo has it, let's watch and see if this tidbit spreads. It's a trivial matter in this case, but a case study of sourcing and the spread of (dis)information.
This surely happens all the time with both opinions and facts. Usually it's just hard to recognize when reporters are playing a game of telephone. So it's interesting to when you can actually spot the DNA of a particular factoid.
A couple of months ago a piece in Deadspin said of BB: "This is a man who is known as "N.E. Coach" in Madden because he refuses to join the NFL Head Coaches Association." I blasted the writer because there is no such thing as the "NFL Head Coaches Association." It existed in one place only...the Wikipedia entry on Bill Belichick. The basic Madden concept was accurate, but the mistake showed that writer had "sourced" his facts solely from a Wikipedia page and didn't bother double-checking. But hey, it's just Deadspin, it's not supposed to be taken seriously...right? So I forgot about it until today, when I was reading an article praised in another thread here and hit this:
There are reports that Belichick is the only NFL head coach who doesn't appear in the Madden video games (it reads "NE Coach" instead) because he alone refuses to join "NFL Head Coaches Association" which markets their likenesses.
http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/news;_y...ug=dw-billbelichick110107&prov=yhoo&type=lgns
Well whaddya know. "There are reports," eh? Sure, Wikipedia...and Deadspin! Now that Yahoo has it, let's watch and see if this tidbit spreads. It's a trivial matter in this case, but a case study of sourcing and the spread of (dis)information.
