Geoff Baker Redux

Note: I’m giving this post from yesterday a bump for two reasons: First, it was posted kind of late, and a lot of people don’t scroll back past ATH on a given day, so it’s “new” to a lot of readers; Second, because Geoff Baker his ownself waded into the comments thread last night. I think that’s kind of cool and think that maybe some folks would like to read that too.

Geoff Baker got mad last week when a blogger waded into waters he feels that only professionals like Geoff Baker should be wading. Today he wades into my waters:

Here’s a primer on U.S. libel law and how it relates to blogging, in case you’re interested. It should be required reading for any blogger in this country.

If you get sued for libel, your defense can be “the truth — that what you wrote is true — or that, even if what you wrote was false, you did not act with malice. In Canada, where I began my career, the law is much tougher and states that your stuff had better be true, or you’re in hot water. It’s a bit more lax here in the U.S. with the whole “malice thing.

The U.S. Supreme Court has defined malice as publishing something with “either knowledge of falsity or in reckless disregard for its truth or falsity.”

I was going to write about 1000 words aping his piece from last week, substituting the dangers of amateurs engaging in the business of lawyering for his take on amateurs engaging in the business of professional journalism, but I couldn’t keep a straight face. I’m actually fine with Baker writing about this stuff because (a) it’s not rocket science; and (b) he’s right. Like I said last week, you’ve got to get your facts right if you’re going to get into the accusation business. That goes for bloggers too, and like Baker, I am similarly not impressed with the argument that a blogger can be looser with things if he’s only writing for a small, friendly audience (not that Jerrod Morris was being “loose” in my estimation).

But beyond that, Baker remains off his nut. Last week I (and many others) noted that Baker himself seemed to be doing far worse than Jerod Morris was doing when he suggested that the entire 2003 Seattle Mariners team had been on steroids. Today he defends himself:

Now, this may seem like the same thing to a lot of you, but there are important differences. The most obvious is that no individual was singled out. Believe me, this was intentional. There are ways to approach topics like this, to hint at stuff that may or may not have been going on, but it requires subtlety, not a sledgehammer.

What I wrote still gives every player on that 2004 team an “out” in which they can say: “It wasn’t me he was talking about.”

I suppose that’s fine if all you care about is avoiding legal liability for defamation — and even then I’m not sure that the Mariners as a team wouldn’t have an action for some sort for business disparagement or something — but certainly that’s not the operative ethical standard, is it? Anything is fair game as long as there’s an “out?” That’s not what Baker seemed to be all worked up about in his original piece. It was all about being tough and accountable and writing with integrity and credibility and all of that. Something greater than mere lawsuit avoidance, at any rate. If anything, Baker’s pained rationalization of his February piece directly contradicts his stated belief that looking one’s target in the eye matters. His accusation of non-specific Mariners with an “out” built-in is exactly the opposite of looking someone in the eye. It’s cowardly ass-covering.

Baker’s next point is the freakin’ cake topper:

Some of you have asked why I — and my colleagues — failed to denounce Rick Reilly for publishing similar things about ballplayers that Morris did. Well, the first answer is, many of my colleagues did denounce Reilly several years back when he challenged Sammy Sosa to take a drug test. Many thought he was unfairly singling Sosa out.

My second answer would be: Jerod Morris is not Rick Reilly.

Sorry, I don’t cotton to any system with exceptions that so thoroughly swallow the rules as the one Baker sketches out, and that’s even when the rules are weak moving targets like those he’s proposing. If we are to take Baker seriously, there’s a bogey that all of us writing about baseball need to hit — about thirty years of puff pieces, if I reckon correctly — and once we hit it, anything is fair game. If I’m wrong about this — if, for example, I get my license to be irresponsible at, say, 25 years — I hope that Baker lets me know, because I have a lot of garbage I want to fling at people.

Finally, Baker responds to criticism of his “White Jays” piece from a couple of years ago:

I’ve had people write in to ask me about my so-called “White Jays” series of three stories written for the Toronto Star six years ago. What those stories were supposed to be about was how the Blue Jays, after years of pipelining talent from Latin America, had suddenly become a team with the fewest amount of minority players in baseball. At a time when the number of Latin Americans in the game was exploding.

But the reasons behind that story were lost because of a terrible “White Jays” headline, substituted at the last minute as a front page teaser to the stories, without my consent, or input, or that of the editors working closest with the story.

I’m somewhat sympathetic here, because his “White Jays” story, while not his finest hour, wasn’t as bad as a lot of people made it out to be. But his explanation of this is instructive: other chefs in the kitchen screwed it up, not Geoff Baker. Kind of undercuts that whole notion he’s pushing about the importance and value of all of those editorial layers that separate the pros from the amateurs, doesn’t it?

Baker goes on and on and so could I, but we’d never come to agreement on everything. I do hope, however, that we can agree on this: people who write non-fiction for a living need to be accurate and take responsibility for their words no matter who they are and where they write.


100 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
The Common Man
14 years ago

Bill, Jack’s main issue is less to do with rights, I think, and more to do with what he believes is ethically right.  I think there are legitimate questions as to whether Jack’s perfect world ethics are reasonable expectations of individuals.  If Jack has never done anything ethically questionable, he’s the first since Jesus Christ, who I believe has returned to Earth and is catching for the Minnesota Twins.

Jack, again I think it’s important to point out that Morris didn’t finger anybody.  He raised the point that steroid use has to be an acknowledged possibility, though not necessarily a likelihood, in any instance where a slugger suddenly jumps in performance in his late 30s.  As I wrote earlier in this discussion, there are clear analogies to this, “if you saw a fund manager’s performance was far outstripping the market, even in a down period, and it was not immediately clear how that manager was doing it, wouldn’t that raise suspicions as well, in this post-Madoff environment?  Don’t we have to take the earnings statements of banks with a healthy grain of salt, given their recent history? ”

Jack Marshall
14 years ago

If you don’t need the lecture, then please stop using “circumstantial evidence” as a synonym for “weak evidence” or “invalid evidence.”

Who said Morris didn’t have a “right” to publish his crappy article? Not me. He has a right to publish whatever irresponsible, hurtful, dishonest drivel he wants short of libel, which this wasn’t. Just because he has a right to do it doesn’t make it right to do it. (I’ll spare you the lecture on that.)

Yes, a B student who suddenly aces a test should have the benefit of the doubt if there is nothing more than the unusual performance, and unusually good performance is not circumstantial evidence of wrong-doing absent more, such as previous evidence of character deficiency. If a teacher suggested in his blog that my son was cheating (while “defending” him by suggesting all the other ways he might have excelled), based only on one test, I’d have his head.

You act as if speculation is its own justification. It isn’t. Speculation about McGwire and drugs based only on his performance was unfair. The fact that it turned out to be right is irrelevant. I always had a gut feeling that John Edwards was a lying, phony sleazebag based on little but instinct and the fact that he was a trial lawyer and cared way too much about his hair. It would have been irresponsible for me to write an article saying, “there have been whispers that John Edwards can’t be trusted and is probably the kind of guy who would cheat on his dying wife, but here are some reasons why that might not be true.” As it happens, I was right. It doesn’t change the fact that the article
would have been unfair before I had more legitimate evidence.

Bill @ the daily something
14 years ago

I get the sense that you’re not really sure what you’re arguing. Or that you’re arguing just to argue.

But, fine. If you want to call it “unfair,” then whatever. I might even agree with you. That’s way, way short of what Mr. Baker and others are saying about it. And whatever it is, it’s no more or less fair than the kind of speculation the MSM engages in all the time.

Jack Marshall
14 years ago

And when the MSM is that unfair, it is wrong, unprofessional, and it should be called on it. Just like Morris. That’s all.

Geoff Baker
14 years ago

For Common Man,

Most of the Morris piece was harmless and he did attempt a well thought-out essay on stats. Which is why it made no sense to take the steroids angle and throw it into the headline of a blog that otherwise had nothing to do with it.

Unless, that was his true intention all along. To raise the steroids angle under the guise of a well thought-out stats piece. Morris has since written and told me he truly had no ulterior motive and I accept that on its face. But giving equal prominence to “whisperers’’ about steroids in a piece that was 90 percent about something else makes it appear he was taking a back door route towards suggesting Ibanez might be a user.

And that’s where my “go all in’’ statement comes from. Either you’ve got the goods to put it in a headline, or you don’t. And if you don’t, then don’t try to sneak it in there. In both the headline and his phrasing further down. Both were too strong for what little Morris had to go on. I used the example of what Larry Stone did vis-a-vis Ken Griffey Jr. That’s about the extent Morris should have gone in order to be fair and not make it look like he was strongly hinting at something else about Ibanez with an otherwise routine blog post.

There are lots of people having huge years that are outliers. Ichiro Suzuki is 35 and having his best season since 2004. He had his worst season last year. Going to mention “steroid whispers” in a headline and story about him?

For Sara K., if you don’t like my CEO and embezzlers line, just substitute it for “top bankers” and “fraudulent mortgage underwriting”.

Craig Calcaterra
14 years ago

“Ichiro Suzuki is 35 and having his best season since 2004. He had his worst season last year. Going to mention “steroid whispers” in a headline and story about him?”

Don’t tempt me, Geoff . . .it’s a slow news day . . .

J.W.
14 years ago

On June 2nd, Craig posted a link to, and brief discussion of, Bill Simmons’s article postulating that David Ortiz’s sharp decline was due to the fact that he was older than he claimed to be. The evidence in favor of this charge was Ortiz’s sudden fall off a cliff (though now he seems to be clamboring back up that cliff) and the fact that he is Dominican and kinda sorta friends with Miguel Tejada who did, in fact, lie about his age. The evidence against was Ortiz’s physique and the fact that other players with similar physique and stats have fallen off the face of the earth at the same age as Mr. Ortiz. I argued at the time that Mr. Simmons’ suggesting that Mr. Ortiz is a liar and a cheat based solely on his country of birth and the people he might associate with was irresponsible and perhaps even racist (though certainly not maliciously so, it just strikes me as dangerous to make an argument about someone that uses his or her nationality/ethinicity as the prime piece of evidence.) I was mostly shouted down and one commenter was kind enough to introduce me to reality. I would posit, now, that Simmons and Morris engaged in exactly the same kind of journalism. Both condemned (or more accurately, cast damning accusations at) players based solely on association. Simmons sought to explain a player’s decline by suggesting he might be a liar and cheat based only on a guess and the fact that others in similar situations were guilty of being liars and cheats. Morris sought to explain a player’s rise by suggesting he might be a liar and a cheat based on only a guess and the fact that others in similar situations were guilty of being liars and cheats.

I have two questions then. Question one: Mr. Baker, Craig, fellow commenters, am I right in equating these two pieces of journalism? Question two: Mr. Baker, if you choose to take the time to respond, could you tell me if there’s a reason you would criticize Mr. Morris and not Mr. Simmons?

Jack Marshall
14 years ago

JW: They are virtually the same, and you shouldn’t have been shouted down. I’d argue that lying about one’s age (fraud) is not as serious as PED use, but that’s a close call. Sammons’ article was unfair and irresponsible too.

J.W.
14 years ago

Jack Marshall—

Thanks for the answer; I’m genuinely curious about what other people think. It’s funny though, when I was writing the above comment, I originally had writtena: “I was shouted down and disagreed with by most commenters on that post other than Jack Marshall” but then I decided it would be inappropriate to drag your name into a comment that you had no input on, ya know, since it would be tantamount to saying you agree with my P.O.V. without asking you first.

Jason
14 years ago

“And when the MSM is that unfair, it is wrong, unprofessional, and it should be called on it. Just like Morris. That’s all.”

Agreed.  Which makes Baker’s response, “Jerod Morris is not Rick Reilly,” ridiculous.

The Common Man
14 years ago

Thanks, Geoff.  That’s a well-reasoned explanation and I appreciate your help understanding your thought process.  Headline and phrasing aside, I still think the debate within the vast majority MSM has had more to do with a punk blogger raising the possibility of PEDs, rather than one of their own.  It’s been (in my opinion) largely a reaction to the medium in which the possibility was delivered and the lack of “credentials” that the writer could point to.

And while I appreciate that your article regarding the 2003-4 Mariners does not single out any specific names as potential users, giving individual players an “out,” as you say, I’d argue that by using that broad a stroke, you’re bound to get a little paint on everyone.  And personally, I don’t see a discernible difference between speculating about 13-14 guys (you were talking about hitters only in the article), and 1.  Both articles still cast suspicion on individuals (and Morris’ article, like yours, leaves a significant out if you don’t believe player(s) in question is a doper). 

Again, thanks.  Not enough of your colleagues are willing to engage fans of the game like this and to have these kinds of discussions.  Your enthusiasm for dialogue is refreshing.

Tom M. Tango
14 years ago

The original up-in-arms problem that MSM had with Morris is that they treated him as a wannabe journalist, and that he failed to uphold their standards.  But, that was not the standard that Morris was trying to uphold.  Rather, he was writing to his own standards.  And, as far as I can tell, his standards are being sincere, inquisitive, and resourceful.

***

Geoff’s position on Morris seems to have evolved (which is good) to the point that the issue is that Morris introduced “steroids” into an otherwise decent article.  That by doing so, he forces readers to infer more than Morris meant. I think we can all get behind that.

If this is the true problem with the Morris article (that he went all Bill O’Reilly on us by calling out “Pinhead” because it’s an attention grabber), then in no way is there a controversy here.  The worst you can call Morris is showing bad taste, and having an unclear thesis.  MSM should focus on O’Reilly, Hannity, Rush and the rest of the gasbags.  Those guys make MSM look bad.

So, the Morris article, that he went O’Reilly on us, is what made Ken Rosenthal be on the air for 9 minutes, shaking his head, and spouting ridiculous things like “Do you want this stuff being written about you?” ? (I find it hard to believe that any reporter would say this.)  I have no doubt that Ken Rosenthal did not even read Morris’ blog entry. 

And MSM’s initial reaction was to an event where a blogger exercised his rights to speak out, as he would with his friends or in a bar, without crossing the libel line (which Morris did not approach). MSM, instead of reporting the news, made the news, by asking Ibanez about something that he did not read but asked him to react to a one-line summary by the guy asking the question.  And the rest of MSM reported on the initial MSM report.

I fully support what Morris did and how he did it.  And Baker’s absolutely pithy response article (of Ichiro/chemistry… Craig did you link to it?) is the perfect rebuttal to Morris, about how you can basically ask a question about anything, and find some reasonable cause if you look hard enough.  That Baker response shows that Morris was sloppy in saying “steroids”.

Being sloppy is not a reason to turn his niche blog into something widespread.  However, I am sure Morris appreciates the publicity.

***

My blog had its own thread on the matter:
http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/jerod_morris/

Jack Marshall
14 years ago

Jason: Also agreed. I think Baker probably agrees too, based on his clarification here. As I know by sad experience, it’s dangerous being flip.

Drew
14 years ago

Morris’ headline makes a lot more sense when you take it in the context of how he explained the genesis of his article.  A friend in a fantasy league was jealous that Morris had Ibanez on his team and Ibanez was having a huge season, so his friend claimed that Ibanez’ performance was the result of PEDs.  Morris set out to write an article disproving the “Suspicion of Steroids”, and took into account a few simple statistical measures which he assumed would put the issue to rest.  Of course, what he found was that this quick study didn’t do much to explain Raul’s outstanding season, and therefore he had to consider that there were other possible reasons for the increase in performance, including, yes, steroids.

Now, given that this is why he wrote the article, and what he was trying to address, it makes perfect sense for his headline to be what it is.  If Morris is guilty of something, it’s not considering the way the headline would be interpreted by anyone not privy to his fantasy league discussions, which, it turns out, is pretty much everyone in the entire world. 

I didn’t get the impression that the headline was designed to raise controversy or point the finger at a guy or grab attention, but rather that it just made sense given the reason for the article and the way it was written.

Sean
14 years ago

Mr. Tango,
I’ve come in very late to all this, but I don’t think there is anything wrong with the standards of mainstream media. They held him up to their standard because that’s the journalistic standard, and if people want to gripe about how poorly modern journalists adhere to these, then there’s no reason for a blogger to except something different. Objectivity and accuracy aren’t difficult things to understand, but they can be difficult ones to implement.
BTF spends a good portion of their time taking writers to the woodshed for failing to live up to what is widely accepted as this “standard,” so why shouldn’t Morris?
And nobody takes Hannity or O’Reilly seriously. They talk all the time about how the “MSM” (although they throw liberal somewhere into the acronym). A journalist spending time trying to critique FOX News is like a Bounty paper towel trying to soak up the ocean.

Tom M. Tango
14 years ago

“They held him up to their standard because that’s the journalistic standard”

Sean, that’s my point.  The standard to hold him to is his personal standards, not the journalistic standards.  What Morris did in his blog is identical to what he’d do in a newsletter or in a bar (as long as it doesn’t break any laws).  In no way is what I write here in a comment section or in my blog or in a book or anywhere else for that matter required to meet any standard other than those I can live with (and within the bounds of law). 

If I have an editor or publisher, then he can further control it.

Geoff Baker
14 years ago

For J.W., the simple answer is: two wrongs don’t make a right. And regardless of whether Simmons, Rick Reilly, Murray Chass and a handful of others went about what they did the wrong way, Jerod Morris is still wrong.

And Morris is the only one who had a player go ballistic on him. When Reilly got an angry response from Sammy Sosa years ago after challenging him to take a drug test, many in the MSM called him out. I don’t see and read every single one of the millions of baseball stories written every year. But when asked about specific controversies, I have responded. I don’t see any of my responses on this page, but maybe that’s because the full context would not make for good comedic fodder. Can’t answer that one.

When my readers asked me about how I could use that Rick Reilly-Jerod Morris line, I responded in timely fashion with the following:

“There were also degrees to how the story was played by Reilly (he didn’t publish a huge headline about Beltre).

But do do you know what? You’re right. Reilly is putting himself out there with that statement. If Beltre turned around and decided to sue, Reilly had better have his ducks lined up. So far, Beltre is keeping mum on the issue, as he has for years.

Ibanez isn’t. He’s vigrorously defending himself and trying to change the public account before it gets too widespread.

Would I write, or imply, that somebody might be using if I didn’t have proof? From an ethical perspective, no, I would not. I can’t read minds. And if Reilly gets sued and doesn’t have anything to fall back on from all of his conversations/reporting/digging/inside info over the years, he’ll be just as “out there’’ and exposed legally as Morris.”

So, yes, I would give Reilly the benefit of the doubt over Morris initially, because I know he could have some insider knowledge on what’s going on. With Morris, he has zero insider knowledge and was reckless at best, or trying to go at something a backhanded way at worst. If neither guy has insider info, they are both wrong. But again, it’s easier to keep taking my initial statement in a vaccuum and pretend it was never explained.

And again, the reason I went after Morris is because of the storm his blog generated as opposed to those other writers, none of whom was threatened with a lawsuit by any player. None of whom popped on my radar. I’m pretty busy covering the Mariners, folks. Did the blogging world go after Simmons initially? No. Probably because they never read what he wrote or it never really registered because of the lack of reaction generated. I went after Morris because his story popped on my radar, on national TV and around the country on wire services. We can blame the Philly paper for that, or ESPN, or Ibanez, or MLB, or me, or the MSM as an entity. Or, we can just put the blame on the guy who recklessly wrote what he did in a headline and the body text.

And again, if you and others still don’t agree with me, then go write the same post with Ichiro Suzuki’s name in the headline. Craig, I know you were being funny, but I am trying to tempt you now. Go do it, if you so strongly believe in the right of Morris to do what he did. If he’s really changed the rules of the game and established that bloggers have leeway that supercede the traditional media, then publish an Ichiro post with the identical wording and headline. Shouldn’t be that difficult. Or don’t. We both know you can’t. This isn’t about threatening the existence of bloggers. It’s about making sure everyone with a computer doesn’t start taking liberties with people. Anyhow, this has been a refreshing exchange.

Jack Marshall
14 years ago

Well, Tom, that was one of the best examples of ethical relativism advocacy I’ve encountered in quite a while, but like all ethical relativism,it’s pure junk.

Neither you nor Morris should be gratuitously and irresponsibly harming others, or publicizing falsities, or being gratuitously mean or unfair just because it’s the standard, however crummy, that “you can live with.” That’s a swell standard if you live alone in a cave and don’t communicate with the outside world, but when your conduct affects others, damn right you have an obligation to come up to a higher standard. Standards of conduct evolve as cultures (which includes cultures of professionals and those in the same enterprise, like blogging) decide what is in everyone’s best interest, that is, right. Nobody can be part of a culture and still declare, “the only standards that matter are my own,” unless those standards are higher…not LOWER. (I have a hard time even believing that you meant what you wrote, since your commentary is generally well-reasoned and astute.) Does one have a “right” to publish unfair, careless, mean-spirited bile? Sure thing, but maintaining that it’s fine and dandy to do so as long as one has sufficiently abyssmal “personal standards” is just bizarre.

Sara K
14 years ago

“Neither you nor Morris should be gratuitously and irresponsibly harming others, or publicizing falsities, or being gratuitously mean or unfair just because it’s the standard”

Are you saying you felt like the Morris article did these things?

Bill @ the daily something
14 years ago

First of all, I find it amazing and admirable the way both sides have trended toward a middle ground during the course of this conversation. When does THAT ever happen on the internet?

But, Geoff, a relatively minor point: Ichiro! is a really bad example. You can debate whether he’s really having his best season since 2004; I’ll take his 2007, by a hair, because of the better OBP. He’s hitting for essentially the same batting average now that he did then, and he’s managed to send maybe two to three extra fly balls over the fence from what we’d expect him to. Yeah, obviously it’s a huge improvement over 2008, but Ichiro!, God bless him, has had exactly those types of fluctuations before. ‘01, ‘04, ‘06-‘07, and ‘09 Ichiro! is a Hall of Fame player, while ‘02-‘03, ‘05, and ‘08 Ichiro is more or less an average hitter who runs well and plays good D. There’s nothing out of the ordinary here, except that you never quite know which of those two players you’re going to get.

So to suggest something insiduous is going on with Ichiro based on that, whether or not it would be fair or ethical, would just be dumb and logically unsupportable. Meanwhile, Ibanez is (or was) having a season that is completely out of step with anything he’s ever done, especially in the power department. That’s exactly the kind of performance that *always*, unfortunately, leads to steroid speculation. So I don’t see the comparison. And I don’t think that sort of change has really happened to anyone else in the league this year (or in any of the last several years).

Jack Marshall
14 years ago

Sara: Yup, I sure am.

This kind of “When did you stop beating your wife” passive-aggressive stuff is pure innuendo, dirty pool, unfair, and for any player who has played by the rules and tried to show integrity and professionalism, hurtful and infuriating. A simple application of The Golden Rule would tell Morris that it was wrong. I don’t think he was considering Ibanez at all…which, given the fact that he was the target, is no excuse.

“And maybe that training included…
Well, you know where that one was going, but I’d prefer to leave it as unstated speculation.[UNSTATED???] However, if Ibanez ends up hitting 45-50 homers this year, you can bet that I won’t be the only one raising the question.[SO ARE YOU RAISING “IT” NOW OR NOT?] And judging by my buddy’s message board post this morning, and questions like this in public forums, people already are. {LIKE YOU!] For the record, Ibanez has denied ever using steroids. Back in 2007 when former Mariners OF Shane Monahan said that the clubhouse culture in Seattle led him to use steroids, Ibanez and Jamie Moyer came out and publicly lambasted Monahan while denying that steroids had ever been a presence in the Mariners clubhouse. Of course, as well all know, explicit denials of steroid use don’t really mean a whole hell of a lot these days….” [CUTE—SO YOU”RE DOUBTING THIS MAN’S HONESTY BASED ON THE FACT THAT OTHERS HAVE LIED. BASIS? FAIRNESS?]

The more I read the piece, the more incredible I find it that people really think he was not intentionally suggesting that Ibanez doped….just because he did it in such an indirect and annoying way.

Jason
14 years ago

“exposed legally as Morris”

Aren’t there something like eight lawyers commenting on this blog? Hasn’t it been established that what Morris wrote didn’t put him in any sort of legal danger?

Bill @ the daily something
14 years ago

“Aren’t there something like eight lawyers commenting on this blog? Hasn’t it been established that what Morris wrote didn’t put him in any sort of legal danger?”

Yes and YES.

@Jack Marshall: I agree that all the things you point out are annoying and kind of silly. But I don’t see how any of it rises to the level of “gratuitously and irresponsibly harming others, or publicizing falsities, or being gratuitously mean or unfair just because it’s the standard.” He’s especially not “publicizing falsities,” since he’s not actually putting anything forth as fact (or rather, the facts he does put out, the Mariner clubhouse business, are true and pro-Ibanez). All he’s really doing is pointing out the obvious—if you have a huge and unexpected year like that, at his age, people (him included, apparently) are going to start wondering. At least he didn’t actually draw the concrete conclusion, as Reilly did re. Beltre.

Jack Marshall
14 years ago

Jason: Yes.

Michael
14 years ago

“You may be upset that a fellow blogger got told he was wrong in public, but your argument doesn’t become any stronger when you make stuff up. So please, stop.”

Putting words in peoples’ mouths – mine, Craig’s and Morris’ in specific – would certainly be considered “making stuff up” by many people – and certainly as close to it as you accuse me of. So I urge you to take your own advice.

In fact this perpetuates what a cynic would see as the kernel of the whole argument: is the mainstream sports media a bunch of self-righteous hypocrites? You defend yourself with the weakest of evidence (you got one Griffey quote – that doesn’t even compare to LaRue’s article, which he barely had to write his own text for because the quotes were the story) and then bash me because it proves I’m “making stuff up.”

And your attitude toward the Internet seems to be really misinformed, in that you’re dragging out one scrap off the bottom of the pile and turning it into a Big Deal – a trap that someone named Pierre Salinger ran into back in the day, to the detriment of his career. When even baseball “insiders” on this thread are taking you to task, maybe you should sit for a minute and rethink before flying off the handle.

While we’re all flattered that you’re taking it seriously, the fact is that you’ve spent so many column inches giving publicity to one part of a much larger blog post on a marginal, low-readership blog – there are a large number of good, well-read blogs with unique views that are much more deserving (and thanks for finding this one, by the way – I have no connection, like most here I just think Craig is an awesome writer).

I actually used to write about baseball (blogging wasn’t invented yet), on a site that was relatively popular in the early days of the internet. Want to know why I stopped? Because I found that with the growth of ESPN and sports-talk radio, the media was getting in the way of the sport. They had become the story. So the answer for me was to get out of the position of having to watch, hear or read so much bad reportage and just GO to games.

My question to you: now that you’re so Internet-aware, are you going to begin writing about the GOOD stuff coming from there?

And a final observation: Geoff, look at the Alexa traffic for midwestsportsfans.com:

http://alexa.com/siteinfo/midwestsportsfans.com+hardballtimes.com

(click Traffic Rank and choose Trailing 1 month fom the menu below the chart) First note that THT spanks the hell out of it – like the vast majority of blogs, MSF is a flatline as the number 141,472nd most poular site on the Web (and it covers ALL sports, not just MLB like THT does).

Then note the date that traffic surged. It wasn’t June 8, the day the Ibanez piece ran, or the next day – no, it was pretty much ignored by the world, like most blog posts.

Traffic to MSF spiked after June 10, the day the MSM, Rosenthal and yourself included, Pierre Salinger’ed the Morris post.

So don’t blame all this on a blogger – a blogger is just one dude talking, until someone makes him a Big Deal. You made him a Big Deal.

TC
14 years ago

Jack-I cannot help but feel like your reaction to Tom implies that Morris’ personal standard exist in a vacuum, that they themselves were not influenced by whatever variety of cultures he intersects. 

That said “higher” and “lower” standards, to me, seem to be in the eye of the beholder.  I see writing that I might interpret as careless or deliberate, as light-hearted or serious, harmful to others or benign or helpful, but it’s unclear to me what makes a standard “high” or “low”, objectively speaking.

Preston
14 years ago

Bill, as Joe Posnanski pointed out several days ago, this season is not really out of step with anything Raul Ibanez has ever done – in fact, he’s had several 50 game stretches in his career (and that’s all this is, as of now) in which he has put up similar numbers.  You can read it at http://joeposnanski.com/JoeBlog/2009/06/10/whats-eating-raul/.

Now, while that’s not the easiest thing in the world to notice, necessarily, it probably is something that Morris should have thought about before writing the article the way he did.  After all, we tend to see hot streaks like this to start just about every season; I’m sure you could jump back 50 years and find a comparable situation without too much of a problem.

Jack Marshall
14 years ago

TC…you really don’t see a clear distinction between doing good and harm, being fair or unfair, honest or dishonest, respectful or disrespectful? That standards embodying basic virtues like truth and avoiding gratuitous harm for to others are “higher” than standards embracing lies and cruelty? I find that difficult to believe. Anyone is free to posit a new standard, but as long as the rest of us have to experience and watch its results, we can reject it. That’s how societal standards have always been set, and it works well.

Tom is the one who suggested valid “personal” standards, which suggests to me no specific influences. Perhaps I misunderstood.

Bill @ the daily something
14 years ago

I did read the Poz piece. Yet again, I’m not trying to defend steroid speculation as a thing. The whole topic bores me, and I can’t stand pieces like Morris’. But in context, I think it’s pretty clear that I was assuming Ibanez’ (and Ichiro’s) seasons *end* the way they’ve started. One is exactly the kind of thing that always starts speculization, and one is very clearly not.

Anyway, Poz pretty much makes the same point I’m trying to (though much better, of course):
“I don’t know Jerod at all but feel like in many ways he’s getting a bad rap here”
“What followed, I think, was inevitable. A 37-year-old guy putting up those numbers? A guy few people had noticed the last five years? Yeah, inevitable.”
“Someone, at some point, was going to make an insinuation about Raul Ibanez.”
And so on. But thanks for bringing that piece up.

Michael
14 years ago

Re: Joe Posnanski – funny that it’s taken this long for ANY MSM folk to actually come up with a FACTUAL rebuttal instead of just a sanctimonious “moral” rebuttal.

Hopefully THAT gets picked up and this whole fake controversy is finally put to rest.

Sara K
14 years ago

I see the amazing power of context in the examples you extracted, Jack.  Those lines, separated from the thesis and spirit of the article, certainly do sound vicious.

I am baffled about an apparent discrepancy in perceptions re: the Mariners organization.  Ibanez, as noted by Morris and rehashed by Jack, denied that steroids “had ever been” a part of the Seattle clubhouse. Baker seems to believe that they were indeed part of the 2003 clubhouse (at least, he believed it enough to suggest that the 2004 plummet was due the the fact that “they” were now clean). Unless we’re accepting the possibility that the Mariners (we don’t need to bother naming names) only used in 2003, or only from 2001-2003, then either Ibanez or Baker is woefully misinformed. Or blind. Or lying.

FTR, I have the sense that Baker is an intelligent, well-intentioned person, and I have no reason to believe otherwise of Ibanez.  All the same, can we get our story straight on this?

Jack Marshall
14 years ago

Yeah, Michael, how I enjoy the snarls of those who regard any effort to identify and encourage decent and fair conduct as “sanctimonious.” That’s why “Big Lie’ tactics still remain so effective today…because you and yours only care about the factual rebuttal to the irresponsible accusation, and not whether it should have ever been made in the first place. Just throw it out there, and see what it stirs up, eh? Maybe we’ll get lucky and actually catch a rat! But someone who has done nothing to justify an accusation should not HAVE to rebut one, and neither should Joe Posnanski. Apparently that point eludes you. Too bad.

Michael
14 years ago

Sorry, Jack, I don’t respond to anyone who uses stuff like “you and yours” in the midst of personal attacks.

But thanks for defining “sanctimonious” for us. Thumbs up for that.

Jack Marshall
14 years ago

No apologies necessary, Mikey. I don’t expect responses from those who dismiss genuine efforts to define what’s appropriate conduct as “sanctimonious” and then complain of “personal attacks” when they are called on it. If they had any valid arguments, they wouldn’t resort to name-calling.

The Common Man
14 years ago

Jack, through it all, you still have not proven your underlying assumption, that what Morris did was “gratuitously and irresponsibly harming others, or publicizing falsities, or being gratuitously mean or unfair.”  Your interpretation is that he was deliberately evasive to throw a bomb and run away before it went off.  I, and apparently many others, see it as an acknowledgement of the times we live in, where a 35+ year old guy apparently having a career year raises eyebrows.  I think the burden of proof is on you to demonstrate a) that Morris published a falsity (I see none), b) was mean or unfair (I see no evidence of that), and/or c) actually harmed Raul Ibanez (Ibanez is high in the All Star voting, was sure to go to the game before his injury, is generally well-respected and popular within the game, and has lost $0 because of this).

Tom M. Tango
14 years ago

Geoff says:

“Guarantee you he’s read it since. Again, as any normal person would after this much fuss. Has he come out and apologized, or asked to clarify his remarks? Nope. All we have to go on is that, when told of it, he exploded. The fact that the Philly paper asked him about it is irrelevant. Do you think Ibanez has time to sit around Googling himself at any given moment to see everything written about him?”

I respond:

We don’t know what he was asked specifically.  It may as well have been “This blogger speculated you may be on steroids, and he tried to prove it.  What do you think?”

That Ibanez has subsequently read it, and has not cleared up the issue by saying “The reporter asked me something that really was not what the blogger was trying to say” is not something that we need to infer; that because Ibanez didn’t say it, then we must conclude that he must have been given the proper summary of the article.  Ibanez might simply not want to bother with it.

Geoff says:

“But the law makes no distinction between newspapers and bloggers for libel purposes. “

I respond:

I continually qualify my statements by adding “within the bounds of the law”.  But, this is not the reason that MSM is outraged here, that Morris is a potential libel case.

***

Geoff says:
“So, proving that Morris implied something might not be as big a stretch as you suggest. “

And his linked article responds:

“Since Sullivan, a public official or other person who has voluntarily assumed a position in the public eye must prove that a libelous statement “was made with ‘actual malice’—that is, with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard to whether it was false or not” (Sullivan).”

I respond:

I see no actual malice here.  Furthermore, as the continued existence of TMZ.com, PerezHilton.com, and the Antonella Barba false images have shown, to get to actual malice seems to be quite a bridge to cross.

***

Geoff says:

“why should he, you and other bloggers abide by a less-restrictive moral compass than the MSM? Why should it be morally OK for bloggers to harm innocent people by throwing their names next to unfounded gossip about criminal activity?”

MSM acts as it does because it is in its business and self-interests to do so.  In order for MSM to position themselves as “better” than your run-of-the-mill tabloids, they rely on their code of ethics to show that they are indeed better.  It is for that reason that MSM has a better moral compass.  It is why Stephen Glass and Jayson Blair are extremely detrimental to MSM, but if those guys were working in the National Enquirer it wouldn’t be as big a deal.

In order for tabloids and bloggers to compete, they take a different approach to presenting and analyzing the news.  They rely on the First Amendment to get by, and bask in the notion that editorial control is minimal to non-existant.

Sometimes, they screw up, as court cases show.  And most of the times, they don’t.  The Morris case is not one to be outraged over, for libel purposes.

Craig Calcaterra
14 years ago

Just dropping in to say two things:

1. I’ve done my fair share of defamation law (even represented some newspapers!) and I can say with great confidence that there is an absolutely zero possibility that anything in Morris’ article could even arguably be construed as “actual malice.”  To suggest that Morris is a libel case is ridiculous, and I submit that the subject was injected into the debate as a means to provide some false moral high ground to those attacking him and bloggers in general.  We can argue whether he was “right” to write what he did, but the legal aspect to this is a red herring.

2. I personally don’t subscribe to the notion that someone’s moral compass is dictated or even suggested by the outlet for which they write. Any writer is only as good as his body of work, and no one is entitled to any greater deference or any greater scorn based on whether they’re a blogger or a paid reporter for a major daily or major media company.  I welcome the same scrutiny of my work that any MSM journalist normally receives, and in fact, I’d be insulted if someone told me that I’m subject to a lower standard as a blogger.  Sure, maybe that helps me if go astray, but credibility and integrity is a two way street.  Give me full credit when I do something good, give me full scorn when I #### up.

Any other approach is madness in my mind.

Sara K
14 years ago

I was typing the last sentence of a lovely three-paragraph comment when my darling 1-yr-old daughter wiped it out with an amazingly well-placed swipe of her chubby little hand.  *sigh*  I’ll be back later to attempt a reconstruction…

Bill @ the daily something
14 years ago

Geoff,

Again, you’re just WAY off-base in your understanding of libel and slander law. Just keep reading the link you just posted—the whole thing is about the “public figure doctrine,” which is the very thing that makes you terribly wrong about this. (You did mention “malice” in your blog post, but gave no hint at all of what a huge, almost insurmountable hurdle the “actual malice” standard actually is for public figures.)

For better or worse (I’d think most people in your line of work would be pretty well convinced it’s “better”), the Supreme Court has read our Constitution to make it almost impossible to defame a public figure (which Ibanez is, at least for these purposes) unless you’re really, really trying to. No amount of pure speculation will ever suffice. If he had said “Raul Ibanez is on steroids” in a way that suggested he knew it to be true, or if the article had been written about my cousin Jim Bob the obscure middle manager, then that would be an issue. Public figures often do sue for defamation, but they almost literally never have a leg to stand on.

I wrote a much longer explanation of it on my own blog (the-daily-something.blogspot.com), but the tone of it is the much more antagonistic tone of two days ago, so I don’t even want to link to it directly. If you do read it, I’ve softened on this a great deal since then (as it seems like most of us have on both sides), and I apologize. smile 

To get back to your response to me about Ichiro: I agree with you that it’s dumb to speculate about either Ichiro *or* Ibanez. But that misses the point. Ibanez is having exactly the kind of season, assuming it continues the way it’s started, that always leads to steroid speculation among large sectors of both your colleagues and mine (to the extent that bloggers are “colleagues,” which sounds a little haughty for our meagre set). Ichiro’s is just nowhere close. Yeah, he’s hit a couple more HR, but it’s all well within the bounds of what you might expect from him based on 2005-2008. I guess both Ichiro and Raul have hit twice as many HR as you’d expect, but there’s no reason to pretend that doubling up on 2 is anything at all like doubling up on 11. So both the bloggers and MSM (or some portions of both) engage in just the kind of speculation Morris engaged in; Craig writing a completely out-of-left(or right?)-field piece trashing Ichiro would be a totally different matter, so I don’t see how that gets us anywhere.

Tom M. Tango
14 years ago

Craig said:

“I welcome the same scrutiny of my work that any MSM journalist normally receives, and in fact, I’d be insulted if someone told me that I’m subject to a lower standard as a blogger. “

I respond:

Craig, do you actually do this yourself?  Do you hold the WSJ to the same standard that you hold Hannity or Olbermann?  Or do you do as I suggest, and evaluate people based on their own standards?  You, as a lawyer, where ethics and morality plays a prime role, need in your self-interests to be evaluated to a higher standard. 

For me, as a researcher, for my self-interests, I need for my work to be considered well thought out and unbiased. If I wanted to speculate about Roger Clemens, prior to the Mitchell report, I’m fine with that, if it means I have to be held to a lower moral standard for my work to be published.

Again, all within the bounds of law.

Sara K
14 years ago

LCee, I think that while Tom maybe opposed to thier politics, the reason he notes them is that their rhetorical standards would seem to fall below what we are apparently supposed to expect from ‘legitimate’ journalists.  The fact that they are all conservatives does distract from the point, but the point is worth pursuing – if there is some standard all who write for the public should adhere to, whose standard is it? Where is it described?  Who are its models?

That is to say, whose standard are we supposed to measure Morris against?

Geoff Baker
14 years ago

For Bill,

Actually, though, Ichiro’s OBP was only marginally better in 2007 than it is now. The only reason he’s not blowing that away is because his walk rate is way down. Why should he walk when he’s crushing the ball? And since when does steroids talk and speculation center around OBP?

Fact is, Ichiro is on-pace for his best OPS and slugging percentage since 2004, his most home runs and isolated power since 2005 and his most doubles since 2001. His OPS and slugging is the best of his career because of the home runs and doubles. That’s the stuff that’s being used to fuel steroids speculation in Ibanez’s case, so why not here in Ichiro’s case?

And remember, in 2004, Ichiro was 30. In 2005, he was 31.

Today, he is 35 and will be 36 in November, exactly the type of “late bloomer’’ status that is being used to excuse the Ibanez speculation. So, why not have some Ichiro speculation? He is coming close to career highs or second-best highs in several power categories. Sounds like fair game to me, if we apply the “logic’’ used to justify the targetting of Ibanez.

I just think it stinks in both cases.

And how about this idea? A player could also have theoretically used steroids to maintain a consistent level of production from 2001-2009. So, if Ichiro was indeed consistent all those years—which he wasn’t, because of the power spike I just showed you—could steroids not be the reason he is just as consistent at 35 as he was at age 28? Of course it could be. Which is why this type of speculation about Ibanez is bunk. You could speculate about anybody, given what we know about PEDs.

Morris had zero grounds to do so, other than the whispers of the uninformed, chattering classes, who he gave a voice to for whatever resaon.

Craig Calcaterra
14 years ago

“Do you hold the WSJ to the same standard that you hold Hannity or Olbermann?  Or do you do as I suggest, and evaluate people based on their own standards?”

With the caveat that I no longer watch cable news of any type, I’ll offer that I don’t consider Hannity and Olbermann on the one hand, and the WSJ on the other, to be in the same business.  The talking heads are entertainers, and within their little world, yes, I hold them all to the same standard, and that standard is hardly ever met (thus my abandonment of them).

And that kind of distinction probably goes for me and you too.  I dabble (very inartfully) in some rough analysis. You don’t comment on breaking news and stuff and big circus issues as much as I do.  For the most part, we’re doing differnt things, even if we both do it in the context of our blogs.  My view is that any speculation you do about Roger Clemens in the service of your analysis of Roger Clemens’ performance is a different thing than my analysis of Roger Clemens as a person or personality or his Hall of Fame case or whatever. You have to speculate to make sense of numbers. If I speculate, it probably has to be couched differently.

Or maybe not. I’m not sure, to be honest. If it helps, though, I’ll state again that Morris’ stuff didn’t violate any standard in my mind.

michael standish
14 years ago

Better Late Than Never Department:

Someone should have the decency to inform Capper that some lunatic is sending deeply weird messages to the Shyster under his (Capper’s, that is) name.

Craig Calcaterra
14 years ago

The point—I’ll add—is that if there is a distinction in standards to be made (and I’ll grant that there may be) it’s not to be based on whether one is a blogger or online or reporter for a print enterprise.

Tom M. Tango
14 years ago

Craig said:

“The point—I’ll add—is that if there is a distinction in standards to be made (and I’ll grant that there may be) it’s not to be based on whether one is a blogger or online or reporter for a print enterprise.”

Right, as my examples of Lehrer v O’Reilly would suggest.  They are both delivering topical pieces on TV, but I will hold them to the standards that they themselves (implicitly) suggest.

I will hold WSJ to a different standard than the NY Daily news, even though they get their newsprint from the same forest.

I will hold WSJ.com and PerezHilton.com to a different standard, even though they have the same distribution system.

It is not the act of blogging that sets the standard.  It is the specific individual doing whatever expression of First Amendment they are doing.  I consider Poz and DK Wilson to be the best bloggers around, and I’ll hold them to that standard.  I do that because their talents and their content require me to hold them to that standard, in order for them to be as effective as they are.

For Morris, I’ll treat him like a run-of-the-mill blogger, maybe a bit better.

Craig Calcaterra
14 years ago

“I will hold WSJ to a different standard than the NY Daily news”

If they’re both reporting that X happened in Y location yesterday, why would you hold them to a different standard? If Morris and Posnanski are both handicapping the pennant races, why would you hold them to a different standard?

You can certainly take reputations into account when it comes to whether to read someone and, depending on what someone is saying, whether you trust them, but for very basic things like is someone reporting accurate news or is someone offering a compelling argument, I don’t see how it’s relevant. 

Look, I’m not going to the mat on this here, because credibility and all of that can be a particularly individualized concept. I’m just saying that if I report that Hanley Ramirez is about to be traded to the Blue Jays, and I’m wrong, I don’t want anyone saying “well, he is just a blogger, so let’s at least congratulate him for trying to get a story out there.”  At the same time, if a columnist for ESPN the Magazine mangles a piece about the legal implications of the Mitchell Report, I don’t want to hear someone say “well he’s Mr. Big Columnist, and he’s usually right about these things, so let’s cut him a break.”

Sara K
14 years ago

Or a desire to take a closer look at the speculation, offer various ways of interpreting the information at hand, make the point that although we are at a point where we speculate reflexively, no case is ever so cut-and-dried…

Yes, I understand why you aren’t comfortable that he used a named case study for his examination, but we have different interpretations of the purpose and effect of the article.

Jack Marshall
14 years ago

Re: Standards.

The way we set standards was perfectly articulated by Craig above: “Give me full credit whenI do something good, give me full scorn when I #### up.”

Bingo.

This discussion is the way standards get set. Rational performers in the culture adapt their conduct to the consensus. Those who don’t ultimately lose respect, credibility and influence. Censors are unnecessary. But neither can one individual set a personal standard and ignore the professional consensus.

Dan Rather and CBS were positing new journalistic standards on “60 Minutes” when they attempted to use a forged letter to “prove” what was probably true. It was rejected. The New York Times tried a new journalistic standard when it published as front page news speculation by aides that Sen. McCain was having an “inappropriate relationship” with a female lobbyist . (I think this smear job was fairly similar to what Morris did.) The Times caught hell, and won’t try that again soon.

The libel issue (no way Morris’s piece is actionable) just muddles the discussion. Absolutely, Morris is FREE to do what he did. Absolutely, he has the legal RIGHT.  The question is whether anyone who publishes on the web has an obligation to strive for higher ethical standards of competence, fairness,and responsibility than someone writing in their own diary…indeed,whether they should perhaps even strive for the same ethical standards journalists should (but mostly don’t) adhere to.

I just checked the Wikipedia entry for Ibanez, which now includes THIS:

“Ibáñez was the focus of a post in the blog “Midwest Sports Fans”[4] which raised concerns that he was using performance-enhancing drugs.”

And I just ask: is this fair? Is it right? Is it right that a player who, outside of having the audacity to have a hot two months at the plate, has never done one thing to make anyone legitimately doubt his honesty and integrity, should now have this innuendo follow him on the web…theoretically for all time?

Tom M. Tango
14 years ago

Craig said:

“If they’re both reporting that X happened in Y location yesterday, why would you hold them to a different standard?”

If Reuters is reporting something that is happening in Iran today, I will trust them more than if NY Daily News is reporting on the events there.  Reuters NEEDS to be as accurate as possible.  NY Daily News just needs to be “close enough”.

As for your ESPN example of analyzing the Mitchell report, I will hold them to a pretty low standard, and I will look to you, and other legal bloggers for the best way to interpret that report.  In this case, bloggers are held to a higher standard, but that is only a particular group of bloggers.