College football

Matters of Law and Matters of Conscience

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First published in The War Eagle Reader. Link to it here.

It seems that as soon as the first part of Sports Illustrated’s series on the Oklahoma State football program was released, the criticism began.

And quickly following the criticism were the SI defenders. In defending SI, they assured everyone that the articles were well-vetted and legally in the clear.

In today’s media climate, the SI approach to defending its series, much like the series itself, reflects a dated approach.

As many have pointed out, the article itself is fast food — a tired menu served repeatedly.  The “gotcha” articles on NCAA violations have been criticized for ignoring the larger systemic problems while distracting everyone’s attention with hard-to-prove allegations.

SI can make much of its legal vetting and discussions.  But I wonder if, early in the planning process, anyone at the decision-making level sighed and said, “Do we really have to do another of these?  Do they perform a public service in 2013?”

As such, the articles seem to be causing more of a yawn than SI could have anticipated.  Given the struggles facing SI and other magazines, it might not have been the best strategy.

But just as outmoded is SI’s “it’s legal!” strategy.  Maybe back in the day of fewer media outlets, that might have worked.  Considering the multiple outlets fans can choose from today, SI might be again miscalculating.

Perhaps Thayer Evans once again actually did keep just to this side of legal and nonactionable behavior.  Good for him.

But Evans’ approach to ethics has been clear from his actions in the past.  There, it is obvious that his goal is professional success, and anyone involved — sources or subjects — is a means to that end.  And that approach might cost SI more readers than the results would generate.

From his embellished reporting of Texas recruit Jamarkus McFarland to his encouragement of the breaking of federal privacy law in his reporting of Cam Newton at Florida (saved only by Florida’s lack of interest in prosecuting the case) to the cultural bigotry that he and Pete Thamel showed in their reporting on Tyrann Mathieu, Evans has portrayed few of the tenets of ethical journalism.

And in this situation, Evans has practiced his specialty of carpet-bomb interviews.  He approaches a slew of sources with no warning, neglects to say he is conducting an interview (though I always warn anyone that when you are talking to a journalist, you are being interviewed), and slaps the results together with zero concern for the interview subject.

(Disclosure: I am a faculty member at Auburn University.  I will claim my concern is based on ethics, not content.  But that is for the reader to judge.)

Today, when a writer’s past is transparent, regardless of his own ethics, Evans’ record is there to judge.  So that when sources claim that he deceived, or did not fully disclose, or misquoted, readers have a lot of evidence at their disposal.

For some reason, Thayer Evans is a sports journalism Lane Kiffin, falling upward after consistent ethical fumbles.  Apparently SI likes him because he “gets the story;” I almost expect his SI editors to be wearing green eyeshades in smoke-filled rooms.  A former SI staffer had his own theories as to why Evans and Pete Thamel were hired, along with concerns.

And maybe they paired him with George Dohrmann, a Pulitzer Prize winner, to add a respectable veneer to his reporting tactics.  Like expecting a clean dog to scare the fleas off its mangy companion.

The Oklahoma State series might not result in any successful lawsuits.  But the journalism being practiced and endorsed — in both its ethics and its perspective — belongs to another age.  Its statute of limitations has long run out.

To my students and other journalism students, a reminder: The subjects you interview and write about are human beings, not objects.

And you are a human being as well.  Act like one.

Auburn journalism professor: Joe Schad’s ESPN report on Manziel raises questions about credibility

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First published on AL.com. Find it here.

When ESPN’s Joe Schad reported on the Johnny Manziel autograph allegations Tuesday, those who follow me on Twitter (shameless plug — @John_P_Carvalho), you saw me tweeting a lot of questions.

These questions reflect the kind of issues we talk about in journalism as it relates to such issues as source credibility and anonymous sources.  So here, with more than 140 characters, are some of these issues.

First, a complaint about reality.  I recognize that ESPN is in a rush to stay ahead on this story.  I am not suggesting that they gaze at their navels for days, meditating on principle while the story passes them by.  But some additional steps would enhance their credibility and maybe help the reader understand the story better and trust the reporting more.

Now, on to the problems:

Problem #1: Source credibility.  I do not know much about autograph brokers, but they don’t seem to rate high on the respect scale.  They seem to prey on the naivete of both athletes and sports fans.

Journalists deal with this all the time.  Perhaps a paragraph of discussion in the article, along with a link to a sidebar on these brokers, would enlighten the audience as to ESPN’s awareness of whom they are dealing with.

Source credibility was a big issue in an important libel case, Curtis Publishing Co. v. Butts (1967).  You’ll have to do your own Google search for the case details; it does involve allegations of cheating against Bear Bryant, to whet your appetite.  One thing that worked against the Saturday Evening Post was that the main source for the article had served jail time for fraud.

Problem #2: Granting anonymity.  Perhaps no ethical decision is abused more than this.  Journalists recognize that granting anonymity immediately causes the audience to doubt the source, so we try to make sure the source has a good reason for requesting anonymity.

This source would claim a valid reason for requesting anonymity.  He (Schad identifies him as a male) could lose business if he is identified as the source for the video.  But when a source in a shady business (see Problem #1) seeks protection, the cringe factor increases.  Granting anonymity to the wrong source can make the reporter look like a dupe.

The responsible thing to do is, within the article, include a paragraph or two explaining the decision and explaining how the source fits in to the story and the situation.  In other stories (granted, involving more credible sources), you frequently see a sentence like, “The sources requested to remain anonymous because they are not authorized to release information on the case.”

Another responsible action, which I would wager Schad did, would be to identify the anonymous source to a superior.  This is SOP for any journalist.  Washington Post Executive Editor Ben Bradlee knew the identity of “Deep Throat” in All the President’s Men.  Which relates to the next problem.

Problem #3: Selling videos.  While the cell phone video has what would be explosive content, if true, ESPN was correct in not paying the autograph broker for it.  While some tabloid publications/websites might, most traditional media outlets do not pay for interviews or documents.

In essence, the autograph broker was damaging his own credibility here.  Schad’s story does not specifically say that the revelation of the video’s existence set off some kind of bidding war, though I can imagine the broker got at least a few offers.  In offering it for sale, he seems to be out for personal gain more than anything.

What is confusing, however, is who actually saw the cellphone video.  Did Schad alone see it?  Or did someone else see it?  The story is unclear here, because it uses the terms “Schad” and “ESPN” interchangeably.  (In these situations, I usually write a comment in the margin that says something like, “Networks don’t view videos; people do,” and have my student clarify.)

As with the anonymous source, it would be safest for two people — Schad and someone else, preferably a peer or superior — to view the video.  That not only increases the story’s credibility, but demonstrates ESPN’s commitment to cover its bases.

I’m not claiming that these are situations where ESPN and Schad failed.  I am saying that these are potential pitfalls that should be addressed in the presentation of such reports.

It’s one reason investigative reporting is such an arduous and costly enterprise.  In the classroom, we teach our students not simply to take such situations and run with them, but to evaluate and appraise and ask and decide, and then to communicate those decisions.

(Side note: Critics always claim that college students should not major in journalism.  This is an example of why it is a good reason to do so.  Better to cover this stuff in the classroom, before it runs you over in a job-related situation)

I doubt ESPN reps or Joe Schad will answer these questions because of what I write here.  Let’s hope they answer these questions in their articles because it represents solid, responsible investigative journalism.

Auburn is Writing its Own Stories

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First published by The War Eagle Reader. Link to it here.

The Auburn Athletic Department’s hiring of former Birmingham News sportswriter Charles Goldberg and former Huntsville Times/AuburnUndercover writer Phillip Marshall was a surprise.

The trend, however, is nothing new.  Many major college athletic departments are doing the same thing.  Having relied on newspapers and Web sites in the past, they are taking their messages straight to their publics.

That adds a lot of new wrinkles at every point of the relationship between fans, athletic programs and media.  The term “media” might be derived from the Latin for “between,” but the World Wide Web and social media are empowering organizations to shoulder the traditional media out of the way and speak directly to audiences effectively.

For the Auburn Athletic Department, that means using Facebook and Twitter to direct fans to its website, AuburnTigers.com.  Jack Smith, senior associate athletic director for communications, oversees the project.

Smith said about 20 FBS-level schools have hired popular, experienced beat writers for that purpose, following the lead of NFL teams.  He points to the University of Florida, which hired Chris Harry, who covered the Gators for 13 years with the Orlando Sentinel, to be senior staff writer for GatorZone.com.

And the University of Oregon just announced the hiring of Rob Moseley, who covered Ducks football for the Eugene Register-Guard for the past six years, as editor-in-chief of goducks.com.

The goal, Smith said, is to engage the Auburn community — fans, alumni, students and donors — on all platforms.  That includes the above strategies and a new project, Tiger Roar Digital, an online version of the quarterly magazine sent to Tigers Unlimited donors.  The online magazine will launch in mid-August, featuring articles by Goldberg and Marshall, photos by Todd Van Emst, and embedded videos, Smith said.

It’s a recent project, but it has been in the works for a while.  Marshall, long-time Auburn beat writer for the Huntsville Times(1994-2008) and AuburnUndercover.com (2008-2013), said Smith originally approached him last summer, long before the Selena Roberts article on Mike McNeil and the ESPN report on Dakota Mosley, in case you were wondering.

Marshall, however, declined the opportunity.  Earlier this year, the Athletic Department hired Goldberg.  When they approached Marshall again in June, he was ready for the change.

“The move to 24/7 was really good,” he said, referring to the parent company of the AuburnUndercover site.  The site had grown in his time there, fueled by the 2010 national championship and two coaching transitions.

Two aspects of the job, however, grew difficult.  The first was administration of message boards and answering fan questions.  ”For a long time I didn’t mind it, but it was wearing on me at the time,” he said.

The second was the increased emphasis on recruiting.  Fan sites like AuburnUndercover draw and keep their subscribers with aggressive recruiting news, and while Bryan Matthews does excellent work for AuburnUndercover, Marshall said he won’t mind leaving that behind.

Because it is affiliated with the Athletic Department, AuburnTigers.com is not allowed to report on the recruiting of specific athletes.  So at least from that perspective, the other sports media retain at least one advantage, besides editorial independence.

The audience is there.  Auburn’s official Facebook page has more than 256,000 likes.  Marshall has almost 10,000 Twitter followers (though he admits to mainly linking and retweeting).  Goldberg — also a retweeter and linker — has 18,000 followers and the Auburn football has about 64,000.  Even counting for overlap, that is a lot of potential eyes for Marshall’s and Goldberg’s articles.

Fans familiar with Goldberg and Marshall know what to expect.  They channel Grantland Rice more than Deadspin, and while they are reliable information sources — an Auburn football news tip, good or bad, was not considered solid until one of them confirmed it — they are well-suited to the articles intended for the site.

Marshall said the most attractive part of the job is “telling stories of Auburn athletes and coaches.  I like doing those kind of in-depth profile stories.”

Smith said that Goldberg and Marshall are expected to write objective stories.  At the same time, Smith, avoiding references to current sports, said, “If we had a cricket team, and it were to get destroyed in a game, and the coach says, ‘That’s as bad as my team has played all year,’ they are going to quote the coach.  At the same time, they are not going to write a column that the cricket coach should be fired.”

Marshall concurred with Smith’s example.  ”I’m not going to write a column that’s saying someone ought to be fired,” he said, “but the truth of the matter is, I’ve never done that anyway.”

So where does that leave the traditional media folks and relatively newer fan sites? Piece of cake. The AuburnTigers.com strategy might take some attention and media time from the audience, but as we’re finding, the saturation point is a constant speck on the horizon.  This ain’t the 1970s, when the market was driven by scarcity.

The main advantage — and it’s neither small nor minor — for Goldberg and Marshall is access. The Athletic Department can have them break news on official announcements, embargoing the external news sources.  That would also enhance the AuburnTigers.com site, making it seem more useful as a news source.

That’s a tough head start for their colleagues to overcome.  Still, the Jay Tates and Brandon Marcellos will have plenty of opportunities to provide the kind of information fans won’t find on the AuburnTigers.com site, and they are definitely up to the challenge.

Sports fans are information-hungry and information-savvy — whether the information comes from the media or from the organization itself.  They know what kind of info they like and they know where to get it and how to find new sources.  In that sense, there is still plenty of attention to go around.