Possible ESPN Agenda

[JJReddawg]

In seeing all the reports that are broadcast on ESPN (i.e. OTL & Sportscenter) and how they only seem to report one side of this story makes me believe they have some agenda. Forget about them being behind in the Penn State situation. Even if they were trying to be in the forefont on this one, they would still report more from the previous investigation and why it was never aired; kind of like the Post-Standard's report on why they didn't report it. I also believe more face time would be given to former players coming out and supporting Bernie Fine.

So, why would ESPN and their legal team continue to allow the one sided reporting?
1.) A lawsuit from either Fine or Syracuse would appear to be unlikely as this would bring the this whole situation up again and they would have to prove that these events did not take place. It appears to me the only way that would happen is if either of the accussers came out and stated they were lying about everything.
2.) Could their possible motive be to devalue Syracuse University as a whole. Whether these allegations are true or not, putting this out there does not look good for the Univeristy. (i.e. Isiah Whitehead) So why would ESPN attempt to be devaluing Syracuse? Could it possibly be so that when the ACC goes to ESPN to renegotiate their contract, the value of adding Syracuse is no longer as much as it once was? It seems as if the Penn State situation gave them a perfect opportunity to bring up a dead investigation from 8 years ago.

**The following is complete speculation and should be taken as nothing more**

In another note, I read on here that someone had talked about Dr. Drew having a discussion on lying and that sometimes the act occurred, but was usually done by someone else. So let's say that molestation occurred to both Bobby Davis and Mike Lang. Is it a coincidence that they are step brothers? Could it have possibly been the Father/Step Father who committed the acts against the two of them? He passed away in April of 2010. Did Mike Lang feel obligated to say something about his father, but never did? Was he bitter about never saying anything and felt he needed to get this off of his chest to clear his "demons"? Did his step brothers allegations against Bernie Fine, someone who he was connected to and thought of as a fatherly figure, provide him the perfect opportunity to clear his "demons"?

 

[liljoe]

**The following is complete speculation and should be taken as nothing more**

In another note, I read on here that someone had talked about Dr. Drew having a discussion on lying and that sometimes the act occurred, but was usually done by someone else. So let's say that molestation occurred to both Bobby Davis and Mike Lang. Is it a coincidence that they are step brothers? Could it have possibly been the Father/Step Father who committed the acts against the two of them? He passed away in April of 2010. Did Mike Lang feel obligated to say something about his father, but never did? Was he bitter about never saying anything and felt he needed to get this off of his chest to clear his "demons"? Did his step brothers allegations against Bernie Fine, someone who he was connected to and thought of as a fatherly figure, provide him the perfect opportunity to clear his "demons"?

Sorry, label it speculation all you want, this is not ok on your part. It's this type of speculation that harms people in the first place.

 

[orangefan13]

Maybe we will find out after the 03 title the alleged victims are taking the fall to make Bernie and JB heros and get the university alot of money.

They can just plead insanity by drugs right?

Later JB comes on and says I told you so this whole thing was about money

 

[armory]

ESPN is in bristol connecticut. They are likely UConn fans. Syracuse leaving the big east without UConn hurts UConn's program. ESPN decides to take down Syracuse's program as revenge.

Take it to the bank.

 

[orangefan13]

ESPN fears us having to much recruiting and momentum under JB for Duke and UNC.

Yet Duke and UNC become outraged espn is trying to do this to us.

 

[BlackSquirrels]

So, why would ESPN and their legal team continue to allow the one sided reporting?
...
2.) Could their possible motive be to devalue Syracuse University as a whole. Whether these allegations are true or not, putting this out there does not look good for the Univeristy. (i.e. Isiah Whitehead) So why would ESPN attempt to be devaluing Syracuse? Could it possibly be so that when the ACC goes to ESPN to renegotiate their contract, the value of adding Syracuse is no longer as much as it once was? It seems as if the Penn State situation gave them a perfect opportunity to bring up a dead investigation from 8 years ago.

This is the new leader in the clubhouse for most outrageous conspiracy theory of the season. (The previous leader was the idea that Boeheim has only been starting Brandon Triche the last few years to curry favor with DaJuan Coleman.)

A huge part of ESPN's business is college sports. It doesn't help ESPN very much to have people thinking there are deviants involved with college sports programs.

Also, this morning's OTL piece was not exactly one-sided. They gave a lot of air time to Boeheim's comments in support of Fine. The show ended with legal analyst Roger Cossack emphasizing the importance of Boeheim's denial of Davis's claim that Boeheim saw Davis in Fine's hotel room and reminding everyone about the Duke lacrosse case.

 

[Dick_in_MI]

In seeing all the reports that are broadcast on ESPN (i.e. OTL & Sportscenter) and how they only seem to report one side of this story..."

Truthfully, this is the thing that bothers me the most about this. You would think that journalistic integrity would dictate that they would perhaps present a position but at the same time present all sides of the story.

Instead, they are acting as though they have been retained as Davis' personal attorneys and PR people. Yes there have been a few atempts but there have been many segements on ESPN that failed to mention the other side at all.

I don't know if they have an agenda or not, but I'm shocked that there isn't an editior somewhere in Bristol who doesn't see the general lack of impartiality.

 

[DoctorBombay]

ESPN is in bristol connecticut. They are likely UConn fans. Syracuse leaving the big east without UConn hurts UConn's program. ESPN decides to take down Syracuse's program as revenge.

Take it to the bank.

 

[fairfaxcuse]

Truthfully, this is the thing that bothers me the most about this. You would think that journalistic integrity would dictate that they would perhaps present a position but at the same time present all sides of the story.

Instead, they are acting as though they have been retained as Davis' personal attorneys and PR people.

I don't know if they have an agenda or not, but I'm shocked that there isn't an editior somewhere in Bristol who doesn't see the complete lack of impartiality.

I'm with you- The only balance that I have seen on ESPN was by the lawyer on outside the lines who cited the Duke lax scandal, but even he hedged a bit.

I'm kinda of disappointed there are not more calls questioning just the reporting other than Jason Whitlock (and maybe the Post Standard if you read between the lines) . If you compare the PS stories this am with those from ESPN, the unevenness in reporting is glaring. The PS stories paint shades of grey whereas everything is black and white with ESPN. PS notes why they didn't write the story and what has changed. They also ask unanswered questions regarding the investigation, such as the Syracuse Police's role. Finally, the PS does not gloss over what were disturbing details on both Fine and Davis's stories (e.g., the lack of coorboration on Davis's part (possibly bad for Davis) and the fact that Davis did get 5K from Fine (possibly bad for Fine)).

When the story broke on Thursday, ESPN had every right to run the allegations with two sources. However, their reporting is completely unbalanced and now is lacking credibility. None of this says whether Fine is innocent or guilty. It just says that if you look to ESPN, you can not trust them to run the full story and that is a pretty awful thing to say about any organization trying to report the news.

 

[Dick_in_MI]

When the story broke on Thursday, ESPN had every right to run the allegations with two sources. However, their reporting is completely unbalanced and now is lacking credibility. None of this says whether Fine is innocent or guilty. It just says that if you look to ESPN, you can not trust them to run the full story and that is a pretty awful thing to say about any organization trying to report the news.

That's it in a nutshell. The sad thing is that much of the country takes what ESPN is presenting at face value, and thus their opinion of Fine as well as the University is based upon one-sided reports.

It has nothing to do with Bernie's guilt or innocence.

To me, everytime they present allegations in this matter they should be saying "we'd like to remind our viewers that between 2003 and 2005 Syracuse University, The Syracuse Post standard, and we at ESPN investigated these claims and did not find sufficient proof of their veracity.

While that doesn't mean new evidence hasn't come to light, it would at least attempt to communicate the fact that there were two sides to the story.

 

['72 Orange]

I was shocked that the first instance I could recall in the OTL story of someone mnetioning the concept of "presumed innocent until proven guilty" was 23 mins into a 30 min story. Yeah that's fair & balanced!

 

[Zelda Zonk]

Truthfully, this is the thing that bothers me the most about this. You would think that journalistic integrity would dictate that they would perhaps present a position but at the same time present all sides of the story.

If the accusations weren't against Syracuse, we would likely not have an issue with "journalistic integrity." We would probably be more in favor of ensuring that "all the facts" are released and that any culpable individuals are brought to justice, because children need to be protected.

Yeah, there's a conflict. Protecting REAL victims involves infringing upon the rights of the accused. It's a problem. It's more of a problem with those deemed "public figures," as "private citizens" don't have accusations broadcast to the world. I wish all of this could be done privately, but then you have the matter that the press CAN help to ensure transparency in the process.

Sadly, there isn't a perfect system. Life isn't fair.

ESPN... Well, they're broadcasting a report by one of their reporters. If they were to all deny the validity of the report, they wouldn't have aired it in the first place. It's not a surprise that they're backing a story they aired. Some of ESPN's programming provides for editorialism and opinion. Some programming is more 'newsy.' In the latter is found more objectivity.

 

[jordoo]

ESPN's agenda is the same as always to make money and move closer to monopolizing sports.

 

[Dick_in_MI]

If the accusations weren't against Syracuse, we would likely not have an issue with "journalistic integrity." We would probably be more in favor of ensuring that "all the facts" are released and that any culpable individuals are brought to justice, because children need to be protected.

Who says that SU fans don't want all the facts released? I sure do and I'm guessing most others do as well.

that wasn't really the point of my post.

 

[jekelish]

I definitely want every fact to come out. The quicker that happens, the quicker Bernie can be exonerated, or the quicker we can rid our University of a monster and start fresh. In either case, I don't want any facts left uncovered.

I just really hope it's the whole "exonerated" thing.

 

[DoctorBombay]

If the accusations weren't against Syracuse, we would likely not have an issue with "journalistic integrity." We would probably be more in favor of ensuring that "all the facts" are released and that any culpable individuals are brought to justice, because children need to be protected.

Yeah, there's a conflict. Protecting REAL victims involves infringing upon the rights of the accused. It's a problem. It's more of a problem with those deemed "public figures," as "private citizens" don't have accusations broadcast to the world. I wish all of this could be done privately, but then you have the matter that the press CAN help to ensure transparency in the process.

Sadly, there isn't a perfect system. Life isn't fair.

ESPN... Well, they're broadcasting a report by one of their reporters. If they were to all deny the validity of the report, they wouldn't have aired it in the first place. It's not a surprise that they're backing a story they aired. Some of ESPN's programming provides for editorialism and opinion. Some programming is more 'newsy.' In the latter is found more objectivity.

In the PSU case, I didn't necessarily feel Paterno should've been fired for his role. He did after all contact the "proper" authorities. He was fired for being the face of PSU, & for not doing more. As for Sandusky; the GJ, the arrests, the indictments, multiple witnesses, a 3+year investigation, prior admitted involvement, etc. kinda secured his status in the story.

Bernie Fine has been ACCUSED, INVESTIGATED, but not charged. He has done nothing wrong...until further notice. So, responsibly calling for the "facts to be released" in this case, is alot more important IMO.
What ESPN is doing is, using its bully pulpit to hammer allegations at the man without due process, and that's scary as hell.

Anyone...yes, anyone can be accused of something like this, and then asked to disprove a negative.
Its like that question; "When did you stop beating your wife"? There is no right answer that would absolve you of some guilt.
ESPN is literally posing this question about Bernie Fine through its biased reporting. Its shameful, disgraceful, but most of all, frightening.

 

[Col. Bleep]

If the accusations weren't against Syracuse, we would likely not have an issue with "journalistic integrity." We would probably be more in favor of ensuring that "all the facts" are released and that any culpable individuals are brought to justice, because children need to be protected.

Yeah, there's a conflict. Protecting REAL victims involves infringing upon the rights of the accused. It's a problem. It's more of a problem with those deemed "public figures," as "private citizens" don't have accusations broadcast to the world. I wish all of this could be done privately, but then you have the matter that the press CAN help to ensure transparency in the process.

Sadly, there isn't a perfect system. Life isn't fair.

ESPN... Well, they're broadcasting a report by one of their reporters. If they were to all deny the validity of the report, they wouldn't have aired it in the first place. It's not a surprise that they're backing a story they aired. Some of ESPN's programming provides for editorialism and opinion. Some programming is more 'newsy.' In the latter is found more objectivity.

AMEN!
Unfortunately, you're one of the few posters who seems to have any sense of responsibility.

I hope Bernie fine is innocent.
I have my own issues with ESPN's work on this story.
I think the accusers have some problems with their stories (most accusers do - regardless of the veracity of the underlying accusation).
I think the Syracuse police have some problems.

But the last thing I'm going to do is make silly conclusory judgments about an alleged act that is among the worst crimes possible.

It's one thing for someone to say he doesn't see much hard evidence against Bernie Fine. It's quite another to jump up and down and blame ESPN, the police or the man in the moon. It illustrates the "our team all the way" attitude that permeates big time college sports and fosters the "just win, baby" culture. And that's what opens the door for all kinds of corruption.

Zelda is absolutely right. If this was happening at another school we'd be
demanding investigations and hollering about protecting victims.
(Imagine the uproar if it was G-town).

But it's not. It's our team. Our responsibility is still the same.

I think there's a good chance that someone will do a story about the attitudes expressed by people on this forum. For the sake of SU basketball and its fans, I really hope that doesn't happen. The story wouldn't be very flattering.

 

[Bayside44]

In seeing all the reports that are broadcast on ESPN (i.e. OTL & Sportscenter) and how they only seem to report one side of this story makes me believe they have some agenda. Forget about them being behind in the Penn State situation. Even if they were trying to be in the forefont on this one, they would still report more from the previous investigation and why it was never aired; kind of like the Post-Standard's report on why they didn't report it. I also believe more face time would be given to former players coming out and supporting Bernie Fine.

So, why would ESPN and their legal team continue to allow the one sided reporting?
1.) A lawsuit from either Fine or Syracuse would appear to be unlikely as this would bring the this whole situation up again and they would have to prove that these events did not take place. It appears to me the only way that would happen is if either of the accussers came out and stated they were lying about everything.
2.) Could their possible motive be to devalue Syracuse University as a whole. Whether these allegations are true or not, putting this out there does not look good for the Univeristy. (i.e. Isiah Whitehead) So why would ESPN attempt to be devaluing Syracuse? Could it possibly be so that when the ACC goes to ESPN to renegotiate their contract, the value of adding Syracuse is no longer as much as it once was? It seems as if the Penn State situation gave them a perfect opportunity to bring up a dead investigation from 8 years ago.

**The following is complete speculation and should be taken as nothing more**

In another note, I read on here that someone had talked about Dr. Drew having a discussion on lying and that sometimes the act occurred, but was usually done by someone else. So let's say that molestation occurred to both Bobby Davis and Mike Lang. Is it a coincidence that they are step brothers? Could it have possibly been the Father/Step Father who committed the acts against the two of them? He passed away in April of 2010. Did Mike Lang feel obligated to say something about his father, but never did? Was he bitter about never saying anything and felt he needed to get this off of his chest to clear his "demons"? Did his step brothers allegations against Bernie Fine, someone who he was connected to and thought of as a fatherly figure, provide him the perfect opportunity to clear his "demons"?

This is tin foil hat stuff. ESPN is trying to break a story - however hamfisted it may be. I doubt a place loaded with SU grads is intentionally trying to take down the homeland.

 

[cuserulesall]

AMEN!
Unfortunately, you're one of the few posters who seems to have any sense of responsibility.

I hope Bernie fine is innocent.
I have my own issues with ESPN's work on this story.
I think the accusers have some problems with their stories (most accusers do - regardless of the veracity of the underlying accusation).
I think the Syracuse police have some problems.

But the last thing I'm going to do is make silly conclusory judgments about an alleged act that is among the worst crimes possible.

It's one thing for someone to say he doesn't see much hard evidence against Bernie Fine. It's quite another to jump up and down and blame ESPN, the police or the man in the moon. It illustrates the "our team all the way" attitude that permeates big time college sports and fosters the "just win, baby" culture. And that's what opens the door for all kinds of corruption.

Zelda is absolutely right. If this was happening at another school we'd be
demanding investigations and hollering about protecting victims.
(Imagine the uproar if it was G-town).

But it's not. It's our team. Our responsibility is still the same.

I think there's a good chance that someone will do a story about the attitudes expressed by people on this forum. For the sake of SU basketball and its fans, I really hope that doesn't happen. The story wouldn't be very flattering.

That's it in a nutshell. The sad thing is that much of the country takes what ESPN is presenting at face value, and thus their opinion of Fine as well as the University is based upon one-sided reports.

It has nothing to do with Bernie's guilt or innocence.

To me, everytime they present allegations in this matter they should be saying "we'd like to remind our viewers that between 2003 and 2005 Syracuse University, The Syracuse Post standard, and we at ESPN investigated these claims and did not find sufficient proof of their veracity.

While that doesn't mean new evidence hasn't come to light, it would at least attempt to communicate the fact that there were two sides to the story.

 

[72Cuse]

Did any

That's it in a nutshell. The sad thing is that much of the country takes what ESPN is presenting at face value, and thus their opinion of Fine as well as the University is based upon one-sided reports.

It has nothing to do with Bernie's guilt or innocence.

To me, everytime they present allegations in this matter they should be saying "we'd like to remind our viewers that between 2003 and 2005 Syracuse University, The Syracuse Post standard, and we at ESPN investigated these claims and did not find sufficient proof of their veracity.

While that doesn't mean new evidence hasn't come to light, it would at least attempt to communicate the fact that there were two sides to the story.

Did anybody at ESPN read or see "The Crucible"?

 

[Ghost]

This is tin foil hat stuff. ESPN is trying to break a story - however hamfisted it may be. I doubt a place loaded with SU grads is intentionally trying to take down the homeland.

This, their motivation is ratings. It's good television. I would have expected more from a place loaded with SU grads, but I'm not sure why.