MrDollarBills wrote:Honestly after the horrible behavior that we saw from the media on the day that Kobe died, I can't defend how some folks go about their business.
Not sure what you're referring to, exactly. The vast majority of stuff I've read since that horrible day was in the zone of being shocked, saddened and tributary.
MrDollarBills wrote:However, I think you are a bit too dismissive of how the media plays their game to tear down guys that don't tow the line.
You're probably not wrong in that. I'm viewing it as a process, not taking it all that personally, even though it does affect me in negative ways as a fan.
Ideally we don't need the media to be sharks treating peoples' words like fresh kill. I also don't think it's fair (or smart) to characterize the media as unified in much of this. They're unified by profit, true, but not some kind of overarching message or agenda IMO.
One month into the season, Stephen A Smith came out and said "I don't know if it's true or not but I'm hearing really bad things about Kyrie Irving in Brooklyn. Again, I don't know if it's true or not but that's what I was told". People then took that and ran with it as if it was a FACT.
These people will say anything, regardless of it being true or not, just to push views and clicks. It's garbage and I don't think that KD or Kyrie should have to shut up about it.
Hence why I was saying people like Bayless (or Smith in this case) can take a flimsy premise and make hay with it, and it's all part of the game, rightly or wrongly.
KD and Kyrie can react to that with legit anger, and I understand that, but I would hope they also realise that most of these people don't actually care about them either way, and are only using them. The idea that there's ill-will is probably a reach in most cases.
.
In MMA recently, Conor demolished Cowboy, and Smith has been the loudest voice since then saying "Cowboy took a dive!" But most fans who've followed both men for years seem to agree that's a ridiculous take, and incredibly disrespectful, to boot. I suspect that the reason there's not bigger backlash is because most people are also kind of thinking "big deal... it's just Screamin'-A and his latest narrative." Or the wacko segment is thinking "exactly, he took a dive! Thank god someone in the media had the balls to go there." And the ad-money keeps rolling in...
