The first rule of Phight Club ....
... is that nobody talks about Phight Club. Well, that's how it used to be.
Once upon a time you could have a good, ol' fashioned yelling match with a player, coach or manager in the clubhouse and didn't have to worry about it leaving the clubhouse. And why would you want it to leave the clubhouse? For what purpose? Covering baseball is a different animal from other sports. It starts in Clearwater with 6 1/2 weeks of spring training, then a six-month, 162-game schedule where members of the media and the team are around each other practically every single day.
It's like being members of a big, dysfunctional family in which the media and team are brothers who kind of tolerate each other because, well, what choice do you have when you're stuck in the same house together for eight months? And along the way you end up having some laughs and some arguments - all of which come with the territory.
Ah, but this is the age of MySpace, reality TV and - yes - blogs. Now it seems as if anything you say or do can turn up on streaming video or audio .... like the verbal showdown Brett Myers and Inquirer writer Sam Carchidi had in the clubhouse after Saturday night's game.
Since KYW 1060 had the gumption to put the unedited, R-rated audio of the incident online, I guess it's fair game.
First of all, there is a history involved. Many players - Brett being on of them - don't like the style of interviewing Sam often uses, particularly since he is a backup writer who is there once in a blue moon and oftentimes digs at issues that have been addressed in the days before he shows up. Personally, it can get on my nerves, too. For example, before Saturday's game Sam asked Charlie Manuel with a tinge of exasperation in his voice what was going on with Tadahito Iguchi and the possibility of him playing some third base. That was an issue that Manuel and Pat Gillick both put to bed days earlier by stating that such a move would require a spring training's worth of practice to pull off. Yet Sam shows up and asks questions as if nothing has changed since the last time he was at the ballpark, which was weeks ago.
Pretty annoying, right?
That said, both parties were in the wrong Saturday night. Brett clearly wasn't happy about his performance, and he allowed whatever prior headaches he received from Sam to remain exposed. You have to be better than that.
Sam, meanwhile, should have just let it roll off his back, at least for the moment. If he felt he needed to confront Myers on the matter, do it one-on-one - and if he doesn't understand why he should wait, all he has to do is go to KYW's Web site to figure it out.
It's a different world thanks to the Internet, and not always in a good way. The bottom line is that we need to adapt so that the occasional blow-ups that take place don't become the story .... SINCE WE AREN'T THE STORY!!!!
Once upon a time you could have a good, ol' fashioned yelling match with a player, coach or manager in the clubhouse and didn't have to worry about it leaving the clubhouse. And why would you want it to leave the clubhouse? For what purpose? Covering baseball is a different animal from other sports. It starts in Clearwater with 6 1/2 weeks of spring training, then a six-month, 162-game schedule where members of the media and the team are around each other practically every single day.
It's like being members of a big, dysfunctional family in which the media and team are brothers who kind of tolerate each other because, well, what choice do you have when you're stuck in the same house together for eight months? And along the way you end up having some laughs and some arguments - all of which come with the territory.
Ah, but this is the age of MySpace, reality TV and - yes - blogs. Now it seems as if anything you say or do can turn up on streaming video or audio .... like the verbal showdown Brett Myers and Inquirer writer Sam Carchidi had in the clubhouse after Saturday night's game.
Since KYW 1060 had the gumption to put the unedited, R-rated audio of the incident online, I guess it's fair game.
First of all, there is a history involved. Many players - Brett being on of them - don't like the style of interviewing Sam often uses, particularly since he is a backup writer who is there once in a blue moon and oftentimes digs at issues that have been addressed in the days before he shows up. Personally, it can get on my nerves, too. For example, before Saturday's game Sam asked Charlie Manuel with a tinge of exasperation in his voice what was going on with Tadahito Iguchi and the possibility of him playing some third base. That was an issue that Manuel and Pat Gillick both put to bed days earlier by stating that such a move would require a spring training's worth of practice to pull off. Yet Sam shows up and asks questions as if nothing has changed since the last time he was at the ballpark, which was weeks ago.
Pretty annoying, right?
That said, both parties were in the wrong Saturday night. Brett clearly wasn't happy about his performance, and he allowed whatever prior headaches he received from Sam to remain exposed. You have to be better than that.
Sam, meanwhile, should have just let it roll off his back, at least for the moment. If he felt he needed to confront Myers on the matter, do it one-on-one - and if he doesn't understand why he should wait, all he has to do is go to KYW's Web site to figure it out.
It's a different world thanks to the Internet, and not always in a good way. The bottom line is that we need to adapt so that the occasional blow-ups that take place don't become the story .... SINCE WE AREN'T THE STORY!!!!
1 Comments:
Great picture. You're quite the artist!
Post a Comment
<< Home