Thursday, February 14, 2013
Murray Chass on Sports: GUILTY IN COURT OF CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE
(www.murraychass.com)
Postsportswriter writes presponse about Mike Piazza.
Had Piazza agreed to an interview this week, I would love to have had the opportunity to ask him about his back and the timing and disappearance of his acne. But the guy who just published an $800,000 book, isn’t doing interviews.
Why should he care about book sales? He got his money. The publisher, on the other hand, should care for the same reason, but neither Mr. Simon nor Mr. Schuster wants to ruffle Piazza’s feathers, you know, the ones left from the steroids.
I know from experience that when I write about Piazza and steroids, especially the acne part, I can expect to be inundated with a torrent of e-mail responses from Piazza’s zealous fans.
There’s never enough time to answer all of the e-mail so I decided I would try something different. I am going to reply to reader mail before I receive it. A writer friend suggested I could call it not my response but my presponse. So here is my presponse:
I know that you don’t agree with my view; in fact, I know that it offends you. But I calls ‘em the way I sees ‘em. You certainly are entitled to your opinion, and I don’t begrudge you your opinion. But you are not objective, and you are willingly blind to whatever your hero might have done.
If he cheated, he cheated, and he deserves whatever negative consequence that befalls him. If you want to ignore the acne and make excuses for it and invent reasons for its sudden disappearance, please feel free to engage in any fantasy you desire.
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1 2 >pranking Francesa
That's an expensive book!
More seriously, what would interviews do? I haven't read the book but I imagine the answers Piazza would give to any questions are in the book. Chass and others may not like the answers but he does address the issues. A NY Times review includes this;
Does Chass really think asking him about bacne is going to cause Piazza to break down and confess all manner of steroid usage? That he doesn't like what the book had to say doesn't mean Piazza didn't address the issue.
Piazza was on the Daily Show on Tuesday promoting the book. Maybe he just doesn't do interviews with bloggers. Or maybe it's people who in the past have gone out of their way to write multiple hit pieces on him.
I'm not sure that he hasn't.
If anyone wants to go in halfsies, drop me a line...
I was about to say this. Chass sometimes appears to forget that he no longer writes for the New York Times. Maybe it would be surprising for an author to turn down an interview request from the Times...but why submit to an interview from a blogger, particularly one whom you know will have a negative bias.
The backne suddenly disappeared? And he knows this how?
I read this as "pizza-jealous fans".
"Hey! You have pineapple on your slice! No fair...!!"
OK, if you say so....
I'm wearing a red evening gown and stiletto boots as I descend the stairwell of an ancient castle, my path lit only by cobweb-draped candelabras. At the bottom, I come to a steel door. Upon opening it, I discover an elaborate dungeon, filled with what appear to be hundreds of sophisticated torture devices. Splayed out on a love seat, his wrists and ankles shackled, and furiously blogging is Murray Chass, wearing only a leather thong and a gasmask. Just then, a unicorn prances into the room, approaches Chass, and begins violently licking his feet.
Jesus, Murray. Come up for air.
"If you find a zit, you must acquit!"
Chass's next column will be about how Piazza must be guilty because he hasn't sued him.
God Chass is an insufferable ass. Even worse, he's a discredit to anyone who legitimately opposes PED usage in baseball. I read him and I almost want to say "go grab your needles, boys! F**k this guy!"
I don't think that is proper English.
Come on!
MURRAY CHASS DOESN'T WEAR A $5,000 SUIT, MR PRESIDENT.
I'm not sure there's a "legitimate" opposition to PED usage in baseball, any more than there is a "legitimate" opposition to homosexuality. It will always exist, because it is a natural state. Athletes competing at the highest levels have always tried to gain an edge, will always try to gain an edge. And not just a few of them, but scores of them, which renders the whole "legitimate opposition" utterly silly. I mentioned in another thread that I recently watched ESPN's 30-for-30 on Ben Johnson and the 1988 Olympics. While Johnson will forever be villified, how many people know that four _other_ athletes in that same 100-meter race were later involved in their own PED scandals?
This is what athletes competing at levels above beer softball leagues do. And it hasn't hurt attendance or revenue one bit, so ultimately it is accepted. And there is no reason to be obsessed about it.
What sport has gone extinct because fans wouldn't stand for PED usage? None. Yet PED usage has been rampant in the NFL for fifty years, in MLB for fifty years, in the Olympics, in cycling, in big time college football.
Years back, the host of a local sports radio show found himself seated on a plane next to one of the trainers (possibly Ben Johnson's - I don't remember exactly) for the runners in that race. He asked the guy why, given that Ben Johnson got nailed for cheating, the other competitors themselves didn't make a bigger stink about it. He was told that they didn't want to draw any extra attention, as the only guy who was running clean in that race finished last.
I don't know how true it was but, given what you've already noted about the other guys who have been caught, it seems like a reasonable story.
Reminds me of what Ben Johnson's coach, Charlie Francis, said in 2000 when asked how many of the top 10 100-meter dash runners were juicing: 11.
As I've mentioned before, sponsor actions have almost completely eliminated therapeutic use exemptions (at it's height. ~40% of the field had some for of TUE)
EDIT: A quick search for "back rash catcher" (I can't wait to see by sidebar ads for the next month) turned up that Posey suffered from shingles on his back early last year. So he goes into the roid pool this year. :-)
He also did the Daily Show earlier this week. Maybe it's just bloggers with whom he is not doing interviews.
It hasn't? I honestly don't know a single person who still pays attention to cycling.
Me either. Of course, I never knew anyone who followed the sport.
I do, but I pity him. If not for Facebook, I wouldn't have known about it, & I'd think much more of him.
C'MON!
Finally -- a link worthy of a website called "Bleacher Report"
The mid-60's?
I do, but I pity him. If not for Facebook, I wouldn't have known about it, & I'd think much more of him.
He must be a foreigner. A bad foreigner, not a good one.
I'd spring for one myself just to give to Ray. Honest effort deserves some sort of tangible reward.
Well, it's customary to give interviews along with the release of a book, movie, and often a bad sign when someone doesn't play along with the pr game. The writer or star doesn't like the final cut, doesn't like the push the distributor is giving the work, had her feathers ruffled by someone or, not to give fuel Chass's argument, doesn't want to deal with follow up questions.
By far the likeliest reason, though, if Piazza's making the big rounds such as The Daily Show, is that his agent didn't even bother to mention Chass's request to Piazza, unless he was looking for a giggle.
It's not unusual for a guy to do a 'targeted negative interview' where he'll sit down with an interviewer known to be hostile. He gets to focus, gets to get it done, gets to say he dealt with it. Chass wouldn't be that negative interviewer, though. You want someone not completely deranged, someone you trust to report accurately
I'm in awe of post 17.
Seriously, I only just saw it. That didn't get nearly enough credit.
Really? I mean it's a fine humorous effort but it invokes the image of Guapo* in an evening gown and stilettos playing bondage games with Chass (in g-string and gasmask). That's enough to give me nightmares for well over a month. And, when you dream about them, unicorns are definitely not unicorns.
Also he beat me to the joke and took it much farther than I was willing to go and that makes him history's 67th greatest monster.
* I know not Mr. or Ms. Guapo but, seeing as how he/she has adopted the nickname of Rich Garces, I am not expecting good things in the evening gown competition.
But then again, I'm not a big name like Mike Piazza, who has likely been inundated with requests and is forced to pick and choose which ones to do. Murray Chass' blog involves such a smaller audience than WFAN or the MLB Network that the choice becomes relatively easy. Another concern Piazza might have would be Chass' ability to edit his comments or misquote him completely, as opposed to doing a live interview on radio and TV where his words are not as easily twisted.
Bottom line: if you're a celebrity or a high-end bestselling author, you can pretty much do what you want. As for the rest of us, we need to do every interview that becomes available.
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