New York Times' George Vecsey Is "Old Appalachian Hand," Awful Columnist
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
It's rare that I read a column that is so bad I feel compelled to point out how bad it is. In fact, I don't think I've ever done this before because generally I have a pretty lenient standard on these things. But George Vecsey of the New York Times, who I'd never heard of before this work, managed to string together a column that is an epic in absurdity: John Kennedy Toole meets college recruiting. Read it here.
But first, let's review how the New York Times has turned a secondary violation, at best, into the story equivalent of Lane Kiffin dumping three million dollars out of a helicopter, spreading out the cash on the field, bringing over hostesses, and filming an orgy for recruits.
Trust me, I know how to get attention for stories. But generally those stories are rooted in opinion, that is, they're supposed to take a side one way or the other.
This story is different, it's ostensibly hard news. Only, as you've seen from my prior writing, there has been a clear agenda from the get-go. Yep, the New York Times has played a game with the Tennessee recruiting scandal. They've done everything they could to turn a couple of plain old rocks into shiny gold bullion. Welcome to the new alchemy of sports reporting, if you don't have the goods, fake it and hope no one calls you on it.
Why? Because they're trying to brand themselves as a muckraking investigative team policing the world of college sports. Only they've failed.
Miserably.
And I'll confess that disappoints me. Because I'm a New York Times subscriber and have been for years. I rely on them to bring me solid news from some of the most intelligent minds on earth.
I even, and this is a bit embarrassing, have a New York Times t-shirt that I bought at their online store.
Seriously, a t-shirt.
I also have a Washington Post t-shirt from my college days in D.C., and I might have to break that one out more regularly from now on.
So my point is, usually the Times delivers, and I appreciate that delivery because it helps keep me informed in a world where complexity and nuance isn't often examined.
But not this time.
Here's their formula for the Tennessee story for the unaware.
1. Break the huge story that girls went to a high school football game. Include in that article many factual inaccuracies, rush it to print, and don't bother contacting anyone at Tennessee beforehand.
In fact, rush this story to such an extent that it never appears in the paper delivered to the market that would most likely read it, the Southeastern edition.
2. Hit the interview circuit where a fawning news media does nothing to call you on any of the errors in your reporting.
Wax eloquent about things you don't actually know about, including the prevalence of secondary violations under Lane Kiffin--they aren't really out of the ordinary--and accept the praise of a news media that desperately needs a new story to trumpet every day lest their viewers fritter away.
3. Follow-up your story with a reaction story the next day.
4. On Friday, spring a new story that features quotes from an AAU basketball promoter, the slimiest people in all of sports and there isn't a close second, about how hostesses were trained to rub their breasts on recruit's arms.
The story provides nothing but salacious content.
Aside from the sheer ludicrousness of this story--how long could the breasts touching the arms training possibly take and what were the other steps?-- the AAU guy took five recruiting visits in the past four years.
Five!
If you're really that offended by your treatment wouldn't you stop going? Wouldn't most people?
5. Write an opinion piece about the story that you broke in your newspaper.
This latest move by the New York Times is the weakest. In fact, it makes every other story pale in comparison.
Let's dive in to this Vecsey column, shall we?
a. Vecsey gives us the definition of a hostess.
Thanks, I guess.
He also puts the word "hostesses" in quotation marks.
Why?
Does he dispute that they are actually hostesses? If so, why does he he then give us the definition of hostess?
And why is the New York Times allowing him to obliquely hint at prostitution when there is no evidence whatsoever of that fact? Quoth Vecsey: "I thought there was a law against this kind of thing, across state borders or something."
Calumny meets columny.
He also drops this beautiful line, "I'm not suggesting anything untoward happened on the little trip from Knoxville, Tenn., to Duncan, S.C."
Thanks for that. I'll echo your faint praise with my own, "I'm not suggesting that George Vecsey couldn't write his way out of a paper sack if it was open on both ends and other writers wrote the beginning, middle and end of his little column, I think he's quite capable."
b. Vecsey writes: "The N.C.A.A. seems to find this a trifle irregular. Whether Coach Lane Kiffin actually handed the hostesses a road map and chits for gasoline fill-ups is not the point. It happened on his watch, the way Watergate happened on the watch of Richard M. Nixon."
First of all, where does his authority that "The NCAA seems to find this a trifle irregular," come from? There is no evidence that the NCAA finds it a trifle anything. Because they haven't issued any commentary on any findings.
And unlike the New York times, the NCAA has not made a ton of factual errors in their reporting about this issue. So pardon me if I'm not willing to take a leap of faith and follow Vecsey's logic.
Second, did he really equate two girls holding up a sign that says, "Miller and Willis have our hearts," with Richard Nixon subverting the American electoral process?
Yes...he did.
And he "writes" for the newspaper of record in America.
c. Next Vecsey memorably shares: "By the way, I am no Tennessee-basher. I'm an old Appalachian hand. Been to Kingsport and Monteagle and Oak Ridge."
So, wait, you're "an old Appalachian hand"--whatever that means-- if you've been to three cities in Tennessee?
That's three real cities!
In the same state he's writing about!
I can't wait until the World Cup. Because then I can write this sentence when I jot off a column that makes no sense about European soccer.
"By the way, I am no Europe-basher. I'm an old European hand. Been to Rome and Prague and Paris."
Do you see how ridiculous that sounds?
To say nothing of the lame attempt at writing in a folksy manner. Which is, you guessed it, patronizing and insulting to intelligent Southerners.
If our good ole boy Vecsey was writing about going to Memphis to hear the blues would he write, "Lordy, I'se excited to see them mens strum dem fingers."
Probably not, right?
So why insult Southerners of all races by employing a bad vernacular in his column?
d. Vecsey continues his bad Southern writing: "Makes me want to get in a car and take a drive. The Web tells me that Interstate 40 is cut off by a rock slide west of Asheville, N.C. (I am not making this up), so if I had time and the weather were benign, I would take Route 441 out of Knoxville through Sevierville and Pigeon Forge, put on a Dolly Parton tape in homage, and think about taking a hike in the Smokies, haven’t done that in years, and then meander around Asheville on local roads, bowing toward Thomas Wolfe's gravesite (damn, I am getting nostalgic just writing about this) before picking up Interstate 26 toward Spartanburg, S.C., and adjacent Duncan.
Two hundred and three miles. That's what it adds up to on my AAA map. Each way. Actually don't know how the hostesses got to the high school football game. Maybe they were flown on a private jet donated by some fat-cat Tennessee Vols booster."
I think this is a direct response to my assertion that arguing "nearly 200 miles" in the Times' initial article was an attempt to skew the facts. And, credit to Vecsey, he's correct that there is presently a rock slide blocking part of I-40.
But that rock slide happened at the end of October. So when the girls went to the game, at the end of September, they took a major interstate. Ashame, really. Because doesn't Vecsey write so purty about the roads he would take?
Meaning, you guessed it, the trip to the high school game is still shorter than the Times asserts...on their fifth try to get it right.
e. Insert random rumination about Hofstra football. (I am not making this up.)
f. Finally the stirring conclusion: "Could the N.C.A.A. mandate an autumn without the sound of "Rocky Top" echoing off the hills? Could happen. Maybe should happen. And if it does, I recommend a hike in the Smokies on Saturday afternoon. No hostesses up there, however."
Aside from making no argument in his entire column, Vecsey comes to the logical conclusion that the NCAA should do...what exactly?
He isn't even clear on that.
He suggests that either the NCAA should give a team the death penalty--which hasn't happened in the NCAA since the early 1980's and happened then because SMU was rife with corruption--because two girls went to a game and held up a sign for guys that weren't even on UT's team.
This suggestion is so laughable it makes flat-Earthists seem rational.
Or.
He's suggesting that the NCAA penalize Tennessee by forbidding the playing of Rocky Top. Which, to be fair, is even funnier, albeit unintentionally.
That's your newspaper of record in America, gents.
Frankly, the Times should be ashamed. Labels: george vecsey is awful writer columnist new york times
Posted by Clay Travis at 11:00 AM
 
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Amen brother. Could not believe what I was reading. Plus, gotta call BS on his good ole' Tennessee boy credentials. If he knew anything about Southern women he would certainly know that they know a thing or two about football and would not need Lane Kiffin to tell them what to do. Gotta remind them of the rules, take the slap on the wrist, and move forward.
Not to mention the fact that he basically calls the girls prostitutes when he writes, "I thought there was a law against this kind of thing, across state borders or something." Pathetic so-called journalism. This Vecsey guy is the very definition of a blubbering idiot.
Nice piece! Keep it up.
keep fighting the good fight. That article is complete garbage.
Good point on the prostitutes angle. That would be an interesting legal case. Everyone knows which girls he is talking about, right? Especially since they linked the SI.com story where the girls are named and pictured.
Are they private or public figures?
Can you just call them prostitutes in print?
I don't think so.
Someone ought to ring up a lawya. Hopefully he's an old Appalachian hand.
Thank you so much for writing this. It would be really great if the times would publish your column as some sort of rebuttal/letter to the editor.
Leave it to a Yankee newspaper to make me agree with a Tennessee fan.
Good work Clay!
Under common law, defamation is actionable per se if it falls into one of four categories:
* imputations of criminal conduct
* allegations injurious to another in their trade, business, or profession
* imputations of loathsome disease
* imputations of unchastity in a woman
It's amazing what some people call journalism these days. It's certainly not the profession which I intended to spend my life anymore. The old sex-sells axiom is alive and well in this set of "breaking" stories from the New York Times.
Unfortunately for them, all the Tennessee haters and all the people in the country who want to see Kiffin fail, this is nothing more than flesh wound for the program.
With the new Vecsey column, he has replaced sex selling with stupidity sells. I'm no longer buying, however. Canceled my subscription.
Three out of four ain't bad when it comes to per se violations.
Great Clay. Thanks for this.
The only real problem I see with your article is that you seem to be operating under the delusion that the NYT's with its far left bias handles straight news stories much better than these guys have handled the UT story.
You've done a pretty good job calling them on factual inaccuracies and innuendo as fact concerning this story. It is a whole bunch of smoke that only barely obscures reality but does so well enough to tantalize the uninitiated. Their political news is more bias but written in a more deceptively sophisticated way.
I'd say all four of the Hofstra graduates who read that are wishing that buffoon didn't mention that he went to their school. An the NYT must be so desparate that the paper will print just about anything. Surely they didn't pay him to write that.
I'm shocked that you actually read the New York Times Clay. Come on dude. Change your subscription to the Wall Street Journal.
Thank you Clay. I think we should correlate an effort to bombard the NYT website with pro-Vol comments, perhaps linking to this fine narrative.
I'm down here in Birmingham. Prior to the first article, the NYT was nothing but liberal propaganda for most down here. It's amazing how much credibility it has gained since the stories started coming out.
Well written, Clay. The worst thing about this "story" is that almost every college sports fan in America fails to actually learn any of the facts of the issue. It's obvious the journalists don't, nor do the radio guys. So, lies and innacuracies are spread to the point that everybody is enraged about a girl holding up a sign at a HS game. Ridiculous.
Nice read Clay.
I wonder about the verasity of the comments of Mr. Easterwood, who is not a UT fan...here is a quote from him on Memphis basketball board about Willie Kemp in 2005(MemphisTigers.org) "You can tell the UT people that they wish they had a crytal ball as good as mine. They need to worry more about LSU, or Fulmer eating to many Krispy Kreams and Budweisers.Willie might wait on his decision a day or 2. Only to be sure of his choice.He knows what he wants, people who don't agree are asking him to wait."
Link...http://ncaabbs.com/showthread.php?tid=157776 (near the bottom)
Did the NYT check this guys credibility? Heck, he was so offended he went on visits 4 or 5 times...lol
Warren Hale - tnsupervol@aol.com
Your article was infinitely more interesting and far more entertaining. I think all of the sports writers from the South ought to offer Vecsey an opportunity to debate you on this issue (note how I nominated you for a debate without asking you whether you were interested or not, but you are -- like me -- a lawyer nee' "shyster" and I figure you are always up for it). Why is it that I doubt he would be interested in having to defend his article without the benefit of that Times masthead behind which he can shield himself from disapprobation and embarrassment.
"All the news that's fit to print," my ass...
Well said!
I've been saying the 170-200 mile comment since this thing started. Hell now today it is about 200 miles away. But when it happened there was no rock slide on 40 and that cuts a good 30-40 miles off the trip. Get it right dumbas$es!!!
Do people know that Easterwood character? He's publicly admitted to steering recruits away from UT. He's apparently bitter that his own son wasn't offered by UT. He's a well-known repeat offender when it comes to lying about colleges' recruiting practices, either because they didn't recruit one of his players, or because he wanted to make them look bad in order to steer his player elsewhere.
On one recent occassion, he actually took his entire team to Memphis' elite camp instead of UT's (where the players unanimously wanted to go) because his AAU team is Nike sponsored, and UT is an Addidas school. What a douche.
http://gary-parrish.blogs.cbssports.com/mcc/blogs/entry/6271764/15458395
http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/news/story?id=2212056
Great job Clay. My initial thought after reading the NYT story was, how did this get in the the NYT? You would think that the newspaper of record would have more to write about. Say, Acorn, Illinois political corruption, how the current administration is bankrupting this country. It struck me as odd, that a story so thin on details, merited any ink at all. Thanks Clay!
I loved your post. I wrote that idiot a letter telling him many of the things you pointed out. and called him a moron, just in case he hasn't figured that out. Tennessee fan or not, this guy is bad for sports and for women, insinuating they are prostitutes. so mad!!!
You'd never heard of George Vecsey?
Nope, never heard of George Vecsey, heard of Peter, his brother but only from television.
Read the Times all the time, but don't read any sports columnist over the age of 45 because they all write as if the internet doesn't exist. Now if Dowd or Friedman or Krugman had written the piece, I'd have a very solid working knowledge of them.
George Vecsey?
Like most every Southern sports fan under the age of 40.
Nada.