What would happen say if you were out drinking with your best friend, married with kids, and he negotiated his way back to a Motel 6 with a woman half his age. Your friend doubled as the Mayor you cover. It's a fine line, but an important one.
That is why ESPN's new "decision" is disturbing. On Wednesday, the "world wide leader" published a report detailing an under cover reporter's observations of LeBron James' adventurous night on the town. According to a New York Daily News article, James and his friends were depicted in the ESPN article to be drinking and hanging around with scantily clad women. James was presented a cake by go-go dancers and his sky high ego was on full display.
It's not shocking that after 15 minutes, ESPN took this article down, saying that the article had not gone through the proper editorial process, but with James and ESPN virtually tied at the hip these days, I suspect there was a little more than a red pen.
The following is taken from the Daily News article:
"Digital media editor Rob King said in a statement Thursday that the author of the article, Arash Markazi, "did not properly identify himself" and "we are not comfortable with the content because of the manner in which it was reported.""
In other words, ESPN wasn't "comfortable" with disparaging their number one ratings producer, shocking.
I don't expect this story would have been taken down if Randy Moss was the perpetrator. Or Ron Artest. Or even Kobe Bryant. After all, none of those guys chose ESPN to do a self-serving one hour TV special on where they would play next.
Quite frankly it's a cover up and it should deeply disturb professionals in the media the world over. ESPN wants to protect their brand, that's fine, but their brand shouldn't be the same as the one they are covering. It's unethical.
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