Even worse, those of us not at the trial, not listening to the entire testimony... we're basing our opinions, our judgments (if we are making them) on what the media is relaying to us about the trial. With that in mind, let's take a second to review the job the media is doing covering this trial.
The Daily News has been breaking a lot of the story - they were first up yesterday, beating the AP, to the story of Marbury's testimony. They got all the unsavory details out there, which had to be James Dolan's worst fear. How much does Dolan believe in his people? It must be an awfully lot, or he must really think he can win this case, because he should have settled just to avoid this front page cover:
Seriously, Dolan... why let it get to this point? Why let the Daily News and the rest of the local tabloids, which has been out for your blood for a long time, get a free opportunity to bring in a hack writer like Jane Ridley in to shred your team? Here are some tidbits from her column today:"Stephon
Marbury gave a disturbing insight into his character when he said he couldn't
believe that Anucha Browne Sanders was once a college hoops star.
It didn't make sense because in his macho world it's impossible to see a woman as an accomplished athlete or leading business brain."
Presume much? So is the impossibility of seeing a woman as an athlete and brain limited to Marbury or does it extend to all others in "his macho world", meaning like all other basketball players? Excuse me... all other male basketball players.
"It
wasn't the public dis of his team that irked Thomas. It was jealousy at the
attention she was getting. I half expected him to spring from his seat, stamp
his feet and shout, "I'm the one who does the jokes, thank you!"
Browne
Sanders was young, bright and well-educated. Unlike Thomas' cronies, she stuck
to her guns when he criticized her business decisions and refused to suck up to
him. "
Secondly, Sanders is not "young" - she was in her early 40's when this was going on. She's a experienced corporate flack. She knows what is acceptable behavior, and what is not. She also knows what to do if things are not acceptable. She said she complained to bosses and higher-ups, which the correct way to handle harassment in the workplace. However, if she really felt she was still being subjected to harassment, or her complaints were being ignored, she could have done what you or I would have done in that situation - start gathering evidence for a lawsuit. I would e-mail my complaints, so that I had documentation, for example. I would get as much documentation of harassment as I could, so that it wouldn't be a "he-said, she-said" situation.
Point being - she hasn't presented anything more to this point than her testimony. She threw her intern under a bus yesterday, revealing her words, but not calling her to testify... I'm still curious about that. Is the intern (whose name the Daily News claims "it wouldn't release" in today's paper, but which was splashed on the website article yesterday - believe me, I read it at least six times in yesterday's article, and took it out manually in my posts) going to testify? If not, then how can Sanders and her team of lawyers just use the intern's words, when she's not the one claiming that the Garden was a hostile work environment?
Again, don't get my words twisted... I'm not saying Isiah or the Garden is innocent, either. Isiah's work history works against him in this case. Maybe it's suspect, because it is coming from the Daily News in yet another hatchet job against Isiah, but last year they had an article about Isiah's time as owner of the CBA. I couldn't find it, but I did find Can't Stop The Bleeding's excepts:
Thomas, who bought
the league in 1999 and said he was going to turn it into a "Microsoft for
basketball," would curse and threaten to "kick asses" if the teams from Sioux
Falls, La Crosse, Boise and other small cities didn't see things his way.
"He ruled with
intimidation," says Diane Bosshard, who owned the
"Just the rudest person
that I have ever run into in my entire life," says Rich Coffey, the former GM
of the
Regardless, here's the point: James Dolan and the Knicks should have settled this before the trial. They know the New York media wasn't going to cut him any breaks. Dolan, Isiah, the Garden lawyers - they all knew that this was going to make headlines, and it was going to be bad headlines. Unless they have something up their sleeves, the bad publicity they have incurred (plus lawyer's fees) cannot be worth whatever they would have had to pay to make this go away.
Leave a comment
|
6 Comments
Comments
And...based on what I've read, since I'm not in the court room, it seems that Isiah/Marbury and company are, and have, acted like spoiled athletes who expect everyone to bow down to them because of how they perform athletically.
It bothers me, and it has bothered me for some time, that a storied franchise like the Knicks would be in the hands of someone who seems so wrong for a job of this magnitude, meaning there is more that goes into it other than drafting players.
FYI - your coverage of this is excellent. It's been my first stop this week since the trial started.
Thanks Jack. I don't disagree that Isiah is acting (according to the reports) like a spoiled athlete. Marbury, not so much - maybe at one time (like when the incident with tickets first occured, back when he was traded here four years ago), but not in general. If anything, he's been acting lately the opposite - like an athlete with a social conscience. People can evolve.
Back to Isiah - it would not surprise me if the Garden was a tough environment to work in, and if the accusations of unprofessional conduct were true. But at the end of the day, I won't pretend to know - there really isn't any proof coming one way or the other. So I'm going to just leave that alone, and stick to writing about the details as they come out.
I do think, however, that the Daily News was clearly trying to make the Knicks look bad. They always are - I did a post a few weeks back on Mitch Lawrence castigating Marbury for "supporting Vick". Today's article was equally lopsided - it presented one person's opinion of the trial so far (in which the defense hasn't even made its case yet), and who clearly is no fan of Marbury or Isiah. It would be the equivalent of me writing a pro-Knicks piece, and bashing Sanders (the defendant) for throwing her intern under the bus, and pointing out belittling "facts" that are really opinions (calling her a "whiner" who tried to extort money from the Knicks). It lacks professionalism, and underscores my chief complaint with too many MSM writers - they're vindictive and lack objectivity.
I just don't like how Marbury was acting as he was leaving yesterday or how some of his actions were that he described in his testimony.
I don't read the NY papers much, obviously, so I'm not picking up on that stuff like you are....I'll take your word for it
marbury acted like somebody who was being hounded by the media.
Hell, the entire headline is false since Marbury was prevented from revealing any details about what occurred in the limo by the judge.
So, what exactly was lurid about his testimony.
This is freakin' POST. Come on, they cannot be considered a serious media outlet.
Actually when Isiah bought the CBA I lived near Gary, which had or was going to get a CBA team, and it was said that he was buying the CBA and turn it into the minor league for the NBA. The CBA was relatively successful up until Isiah took over and then proceeded to make a lot of bad business decisions and it failed. That's why a lot of the team owners complained in print....because there wasn't any money to get back from Isiah. Anyways, there is a really good rundown here, which was easy to find:
http://www.cbamuseum.com/cbaisiah.html