It doesn't have a lot to do with the beat writers in my opinion. Chad got tired of the expectations that come with the QB job in any big media market and he lashed out at those expectations. That he chose to do this so publicly and in a way that attacked the media are the main issues. There's a responsibility thing that says always look to yourself when you need to get things fixed. Herm didn't have this down, and still doesn't. Chad definitely didn't have this down at the time and now he's paying the price for it. Trying to throw the media under the bus was about as Ryan Leaf-like an action as I've seen outside of Leaf himself. And it was just as likely to fail as Leaf's tantrum.
Because they were giving him crap and he pulled off a great win against Seattle the following week. So he got hissy, Big Whoop. The guy's human. You're blowing it out of proportion, like he's a persistent Prima Donna with a ne'er can do wrong complex. He isn't.
F the media. More and more, the AP-at-large acts as though they are super-self-important. It makes me sick. I said it when they dogged Barry Bonds. (Why couldn't they just let him be, he didn't like the press, big deal. He still signed autographs, and those are the people that pay his salary. Yes, he is a steroid freak, but this was before all that, so it was ridiculous.) The New York media loves to beat the snot out of athletes. A-Rod hit more homers than any other right-handed batter in the history of Yankee Stadium last year, but he strikes out now, and the media has made him an absolute goat. Just wait until the first time Pedro Martinez has a meltdown on the mound. He will go from new Mets hero to zero overnight. Can you imagine if he has a a collapse like he did against the Yankees a few years back? The media will have the fans running him out of town. The final straw for me was a few weeks ago. I was watching Baseball Tonight on ESPN. They were discussing steriods in baseball. One of those schmucks had the absolute GALL to actually SAY that the public doesn't care about steriod use as much as the media does. He went further to say that the public is only concerned with watching the long-ball, and that steriods were acceptable as long as the homers continued. That made me sick, and just showed the true colors of the media. They have an "I'm smarter than you, so I'll tell you what to think" attitude. What makes anyone in the media any more intelligent than any of us? Sure, as far as film study goes, they have more material to sift through, so they know more about individual talents for players than us, but they seem to think they know more about everything, and I for one, am disgusted with it all. When Penny went off on the media and told them it was a privilege to cover the Jets, he was absolutely right. The media doesn't believe it, but they can be barred from the locker room quite easily. Sure, it would cause a lot of backlash, but it doesn't mean the organization couldn't make the decision anyway. I'll say it again, F the media.
Note that A-Rod understands the responsibilities of a pro athlete. He keeps his cool around the media regardless of what he is thinking. Chad's reaction was just decidedly unprofessional and that reflected poorly on him and on the team.
People are human and at times drop the ball. This was a small one to drop in my opinion. The media are a bunch of knuckle-heads anyway. Like rabid dogs snarling for scraps. I say let em starve. That one instance certainly does not make Chad less capable as a QB, though I can respect your suspicion that it might.
Exactly how I feel about it. Every once in a while someone should be jerking the media around by the chain instead of vice versa. :wink:
Ahh but then what about the uproar a couple of weeks ago with A-Rod? When he said something to the effect of "I don't care about the boos, as long as my wife and kids don't boo me." The media swarmed on that like hungry sharks, and had fans in an uproar. I had many arguments in the days after that about how I admired what A-Rod said. And how was Chad's reaction decidedly unprofessional? Perhaps he could have said it with different words, and it may have sounded better, but it was spur of the moment, and let's be honest, we have all said things in the heat of the moment that didn't come out quite right (any married man can surely attest to that.) Look, I am not defending Chad, as much as I am defending athletes in general. Too often these days, the public allows the media to shape their opinions about players, and when the media-at-large feels snubbed, they paint the worst possible picture of that athlete who "had the gall" to put them in their place. I remember not too long ago reading a piece on Bonds saying something to the effect of "Who does this guy think he is? The media is who made Barry Bonds." Ummm, excuse me? If you say steroids made Barry Bonds, then okay, maybe you have a point, but I would think natural talent, and a desire to play baseball made Barry Bonds, long before any media coverage "made" Barry Bonds. The press wants people to be sheep. They tell people what to think, and when to think it. It's sad that in this day and age, so many people follow the words written in the daily tabloids before their own convictions. (It's pretty funny. The Yankees are playing right now. A-Rod got huge cheers a little while ago after running out a ground out. Amazing how quickly people forget they booed him for that last week.) (It gets even better. A-Rod just won the game in extra innings with a walk-off homer, and everyone was on their feet cheering him like they had never booed him before. Amazing.)
my brothers friend kevin keeling who i met 2 days ago told me that the whole jets team visited buckley high school in hartford CT. 2 saturdays ago, and both my brother and kevin told me d'brick is huge and looks like he is 310 lbs... lookout for this kid kevin keeling he is 6'4 265lbs and is entering college as a TE. he has good speed and good hands... he is going to beckard community college in massachusetts... (spell check) on the college name.
The difference is that A-Rod basically said he didn't care if he got booed he was going to go out and do the best he could and he'd listen to the people who really mattered to him. Nothing wrong with that. If A-Rod had BLAMED the fans for his problems then it would be a different issue. Chad blamed the media for his problems when he told them it was a privilege to cover the Jets and they should write things that reflected that. That was just a really stupid statement on his part and it took him two days to realize that and admit it. I like Chad. I think he's the best QB the Jets have had since Ken O'Brien. I also have real questions about his emotional stability and understanding of the role that he is supposed to play as a professional athlete in New York. Playing in New York is not for everybody. There are very few towns that have two or three tabloids competing to get advertising space each and every day. Chad seemed to have a poor understanding of what that actually means and he reacted badly.
Was that how he phrased it? I apologize, I don't remember it that clearly. If that was how he said it, then yeah, I can see someone having a problem with it. I just have a big problem with the media altogether, so I don't give them an inch of rope, unless it's to hang themselves.
“It is a privilege (to cover the Jets),” Pennington told reporters Dec. 20, 2004 at the Jets’ training facility at Hofstra University. “You took that job. You have an opportunity to be around some of the greatest athletes in the world. That's an opportunity. It's not your right. It is a privilege. And it is your job. “It's a privilege for you to be able to report in the greatest city in the world, to be around a bunch of professional athletes every day and do your job. But when it crosses the line sometimes, that's where I have a problem, because whether it’s your job or not, it's about character and it's about integrity and it's about honesty." ------------------------------------------------- Sorry, the guy gets a free pass for a bad day. I didn't hear him curse. I didn't see him spit at them. I didn't see him get physical. And, I found it amusing at the time. Still do.
There was nothing amusing about it to me. What Chad said essentially was that the media should feel privileged that they had the job they did and should not abuse it (implication being "get off my back already".) That reaction caused extreme difficulties for himself and the team for the next few days. In the end he apologized. If he had been right the media would have all showed up hat in hand and apologized. Do you see where he missed the mark and by how much?
Our sense of humor differs. Right to all that, but what I've been saying all along is cut the guy a break. You make it sound like he went on a murder spree, and athletes have done far more damage to their teams with far more heinous behavior. I think you're making it far more critical than it ever really was. And, I also think that people made more than a stink than was necessary BECAUSE Chad is a consistent class act off the field. It was a Drama Queen hissy fit, plain and simple, and folks aren't allowed a mild transgression? I fail to see the long term implications that Chad has crippled the organization with a mouthy faux pas.
All people have the potential of a breakdown like this at times. It's completely natural for people to say some things during the heat of the moment that they wish they hadn't said. Chad had one outburst with the NY media, which is usually very harsh and demanding, during his 6 years as a Jet. He definitely deserves a break and the benefit of the doubt.
omg pennington prolly wont be on the roster within a yr so..........the question is how bored are you guys? i agree with Alio and Jetophile though, mainly cause A)Alio "Fuck the media", his whole response was right from politics to sports they try to spoonfeed you their agenda whether its lack of emphasis or concentration of focus on something. they all need a story and if theres not a legit story to be had, they play mad libs and fill in the blanks or distract your with something. Or they obviously try to paint a picture to an extreme based off of a normal human reaction. B)Jetophile, its just funny. its a calm, cool, collect athlete finally just telling them to leave him alone. Of course what he said could be taken in a tone of arrogance by saying "its a privilege", but guess what? it is. at the end of the day the New York Jets are a business, they can make sure not one journalist finds his/her way to the locker room or the field if they want to. and i think the biggest point is its not like Penny has repeated this, if it really meant anything youd hear the media still milk it for all they can. anyways, the offseason sucks, just let me remind you again.:up:
Personally, I think someone should remind them (media) that it is a privledge. Granted that is not Chad's job to do that, but there is a rampant sense of entitlement that permeates many things american. We often take for granted that privledge and entitlement are different things. We see it quite often in the higher education field. I have to agree with Jeto; when we have athletes that are acting stupid and doing beligerent, intentional stunts, committing crimes and just flat out living immorally, I have a hard time busting a guys chops for a moment of drama... especially when he didn't break any rules. He just stepped on some toes. I say if you're the media - grow a thicker skin. :wink:
