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With the Boston Herald apologizing for its February 2 article claiming that the Patriots taped the Rams’ walk-through practice prior to Super Bowl XXXVI and with Pats owner Bob Kraft accepting the apology, the next step in this saga becomes the soul-cleansing of those involved in the creation of the erroneous story.
On Friday, John Tomase of the Herald will address the situation.
“I know I screwed up on the Rams taping story and I don’t intend to hide behind today’s apology or an editor’s note,” Tomase wrote in “The Point After” blog on Wednesday. “In Friday’s Herald I will explain as clearly as I can where that story went wrong and begin the journey of restoring your trust in my reporting.”
The phrase “restoring your trust” implies to us that Tomase won’t be fired or reassigned.
But should he be? That’s a tough one. We believe that the same editor(s) who opted not to run the story without an on-the-record source opted to rush the thing to print once it became apparent that Matt Walsh was about to go on the record with a competitor. If that’s the case, Tomase doesn’t bear the brunt of the blame.
Still, someone needs to be fired over this one. Otherwise, there would be no true accountability within a medium that whines about the lack of accountability in this one.
May 14th, 2008 at 7:51 pm
I suspect Matt Walsh told Tomase that he was involved in taping defensive signals and he even attended the Rams walkthrough. Which Tomase interpreted as meaning Walsh taped the walkthrough.
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Rating: 2.35 / 5 with 3 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 7:51 pm
All I need to say to Tomasse is what cousin Eddie once said in Xmas Vacation, “You about ready to start doing some kissing?”
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Rating: 3 / 5 with 4 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 7:58 pm
The editors certainly deserve much of the blame and if anyone gets fired their names should be thrown into the hat. I can’t wait to hear what Tomase has to say for himself and if he comes right out and points at Walsh now.
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Rating: 3 / 5 with 2 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 7:59 pm
Tomase reported a story he believed to be true. If anyone should get canned, it’s the editor.
Of course, today’s journalism is a joke anyhow. Nothing happens when one-sided newspapers such as the New York Times print false, agenda-driven crap.
Only this time, the agenda-driven crap was about football, not politics.
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Rating: 2.6 / 5 with 5 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 8:01 pm
No wonder Tomase screwed up the story. Click the link and look at the picture. In college, this guy went by the name of Flounder and hung out with Pinto and Bluto at the Deltas’ Animal House.
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Rating: 3.5 / 5 with 6 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 8:04 pm
Let it go, it’s over.
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Rating: 2.35 / 5 with 6 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 8:10 pm
Then fire the guy who reported Bradshaw was dead!!
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Rating: 2.2 / 5 with 5 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 8:19 pm
Tomase doesn’t bear the brunt of the blame? Are you kidding me or what? His name is on it. Not his Editors. Not his Mother’s. Not mine. not yours. Only his name appears in the article. What’s published in his name is HIS responsibility. It’s part of being a responsible adult. Responsible adults don’t blame their boss for their own mistakes. The take full responsibility for their actions and accept the consequences just as the Patriots took responsibility for breaking the rules and accepted the punishment. The Patriots didn’t try to blame the League for letting them get away with it for years. They didn’t blame the Jets for turning them in. They didn’t point to other teams doing the same thing even though they have evidence to back it up. They owned it. Tomase owns this. If he’s a real man he’ll step up and if not fired, resign.
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Rating: 3.5 / 5 with 8 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 8:20 pm
Wow, an apology for doing something wrong. Maybe Bill Belichick would garner a little more respect from fans if he actually came out and said something like: “Hey everybody, I’m sorry about having one of our flunkies covertly tape your defensive signals, and then pathetically attempt to cover it up by telling the league that I misunderstood the rules. Regardless of if it helped my team or not, and whether every other team does it or not, because I was actually caught I’ll admit to the fans that it was wrong, and I am hoping to begin restoring your trust in my team.” That would be called having class and acting like a man, traits which any fan outside of Boston can see Bill doesn’t possess.
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Rating: 2.85 / 5 with 8 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 8:20 pm
John I hope you can be honest…whatever you think it is, but in the of your job, The Boston Herald” please accept the blame and not try to pin it on Brian Dabol.
Why would a coach of the New England Patriots go to a do nothing, no nothing employee, Matt Walsh, and ask him what he saw at the Rams walk through and could we use it. Walsh at that time was a goofer. A slave boy.
He’s another loser looking for his 15 minutes of fame…and it’s time for his 15 minutes to be gone.
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Rating: 3.4 / 5 with 5 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 8:29 pm
This is not a fireable offense.
It’s Spygate, for crying out loud! Who even really cares? Certainly not football fans.
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Rating: 2.8 / 5 with 5 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 8:52 pm
As someone who lives here when this story broke,it made me sick. You must be a moron to say that Tomase is not responsible but his editors are.He put his name & reputation on the line.Do you think he would be doing a mea culpa if there really was a tape? This is a business, & everyone involved in this supermarket tabloid story that the Herald published should be fired.Those who disagree should think that if Bob Kraft were to sue the Herald for reporting this on heresay,how many millions do you think he would win? This was irresponsible reporting without verifying the facts.Had this story not run,Spygate would be history, & we would not have a Senator from Pennsylvania pushing his agenda to appease his largest political contributor against the NFL.We paid the price for violationg the rules & i believe we were not the only ones doing it.
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Rating: 2.6 / 5 with 5 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 8:57 pm
PS Does anyone on this site think that John Tomase could possibly have any credibility within the Patriots locker room or organization? Good bye Flounder,Philly could be a great place to start over. I’m sure Senator Spector could arrange an interview.
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Rating: 3 / 5 with 6 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 9:17 pm
It’s great that John Tomase is saying what he is saying. But for something as bad as this, someone has to go. Probably an editor. For someone to make it to the Boston Herald, most likely it won’t be tooooo difficult to find another job within the newspaper industry.
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Rating: 3 / 5 with 2 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 9:29 pm
I don’t know what’s funnier — thinking Tomase or his editor is going to get fired, or thinking Bob Kraft’s accepting the apology is some grand gesture. If the story ran, then Tomase’s editor would have had to have signed off on it, in which case they’d both be in trouble, but neither would get fired.
As far as Kraft goes, if he did decide to pursue a libel case against the Herald, he’d have to show good old NY Times v. Sullivan style “actual malice”, which is damn near impossible to do.
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Rating: 5 / 5 with 1 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 9:41 pm
I haven’t heard this mentioned, and I don’t know what category you’d put this in, but the Boston Herald almost buried the initial story. A story that big, which the Herald had to have known would carry the news that day, and it was three pages inside, with a small head, below the fold (to the extend that tabloids have a fold). I remember first seeing it and thinking, “Clearly they weren’t all that enthusiastic about that story.” It underscores the point that, had the Herald known its source was rock solid, that thing would have been back page, bright lights - the whole magilla.
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Rating: 5 / 5 with 1 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 10:04 pm
Tomase needs to come clean about all of the circumstances around his bogus report.
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Rating: 5 / 5 with 1 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 10:05 pm
If they are not going to fire him at least get him out of reporting the patriots, its not like he has any shot of getting access to anyone on the team nowadays… Make him a janitor, instead of writing s**t, he can clean it up.
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Rating: 3 / 5 with 4 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 10:05 pm
I wonder why Tomase disable the comments section? It must be too much fan mail.
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Rating: 3.65 / 5 with 3 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 10:18 pm
Exactly. Proving actual malice is really, really difficult (you can tell because I said “really” twice).
But Florio and his Greek chorus don’t care about that nonsense, or the idea that sometimes–crazy, I know–newspaperfolk make deadline-driven mistakes. They want someone FIRED.
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Rating: 2.35 / 5 with 3 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 10:20 pm
Exactly. Actual malice is really, really difficult to prove (you can tell because I said “really” twice).
But Florio the Tiny and his Greek chorus of shoutalong supporters don’t care about that, nor do they subscribe to the notion that sometimes the news media makes honest–if egregious–mistakes.
They only want someone FIRED.
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Rating: 3.65 / 5 with 3 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 11:02 pm
Lots of time has transpired to make the walkthrough tape disappear. A little cash goes a long way in Hawaii. Also, a libel case against the Herald would be a great thing, lets bring this out in the open. The Patriots are guilty of prior acts, with a little help from the commish in destorying tapes. It’s on record they and their coach have been fined for illegal taping. So go ahead Pats, sue away and open them cans of anacondas like Canseco would say. The pats need to take a page from the rightious Mr. Clemens and his insane pursuit of trying to clear his reputation in Congress. Now look where he is at.
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Rating: 1 / 5 with 1 rating(s)
May 14th, 2008 at 11:06 pm
Which isn’t to excuse bad reporting, of course.
And the fact that this story was (evidently) buried a couple of pages deep definitely calls the paper’s decision-making into question. But I sincerely doubt anyone will be fired.
But who knows? I thought the Meat Puppets would be the next great rock and roll band.
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May 14th, 2008 at 11:11 pm
Can the city of Boston fire the Herald? For those of you not from Massachusetts who don’t know that the Herald is basically just a tabloid paper; this is just another chapter in the out and out stupidity and irresponsibility that makes up the story of the Herald.
This is the same newspaper that printed a photo of a dead teenage girl who was killed during the post world series celebration, and then shrugged it’s shoulders when people were outraged. You want to fire somebody, let’s fire The Herald.
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May 14th, 2008 at 11:26 pm
Mike,
Did NY Times editor Bill Keller get fired because of Judith Miller’s sloppy journalism? Miller was spewing White House lies about the need to go to war with Iraq. For erroneously reporting a sports story, I think firing an editor over carelessness is ridiculous.
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