The JSonline chats with Brewers beat writers Tom Haudricourt and Todd Rosiak are usually good reads. There’s still a fair amount of frivolous babble that would be more appropriate for sports talk radio callers, but there are always a couple of decent questions mixed in. Case in point – the chat with Rosiak earlier this week included a question that touches on the inherent conflict of interest within sports journalism:
Q: Don, Milwaukee – The FSN broadcast the other day during the Brewers-A’s game panned to Tom H. yukking it up with Brewers PR people, including Mike V. Why are the JS writers so cozy with the organization, and what happened to your role as the Fourth Estate? Does this help explain why you and Tom H. were nowhere to be found as the Brewers collapsed down the stretch and why you refused to criticize anyone associated with the club in a meaningful way?
A: Todd Rosiak – Actually, Tom was chatting up former WWE wrestler Honky Tonk Man, who was a guest of the Brewers that day. Perhaps we should ask the Brewers to build a wall around us in the pressbox so as to not comingle with their personnel. Spring training is six weeks long. Give me a break. At Miller Park, our seats are in opposite ends of the pressbox. And my recollection is we covered every game last season and reported exactly what happened. Ask the players if we were nowhere to be found. Several made it known they didn’t appreciate our “negative” coverage. Sounds like you wouldn’t have been happy with anything short of name calling.
Don’s question is needlessly snide, and one suspects he’s the type of fan who is anxious to fire someone. It’s hard to blame Rosiak for giving a dismissive answer. That said, there is a substantive criticism embedded in Don’s question and it would have been interesting if Rosiak has taken it on. Although journalism is supposed to have an adversarial component to it, sports reporters can’t be too confrontational if they want access to players and team officials. It’s easy to see how journalists might avoid certain subjects if they thought those subjects would compromise their relationship with the powers that be.
This isn’t the first time Rosiak has been accused of being in the tank for the Brewers during a JSOnline chat. In 2013, Rosiak faced a similar question (edited for clarity):
Q: Craig, Brookfield – Is it accurate to characterize what you and Haudricourt do with the Brewers as journalism? It seems like you guys hardly do more than serve as a mouthpiece for the organization…relaying the desired narrative. Considering Journal Communications and the Brewers are long standing business partners, is it unrealistic for fans to think the beat writers will do anything beyond soft peddle the coverage?
As with Don from Milwaukee, Rosiak was fairly dismissive of Craig, and explained “Our job is to report on what happens, not editorialize.” You can’t argue with that statement, and indeed it didn’t take me much time to look up examples of Rosiak and Haudricourt writing critically (while not technically editorializing) of Brewers players. But Rosiak didn’t grapple with the serious point of the question, and Craig even went so far as to highlight the business relationship between Rosiak’s employers and the team he covers.
I think it would be unfair to say that either Rosiak or Haudricourt are shills for the Brewers. But it might be fair to say that when journalists view their job descriptions narrowly – just reporting exactly what happens – it could keep them from looking into certain kinds of stories that their readers would be interested in.
I’ve written previously about how I believe the baseball media has been too soft on MLB’s drug war. While I’m willing to accept I have a minority viewpoint on the issue, Rosiak and Haudricourt were in the unique position of being baseball writers in the same city where former MLB commissioner Bud Selig kept his office. Surely they could have pressed a little harder for Selig to explain himself. Even if they largely agreed with his tactics, they could have given their readers deeper insight on how Selig pursued the course of action he did.
If that topic isn’t Brewers-centric enough, the issue of Miller Park’s financing and how public money has been spent on the team is closer to home. Just last week the Miller Park stadium district consultant announced that the tax used to build the stadium would never end (they actually said it might end in 2020, but if you read between the lines it means never). In that case, the JSOnline reporter Don Walker just reported what happened without any noticeable skepticism. You might wonder if the business relationship between Journal Communications and the Brewers would result in JSOnline employees being uncurious about how the Brewers spend public money – and there’s plenty of evidence that they’ve spent it unscrupulously.
Certainly, this conflict of interest isn’t unique to sports journalism. Reporters that cover a wide variety of subjects – politics, entertainment, science, specific professions – often have close relationships with the people they cover. How else would they get good stories if they weren’t friendly with their sources? But the fact that it’s a pervasive issue doesn’t mean it’s not fair to ask about – and it’s a question that deserves a thoughtful answer.
I don’t mean to be too hard on Rosiak and Haudricourt. I’m not intimately familiar with the standards of their profession, and maybe the topics I’ve suggested are radical departures from how baseball writers are expected to go about their business. It’s not their job to try and remedy one of the foremost ethical concerns of journalism. However, I do think that if this question comes up again, it would be enlightening for Rosiak to go beyond “we just report what happens” and hear a little about how he personally deals with this issue – even if he suspects the questioner is only interested in name calling and firing managers.
(Image: marenzogroup.com)
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