Backstage at the Final Four

[Will Lavender]

I highly recommend taking some time to read this article. It's long, but it gets into some really interesting stuff--specifically w/r/t Matt Jones and his ongoing battles with Pat Forde and Pete Thamel. The writer, Brian Weinberg, is from Louisville (really nice guy). He wrote a book about the Pitino era called Portrait of the Writer as a Young Fan that's great if you can find a copy.

Link

[Watchtower]

Long winded, but pretty decent. He could've exposed Forde's association with Slick, but chose not to.

[TrueblueCATfan]

Good read..Sure did not know that Matt Jones was a Duke grad

[Bombastic Blue]

Good read..Sure did not know that Matt Jones was a Duke grad

Would you brag about it?

[ukblue22]

His radio show is very entertaining if you're a UK Fan. If you're not then you probably won't enjoy it. He "Reports" on the Cats the way I would, as a fan first.

[Watchtower]

Jones makes no bones about himself or his site which is the opposite of guys who try to give the appearance of no bias. Forde, Thamel, Tipton and others come to mind. Everyone has an agenda, but Jones isn't ashamed to admit his.

[TrueblueCATfan]

Would you brag about it?

nope..but I just found it interesting

[CATHYnKY]

Good read..Sure did not know that Matt Jones was a Duke grad

If I remember correctly, he did his undergrad studying at Transy. Isn't that why he had on a Transy shirt the show before they played UK?

[cumberlandredskin]

If I remember correctly, he did his undergrad studying at Transy. Isn't that why he had on a Transy shirt the show before they played UK?

Yes he went to Transy. He's mentioned it on his show quite a bit.

[Will Lavender]

Most interesting thing about the piece was the "egos" the guys like Forde and Doyel admit they have. Why? I suspect it's because they know they have jobs that everybody who follows sports wants.

But the ironic thing is that what they do really isn't all that interesting. This is just my personal opinion, but sports isn't that exciting of a thing unless you're a fan. These guys hate fans; fans aren't objective, fans can get crazy. It's what makes fans fans. Fans are the antithesis of Yahoo! Sports and ESPN, places that want you to be a "sports follower," a guy who isn't a fan but who follows all teams, who listens to all the talk shows, who watches ESPN six hours a day (this is one of the reasons the NFL has become so popular, because it's been able to tap into a situation where people follow the league as much as they do "their team").

This is the reason Jones has become hated: he represents what sportswriters hate.

[Dwight Schrute]

He's a Duke law grad. Big difference.

[cumberlandredskin]

Its interesting to see how much the old guard writers hate the new guys like Jones. Times change and the way of covering sports has changed a lot. Guys, like Forde, are just about a dying breed among all of these so called journalist.

[Dwight Schrute]

Its interesting to see how much the old guard writers hate the new guys like Jones. Times change and the way of covering sports has changed a lot. Guys, like Forde, are just about a dying breed among all of these so called journalist.

Forde's not really an old guard guy - he writes for Yahoo Sports - a dot com. The guys that are a dying breed are guys like Jerry Tipton from print sources.

[Watchtower]

Most interesting thing about the piece was the "egos" the guys like Forde and Doyel admit they have. Why? I suspect it's because they know they have jobs that everybody who follows sports wants.

But the ironic thing is that what they do really isn't all that interesting. This is just my personal opinion, but sports isn't that exciting of a thing unless you're a fan. These guys hate fans; fans aren't objective, fans can get crazy. It's what makes fans fans. Fans are the antithesis of Yahoo! Sports and ESPN, places that want you to be a "sports follower," a guy who isn't a fan but who follows all teams, who listens to all the talk shows, who watches ESPN six hours a day (this is one of the reasons the NFL has become so popular, because it's been able to tap into a situation where people follow the league as much as they do "their team").

This is the reason Jones has become hated: he represents what sportswriters hate.

They hate Jones because he's a blatant homer and refuses to apologize for it and they choose to believe they are fair and balanced which is a load of crap bigger than what my grandson used to carry in his diaper.

Forde was able to adapt to changing times, going from print to media. That didn't stop him from sniffing Pitino's bicycle seat, though. All these guys are trying to win a Pulitzer like Mark Story did on exposing the UK Shame stuff. Trouble with that is they all want to hit on Kentucky and would NEVER even think about exposing the school from where they graduated. Because of Calipari, they think UK is an easy target, but forget that Sandy Bell rides herd.

[Dwight Schrute]

Forde works for Yahoo - who in the past has busted UConn and Miami in NCAA scandals. It's not just Kentucky they're after.

The reason they don't take Jones seriously is that he admits his biases while calling out others who don't.