The New York Times basically took Sports Illustrated‘s Ben Roethlisberger expose, reworded it, interviewed new “friends” and entitled it “Ben Roethlisberger’s Journey to Notoriety.”
You guys know that I have never been shy about my dislike of Ben. I’ve always been a critic. I’m just a blogger. I’ve never met Ben. He most likely does not know that I exist. I feel comfortable expressing my opinion of him and trying to do it in an entertaining way.
Yet, when Sports Illustrated approached me for an interview about Ben for their expose, I turned them down. I already told you this, but my gut said not to do it. It seemed like piling on, you know? And I didn’t want to pile on in such a negative, national kind of way.
So color me flabbergasted that between Sports Illustrated and now the New York Times, that so many of Ben’s old friends and aquaintances seemed to jump at the chance to talk negatively on the record about Ben.
I get it. He’s a jerk. Was a jerk. Remains a jerk. He has big personality problems. He might be sexually aggressive. But is it necessary for the people that knew him to continue illustrating all the ways he was, is, and remains a jerk?
What do they gain from this? What do they HAVE to gain?
I mean, I’m a blogger who had a lot to gain if I spoke to Sports Illustrated. Readership, sponsors, page hits, etc. I’ve never met the guy and I still said no. Yet here are all of these so-called friends and acquaintances of Ben’s, who knew him, who know him, who had/have intimate knowledge of his personal life, and with nothing to gain, they had no qualms about dishing to the New York Times about him after the Sports Illustrated piece already hit months ago.
It just seems so pathetic.
[shrug]
There is a world of difference between a random reader who has never met me, speaking negatively about me to the press, versus, I don’t know, a friend from college doing it all, “OMG. I thought I knew her but she turned into such an egotistical bitch.”
One of those, you can brush off as coming with the territory. The other, is just plain unnecessary.
I checked twitter to see how others were reacting to this article, and I couldn’t find anyone that expressed a sentiment similar to mine.
What do you guys think? Kick him while he’s down and burn him in the media, or leave him where he lays, at rock bottom, still trying to pick himself up?
I vote the latter.
(h/t @observacious)
