It's Irresponsible. It's Unfair. It Needs To Stop.

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Due to some graphic language the version of this story posted here at bleacher report has been edited to remove offensive passages. To read the un-edited version click here.

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Yesterday morning I visited ESPN.com, as I often do, for sports news and notes. It is one of many websites I visit regularly for such purposes. There on the front page, amidst the tales of Yankees and Red Sox, the NHL and NBA Finals and other high profile nuggets was a peculiar headline:

Phillies Ibanez rips blogger for PED theory

So I clicked, I read, I followed the links where they led, and read some more.

The ESPN.com headline stems from John Gonzalez of the Philadelphia Inquirer and his columnin which he referenced the blog of Jerod Morris. On Monday Morris, who runs a small sports blog called Midwest Sports Fans as a sideline, posted a story entitled The Curious Case of Raul Ibanez: Steroid Speculation Perhaps Unfair, but Great Start in 2009 Raising Eyebrows.  

I know, lousy title. The premise, as reported by ESPN in all of its’ entities, was that Morris proclaimed Ibanez a possible steroid user. I’ll let you read the story for yourself and make up your own mind. I have formed my opinion, which I’ll get to later.

Ibanez responded angrily when a reporter asked him about the story, which is hardly surprising or wrong. I would too. He went on to tell reporters, according to the ESPN.com article,

“Make them accountable. There should be more credibility than some 42-year-old blogger typing in his mother’s basement. It demeans everything you’ve done with one stroke of the pen.”

For the record I don’t know if Jerod Morris lives in a basement, whether said basement is his mothers and whether Raul Ibanez knows this either. I do know however that in very short order the largest sports media company in the United States made Jerod Morris big news.

ESPN invited him to be a guest on Outside The Lines to discuss the issue with John Gonzalez of the Inquirer and Ken Rosenthal of Fox Sports, both full-time professional journalists. 

In short order both Gonzalez and Rosenthal skewered Morris with every ounce of voracity they could muster. Journalistic ethics and standards were debated, then used like clubs to bludgeon this little blogging man into a pulp. Ken Rosenthal even went so far as to invoke the golden rule in saying Morris should consider if “he would want something like this written about him

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