A Letter from ESPN to a New Hire

I went out to get my mail the other day, and I found an envelope addressed to a nearby town, not to me.

I was going to put it back in the box for the mailman until I saw a Bristol, CT return address. It came from the offices of ESPN.

Curious to see what the worldwide leader would be sending in a large manila envelope, I opened it.

What I found was a new hire packet for a staff member and the information gave a very interesting look at how the worldwide leader handles its business.

Dear [ESPN new hire],

Welcome to ESPN! We at the Worldwide Leader in Sports are excited to have you joining our staff. Enclosed you will find some information about the policies and practices that have helped make us the top sports news organization in the world.

I. What we cover

Here at ESPN, we pride ourselves on putting forth articles and news features that sports fans are interested in. Well, not exactly. Since we pretty much have a monopoly on sports news and highlights, we have to do what we can to attract those people who are only partially interested in sports.

We do this several ways:

A. Anytime a celebrity is involved in a sporting event, we cover it.

B. Whenever a current or former athlete is involved in a criminal activity, we devote all of our time to it.

Example: Even though O.J. Simpson hasn’t been involved with professional football for over 30 years, during his trial we devoted not one, not two, but all three of our major networks to the coverage. We feel that the viewer cannot get enough of watching former and current athletes crash and burn.

1. Anything that suggests controversy is given journalistic priority. Remember, we have a lot of writers on the payroll, and each of them needs to give their take on every issue, even if they are all the same.

2. No controversy? No problem. We just make a mountain out of a molehill. We’ll comb over athlete interviews and try and dredge up something he said and blow it out of proportion.

Example: We ambushed Miguel Tejada over a small discrepancy in his birth certificate, even though it was discussed years ago. If partial sports fans can’t latch onto that, then we’re out of business.

3. Sports highlights are a distant second priority for us. Why show highlights when we can pass judgment on people we’ve never met?

4. An even more distant third is any sports feature that a true sports fan would be interested in.

Example: We recently did a special on “Outside the Lines” about the history of the play-action pass. Did we show it in primetime?  Not when there’s an athlete who gets a DUI. We’ll play the play-action segment at 11:30 in the morning, so most sports fans can’t see it.

C. We also give priority to anything that highlights the plight of minorities, no matter how biased or irrelevant it is.

Remember, we run a lot of live TV, and if anyone ever pulls a Don Imus, we want to have plenty of progressive racial articles to show people that ESPN really doesn’t hold bias against any race, except white people of course.

Example: We will let Scoop Jackson run an article about how Tiger Woods will do more things for this world than Martin Luther King, Gandhi, or any other person who actually created social change. Even when the article endorses Earl Woods’ assertion that his son can accomplish miracles because of his race, but white people can’t.

II. Who we cover

A. The following people will be given top priority, despite their current lack of involvement in sports:

1. Michael Vick

2. Barry Bonds

3. O.J. Simpson

4. Pacman Jones (Update: now playing, but only priority when he is in trouble.)

5. Roger Clemens

B. Anybody else, no matter how good they are at what they do, no matter how much good they do, will be second banana to the above mentioned people.

III. How we cover it

A. Headlines

Remember to always write an attention-grabbing headline. Even if it is inaccurate as to the story’s content.

Example: Before Super Bowl XLII, we wrote a headline that read: “Burress: Giants receivers are better than Pats WR's.” Once the story is read, it becomes clear that Plaxico said nothing of the sort.

In fact, he said this: “They got a great group there, but I don’t see any reason why we can’t play as good or better than them.”

B. Articles

Always fan the flames. Even when a quote is said in a completely innocent context, remember to leave that context out and reinforce the controversial nature.

Example: Write all about how Jameer Nelson guaranteed a win for the Magic in game five, even though he said, "We're going to make some adjustments and we're going to win this game, I'm not being arrogant or cocky or anything like that. I think [Saturday] we let it slip out of our hands. Game two we let it slip out of our hands. We're going to win this game in Detroit."

Does that sound like a cocky athlete, or someone who realizes that his team has to win to keep their season alive? It doesn’t matter; we play it like he was guaranteeing a win by being a cocky jerk.

That’s about it for our basic journalistic rules. Note how they stand in stark contrast to the basic rules of responsible journalism. These are the methods that have led to ESPN's development as the worldwide media leader in sports.

Welcome to the family.