When push comes to shove, this has been a good week for retroactive narratives fitting a story in sports.
Kyrie Irving: An anonymous 'voice for the voiceless' on vaccines?
The Nets star is approaching championship levels of irony.
October 13, 2021 at 4:12PM
The latest example, at least from how it looks here: Vaccine holdout Kyrie Irving, who was taking plenty of heat for not getting vaccinated — particularly after the Nets said he won't play home or away as a result — is now suddenly a champion for a larger cause.
Per a story in The Athletic, Irving is said to be "upset that people are losing their jobs due to vaccine mandates." And per the story, a direct quote, Irving wants to be "a voice for the voiceless" on this matter.
That quote was provided by an anonymous source, which helps us approach a level of irony that is hard to top — something I talked about at the start of Wednesday's Daily Delivery podcast.
A voice for the voiceless. Just not his voice.
Much of this seems like nonsense, a line of reasoning concocted by Irving or whomever is advising him to make his stance seem noble instead of just ignorant. And the story itself reads too much like it came straight from Irving's camp.
That's how the sausage is made sometimes in the national media. Favorable press now. Scoops later. I'm not saying that's what happened here, but others sure are.
It's been quite a week for access sports journalism. That criticism arrives almost in step with ESPN's Adam Schefter coming under scrutiny for reportedly sending to Washington Football Team GM Bruce Allen a draft of a story for revision/editing.
Sending a source a full story is a journalism no-no. The most you should do, in my estimation, is read back a key quote or small slice of important information to a source to make sure it is correct.
We'll see where this all leads, particularly with Irving. Maybe he will put his voice to the subject in the coming days. Maybe he will decide that getting the vaccine isn't such a bad idea and that playing basketball is better than an imaginary and ill-advised cause.
If and when any of that happens, I'll be sure to note who breaks the story.
