McCarthy's criticism of Jason Wilde 'unprofessional'

[Rastak]

Here's a question...If Coach Mac and Wilde go to war, who wins? I say M3 easily.

No, I don't think so. It's very very hard to win a war with the press. They print the stories each day. MM has a press conference once in a while.
It would be counter productive to fight with the press. Denny Green alienated every single reporter in the Twin Cities and they absolutely drilled him every time he made the smallest mistake. And things went downhill from there LOL....

[pbmax]

Gureski, Wilde isn't referencing his own belief that Favre is not listening, he is paraphrasing Jaworski. Believe Jaworski or not, it isn't simpy an assertion of Wilde's own making.

But we all missed the point of the article relevant to the topic originally. After missing a voluntary camp, Harris is not going to show up for the OTAs. Does anyone remember if Harris missed these last year?

This sounds more and more that Al is looking to get paid.

Rather than channel the state of minds of Harris, Wilde and McCarthy, we can agree that Harris and his agent want more money.

And we now can agree (unless he has a habit of skipping these) that Harris is staying away.

And given Harris and agent comments previously, it sounds like he'll be in camp when its mandatory. This is like a flare gun, a heads up, that they'd like something done.

[pbmax]

So what will McCarthy say when the first question at the next press conference is: "Coach, do you have any information on why Al Harris won't be attending OTAs?".

[MJZiggy]

Here's a question...If Coach Mac and Wilde go to war, who wins? I say M3 easily.

No, I don't think so. It's very very hard to win a war with the press. They print the stories each day. MM has a press conference once in a while.
It would be counter productive to fight with the press. Denny Green alienated every single reporter in the Twin Cities and they absolutely drilled him every time he made the smallest mistake. And things went downhill from there LOL....

I'm not talking about "the press" or "every single reporter." I'm talking Mac v. Wilde. A few "no comments" when other reporters got big stories and great quotes and it makes reporting on the Packers rather difficult. It will be made even more difficult if the rest of the coaching staff and other members of the organization become suddenly quiet. Continually ripping the coach with nothing verifiable is only going to kill his credibility. He can bash M3 every day and people will start to think he's just being vindictive. The rest of the press will not join Wilde's hatefest if M3 is giving them what they need.

[Rastak]

Here's a question...If Coach Mac and Wilde go to war, who wins? I say M3 easily.

No, I don't think so. It's very very hard to win a war with the press. They print the stories each day. MM has a press conference once in a while.
It would be counter productive to fight with the press. Denny Green alienated every single reporter in the Twin Cities and they absolutely drilled him every time he made the smallest mistake. And things went downhill from there LOL....

I'm not talking about "the press" or "every single reporter." I'm talking Mac v. Wilde. A few "no comments" when other reporters got big stories and great quotes and it makes reporting on the Packers rather difficult. It will be made even more difficult if the rest of the coaching staff and other members of the organization become suddenly quiet. Continually ripping the coach with nothing verifiable is only going to kill his credibility. He can bash M3 every day and people will start to think he's just being vindictive. The rest of the press will not join Wilde's hatefest if M3 is giving them what they need.

Well, as they are waiting for these press conferences to start, you canbe sure these guys chat. They may not all be friends but I bet some of them are and IF it's percieved that MM threw your friend under the bus you MIGHT be more inclined to retaliate, even subconciously. That's my only point.

[MJZiggy]

They're friends, yet competitors. How would you feel if someone threw Lovie Smith under the bus? If him dissing my buddy gives me an advantage professionally, I don't know that I'm not very secretly kind of giddy about it. It will be interesting to see what happens in the next couple of weeks.

[gureski]

Gureski, Wilde isn't referencing his own belief that Favre is not listening, he is paraphrasing Jaworski. Believe Jaworski or not, it isn't simpy an assertion of Wilde's own making.

You must not listen to Wilde speak on a daily basis as part of ESPN radio. If you did, you'd know that Wild's personal belief is EXACTLY that Favre is uncoachable and wont listen. It's why he wrote the piece. He truly calls him 'Lord Favre' on an almost daily basis. He writes this huge article on how Favre is uncoachable and quotes Jaworski but I ask....why now? Why not a month ago? Where is the story? Where are other experts and players and people around Favre going on record or even off-record to support this assertion? And let's not forget that Henderson vigorously defended Favre against Jaworski so where is that little piece in this story? It's a completely one-sided story written because Wilde isn't fond of Favre and is pissed at McCarthy and therefore he wants to put McCarthy on the spot and cause friction. That's all this was and it's petty.

On the Harris thing.....you've got all sources on record saying there is nothing there. Regardless if it's there or not, until you get some proof that there is a story here you should NOT keep reporting it as truth. A month from now, if this is really happening, then Wilde will have his proof and he can write his story. For now, it's been denied and he should lay off writing that it's true until he has proof. That's how journalism works. Wilde seems to want to continue to report something is true that he (a) can't prove and (b) is being denied by the parties involved. That's wrong. He wrote the initial report and that was fine. Now he needs to back off until he gets proof. To keep asserting that he's right when there is no proof is not what a reporter should do. He broke the rumor, they denied it, and now he needs to sit and wait til there is proof to pursue the story more.

[MJZiggy]

And Sham, you say that the typical sports fan can't weigh the evidence properly and will be mislead. You don't over-react to these stories - why do you assume other readers are too dumb to keep a proper perspective?

Wow, you sure do know how to exagerate HH. I never said anything close to that. Why do you insist on making things up (some would call it prevarication) just because your argument is weak?

One of the real problems with unsubstantiated stories that tend toward the sensational, is that others, including national media pick up on them, often without the background information. Soon the story becomes, "Wilde reports Harris boycotting due to contract dissatisfaction." That summary is just as "truthful" as Wilde's story, but you can see where it goes.

That never happens!

http://www.wkowtv.com/index.php/sports/story/p/pkid/24034

http://www.rotoworld.com/content/playerpages/playerbreakingnews.asp?sport=NFL&id=1775&line=68014&spln=1

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2006/scorecard/05/31/truth.rumors.nfl/

Does anyone have the quote from Harris (or anyone besides Jason Wilde) saying why he's missing OTA?

[Harlan Huckleby]

I'm talking Mac v. Wilde. A few "no comments" when other reporters got big stories and great quotes and it makes reporting on the Packers rather difficult. It will be made even more difficult if the rest of the coaching staff and other members of the organization become suddenly quiet.

This isn't highschool. "Mean Girls", where the kid who crosses the most popular girl gets ostracized. The NFL requires coaches and players to deal with the media.

[MJZiggy]

Not equally.

[Harlan Huckleby]

When the papers first reported that an unnamed source said that the Packers were close to signing Charles Woodson, I didn't see a flurry of complaints about shoddy journalism.

Single, unnamed source stories are common. Usually they prove correct and you forget about them.

People cried "foul!" over Jason Wilde's use of an unnamed source because the story itself was unpleasant to hear, it went against the Packers.

[MJZiggy]

I thought they cried foul because everyone involved denied the whole thing and then the head coach jumped on him about it.

[Harlan Huckleby]

Harris didn't deny it. And the denial of Mike McCarthy means nothing. Well, except to the Packer Cult, who took this as some sort of proof.

[MJZiggy]

Harris' agent denied it.

[Harlan Huckleby]

yes, and reason given for Harris's absence? You have to read between the lines. Harris's agent is protecting his client's public reputation.

I have no problem with people who beleive that HArris is satisfied with his contract, and just staying away for ..... well, for some reason.

I believe Wilde's source, because I trust Wilde, it doesn't sound like a story somebody would just make up, and it seems reasonable to me that HArris wants his contract improved.