Old-school Philadelphia Daily News columnist Bill Conlin cobbled together something foolish on TV last night, and Comcast SportsNet quickly buckled. From Philly’s NBC affiliate:
Conlin was reacting to someone named Raul from Vineland, N.J., who sent in an e-mail commenting on the Philadelphia Eagles.
Regarding a question posed to coach Andy Reid on Tuesday about quarterback Donovan McNabb’s shoulder injury, the question from Raul read aloud by the host was: “Are you serious? It was a stupid question. It’s tendonitis [sic]. Way to go Philly media. You guys do a great job over-analyzing everything.”
“Amazing that guy would leave the blueberry harvest to send that off,” Conlin said a short time later.
“OK, don’t mock the blueberry harvest, mister,” Michael Barkann replied.
Comcast SportsNet reacted to Conlin’s comments at the top of its 5 p.m. sportscast Wednesday.
“Columnist Bill Conlin made a remark that may have offended some of our viewers. His comments (do) not reflect the views of our network, and Bill issued the following statement: ‘The comment was not meant to be controversial and certainly not meant to disparage anyone.’ Bill will not be on air, pending further review,” anchor Neil Hartman read.
I’m not even from the right part of New Jersey to be offended by the blueberry harvest crack. But I agree that one shouldn’t mess with the blueberry harvest.
Also, I have never read Thomas Pynchon’s Vineland. I basically have no grounds on which to comment on this or anything else. But I appreciate the apology.
See, if the caller had been “Roth” or “Cohen,” instead of “Raul,” Conlin would have had to say something like, “Amazing that guy would take time off from controlling the media and dating our blonde daughers to send that in.”
Vineland is, oddly, about the stretch of NorCal + Oregon sometimes called by scary wingnut types “Jefferson”, and not about Jersey. It’s kind of my favorite Pynchon.