Tuesday, August 21, 2007
I've got the Wikipedia blues
I finally got on the phone with a high-level Major League Baseball team executive today, after days and days of trying him with no luck.The guy calls me out of nowhere and I was almost caught with my pants down.
Literally. I just got out of the bathroom.
I left a message with him two weeks ago about an "online published report" that I read about his team's interest in a particular player whose name you'll figure out when the story runs. I couldn't remember if it was a newspaper report, MLB.com, or ESPN -- all I knew was that it was published. And that it was a report. Online.
It was friggin' Wikipedia.
So right in the middle of the interview, I remembered that it I'd read this information on Wikipedia, and hit myself in the head for basing my entire set of questions based on what was likely bad information I read on that website.
So he's going into something about how he gets information on players outside of his region and drops the big one on me.
"Darren, where'd you read this report?" he says.
"You know, I was just thinking about that.."
I was stalling. I wasn't going to give up my sources. No matter how flimsy they may be.
"Because we don't usually comment on these type of speculation stories, but I was just curious. No problem. Hey Darren, take it easy."
"Zip it up, and zip it out."
OK, it would have been pretty cool if I added the the zippy part (Dave Chappelle for the clueless), but I didn't. I just hung up, and added wikipedia.org to the sites I'm not allowed to visit in Mozilla.
Labels: Chappelle stand up genius, lazy reporting, lessons
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