ESPN’s official conscience — network ombudsman Don Ohlmeyer — has weighed in on “The Decision.” It probably won’t surprise you to learn this, but he wasn’t a big fan.
Ohlmeyer writes:
Some found ESPN guilty of violating a key ethical journalistic tenet — paying for news. Others disdained the network’s perceived pandering to a superstar, a trait causing them to ponder the network’s biases. Still others decried a simple announcement being manufactured into the suspense of a “second coming.” The monstrous hype that led up to the special was a calculated and constructed spotlight that media far beyond ESPN helped feed. To many, the aggregate was an affront to humility, loyalty, moderation … and instead became a celebration of greed, ego and excess.
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