Gottcha

Note: this is not a baseball story.

So Theo Epstein got married recently and Theo’s dad Leslie pulled a fast one on the media and an entire Nation. You can read the article here, but basically what it comes down to is that Theo, as is his right, wanted to keep it as private as possible, but the ever meddling media thought they were getting some inside information when they got his dad to talk.

Leslie Epstein basically told Boston Globes baseball writer extraordinaire Gordon Edes in an email that Theo and his new wife were married at a hot dog stand at Coney Island by an orthodox Rabbi; and Edes took the bait, hook, line, and sinker. Before long the news was all over town and all over Red Sox Nation and no one, it seems ever once considered that it was a joke, Leslie Epstein relayed the news rather convincingly.

In the article I linked to above, you’ll notice that Leslie Epstein apologized for it. What is he apologizing for? I say good for him for giving the media exactly what they deserve. I do feel a little bad for Gordon Edes because I think that he’s a great baseball writer who has a lot of integrity and is well respected in the game, but in his attempt to get a scoop here, he probably acted a little too hastily and really should have verified with Mr. Epstein about how serious he was.

But the truth is that Edes isn’t going to take much of a hit here because once the word got out, every other media outlet in New England jumped on it. Edes probably learned a valuable lesson here and I doubt it’s going to affect his credibility much, but it was really nice to see the rest of the media take the pie in the face like they did.

This is part of what’s wrong with this country, too many people are way to interested in what celebrities are doing in their lives and are not concerned enough with what’s going on in their own lives. It disgusts me at how many rags, tabloids, and TV shows are out there making money on this stuff. If people cared as much about their own lives as they did about some of these people’s then maybe there wouldn’t be as many fuckups as there are.

So Leslie Epstein I salute you, nice job. You have nothing to apologize for and if you can get away with pulling off a stunt like that then I say more power to you.