October 16, 2013
From our Walt Whitman desk
Today’s Boston Herald has a swell time patting itself on the back for yet another mention by “Journalism’s own hall of fame” – that would be The Newseum – in its daily Top Ten Front Pages feature.
Under the headline “Sports Stories” there’s this:
When a sports story makes the front page, it usually gets the best play. Just look at today’s St. Louis Post-Dispatch, which devoted half of Page One to the Cardinals’ baseball playoff loss. Of course, newspapers aren’t always so keen to promote defeat. The Indianapolis Star found a way to downplay the Colts’ loss in “Monday Night Football” by focusing on the positive. Go team!
You don’t have to tell the feisty local tabloid twice.
And don’t miss that dig at crosstown rival Boston Globe:
The Herald was the only Boston paper featured in the Top 10 list yesterday. The Herald’s front page was even tweeted out by Red Sox owner John W. Henry.
You know he’s gonna own the Globe too, right?
It doesn’t get much better than that for the Heraldniks.
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Uncategorized | Tagged: Big Papi, Boston Globe, Boston Herald, David Ortiz, Gerry Callahan, Heraldniks, John Henry, Michael Silverman, Paul Keaney, Red Sox, The Newseum, Top Ten Front Pages, Walt Whitman | 
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Posted by Campaign Outsider
September 28, 2013
As the hardreading staff noted yesterday, Thursday’s Boston Globe failed to mention the paper’s relationship to Red Sox principal owner and soon-to-be Globe owner John Henry in a piece about the Sox getting a sweetheart deal for rights to Fenway Park’s adjoining streets.
Friday’s Globe follow-up, however, came to Jesus.
Despite objections, Red Sox win rights to street use
Despite objections from residents and one board member, the Boston Redevelopment Authority on Thursday authorized a $7.3 million deal to let the Red Sox use two public streets near Fenway Park for gameday concessions and seating over the Green Monster.
The arrangement grants the Red Sox permission to close a 17,000-square-foot strip of Yawkey Way for concessions for as long as the baseball team plays at Fenway. It also gives the team air rights over Lansdowne Street to allow for seating over the ballpark’s famed left-field wall . . .
The principal owner of the Red Sox, John W. Henry, is purchasing The Boston Globe and related properties from The New York Times Co. for $70 million.
Better, yes?
1 Comment | Uncategorized | Tagged: Boston Globe, Boston Redevelopment Authority, Fenway Park, Green Monster, John Henry, Landsdowne Street air rights, Red Sox, Yawkey Way | Permalink
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September 27, 2013
(Two-Daily Town is proud to introduces this new feature tracking the Boston Globe’s disclosure of Red Sox principal owner John Henry’s Globe purchase)
The hardreading staff is, as you may have gathered, an eternal optimist. But this piece in Thursday’s Boston Globe gives us pause.
Nut graf:
Cahill said the BRA is attempting to “give away rights to a public street without reasonable public notice, without public advertisement, and without utilizing a public process.” There were no public hearings about the deal, though the board will vote during a public meeting.
Cahill also said the city should not sign a lifetime contract with the Red Sox and should seek a slice of the revenue generated by the team’s use of Yawkey and Lansdowne — a total of about $4.5 million annually, according to the team.
Sweet(heart), yeah?
The problem here isn’t the Globe story – reporter Callum Borchers does a perfectly reasonable job of examining both sides of the issue. The problem is, nowhere does the Globe disclose that Red Sox principal owner John Henry is the boss of them – something the Globe should absolutely overdisclose.
Crosstown, the Boston Herald is less, shall we say, nuanced.
Crying foul over Boston Sox deal
Watchdogs to review $7.3M pact
Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino balked yesterday at intervening in a proposed $7.3 million deal between the BRA and the Red Sox for air rights over Lansdowne Street and game-day concessions on Yawkey Way as the state Inspector General’s office said it would review the deal and an independent watchdog group called it “financially irresponsible”
“Why should I?” Menino asked. “It’s a good deal. (The Boston Redevelopment Authority) got much more money than they got in the past. Think about what the Red Sox mean to the city: jobs, taxes, vitality, heads on beds.”
The Herald piece doesn’t mention the Globe’s opaque coverage of the story.
Not sure that will be the case for long.
1 Comment | Uncategorized | Tagged: Boston Globe, Boston Herald, BRA, Callum Borchers, John Henry, Landsdowne Street air rights, Matthew Cahill, Red Sox, Tom Menino, Two-Daily Town, Yawkey Way | Permalink
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September 22, 2013
The John Henry Era™ at the Boston Globe has officially begun.
From Saturday’s edition of the estately local broadsheet:
It’s not until the 13th graf of that front-page piece that the Globe deigns to disclose.
Red Sox principal owner John W. Henry is currently in the process of purchasing The Boston Globe and its related properties from The New York Times Co. for $70 million.
Though Yawkey and Lansdowne are public streets, the BRA did not put the lease of those properties out to competitive bid, which would have given other businesses the opportunity to challenge the Red Sox for the rights. Indeed, earlier this year, a businessman from Everett told the BRA he was interested in securing Yawkey Way concession rights.
The BRA did not consider his offer, and officials said it would be difficult to put Yawkey and Lansdowne out for public bid because the Red Sox, as an abutting property owner, would effectively have the power to block a competitor from gaining those rights. Since the 2003 season, the Sox have had the exclusive right to sell concessions on that portion of Yawkey Way.
Okay, then. Business as usual in MeninoWorld.
Crosstown, Saturday’s Boston Herald, not surprisingly, was clueless.
Unfortunately, Sunday’s Herald edition isn’t any cluefull.
Boston dailies, we have a problem.
Leave a Comment » | Uncategorized | Tagged: air rights, Boston Globe, Boston Herald, Boston Redevelopment Authority, BRA, estately local broadsheet, Fenway Park, John Henry, John Henry Era™, Landsdowne Stret, MeninoWorld, Red Sox, Yawkey Way | Permalink
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August 18, 2013
Forty-six years ago today, Red Sox homeboy and Hall-of-Fame sureshot Tony Conigliaro had his baseball career turned inside out.
From Bob Ryan’s terrific Boston Globe column today:
Tony Conigliaro would have been an all-time great
I was there. I was there, and I was pretty close, too.
I was there the night of Aug. 18, 1967, when a Jack Hamilton fastball hit Tony Conigliaro in the face. I was sitting in a box seat not far up the third base line from the screen. I went to 27 Red Sox games that summer, and I seldom had a better seat than I did on that Friday night, the start of a four-game series with the California Angels. I had intended to buy my standard bleacher seat, but a guy sold me a box seat for face value down at Kenmore Square, and so I was hobnobbing with the swells in the $3.50 section that night rather than my usual cronies in the dollar bleacher seats (No, kiddies, I’m not making those numbers up).
I saw a lot of Red Sox history made that summer, but there are some historical events you can do without, this one being quite near the top of the list.
Ryan says, “I have not yet been able to let an Aug. 18 go by without thinking of Tony Conigliaro and the night when his life changed irrevocably.” And it certainly did, although Tony C fought back as best he could. As Ryan notes:
Tony Conigliaro was enormously talented. Please remember, when he came back in 1969 after missing the final six weeks of the 1967 season and all of the 1968 season, he was fooling us all. He hit 20 homers and drove in 82 to become the logical winner of the Comeback Player of the Year Award, and he followed that up with 36-116 production in 1970. And then the Red Sox traded him! Don’t get me started on that one.
Just be glad he did get started on this one. It’s an excellent read.
(P.S. The Boston Herald had nothing on Tony C’s anniversary today. We’re guessing Joe Fitz tomorrow.)
1 Comment | Uncategorized | Tagged: Bob Ryan, Boston Globe, Boston Herald, California Angels, Jack Hamilton, Joe Fitz, Red Sox, Tony C, Tony Conigliaro | Permalink
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August 13, 2013
The hardreading staff has been waiting patiently for Boston Herald readers to step up to the plate and weigh in on Red Sox owner John Henry’s purchase of the Boston Globe. There’s been a distressing dearth of Letters to the Editor in both local dailies – it took the Globe a full week to print a paltry three letters about the sale. Disappointing, to say the least.
Now, at last, the feisty local tabloid is on the scoreboard. From today’s edition:
Don’t even know where to start with that one.
So we won’t.
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August 11, 2013
As the hardreading staff has previously noted, the Boston Globe all this past week conspicuously failed to publish any letters about the sale of the stately local broadsheet to Red Sox owner John Henry.
But Saturday’s edition finally ended the Sale-itary Confinement:
Okay then.
1 Comment | Uncategorized | Tagged: Boston Globe, Boston Globe sale, John Henry, Letters to the Editor, Red Sox, Sale-itary Confinement | Permalink
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August 9, 2013
Among its many and varied talents, the Boston Herald has an uncanny ability to find the cloud inside the silver lining. Especially when it comes to crosstown rival Boston Globe.
To wit, today:
It’s wait, see for Globe’s unions
Union bigs at The Boston Globe said they’ll keep an open mind about new owner John Henry even as they face the unpleasant task of immediate negotiations over new contracts.
“I think guarded optimism is the right term,” said Martin Callaghan, the president of the Boston Newspaper Printing Pressmen’s Union. “John Henry seems to be saying the right things, but ultimately it comes down to who he surrounds himself with. We don’t necessarily view him as a newspaper guy, so it’ll be interesting to see if he keeps the current management and who he brings in for day-to-day operations.”
Union contracts at the Globe expired seven months ago. They won’t be addressed until Henry takes full ownership, but we’re not sure the following was a good omen:
Henry toured the Globe newsroom Monday and met with editors and reporters, but hasn’t held any meet-and-greets with either the pressmen or delivery drivers.
Uh-huh. You think dealing with the MLB Players Association is tough, Yacht Boy? Wait till you sit down with the Teamsters.
1 Comment | Uncategorized | Tagged: Boston Globe, Boston Herald, Boston Newspaper Printing Pressmen's Union, John Henry, Linda Pizzuti, MLB Players Union, Red Sox, Teamsters | Permalink
Posted by Campaign Outsider
February 1, 2013
From our Late to the Party desk
Wednesday’s Boston Globe op-ed page featured a piece by sports economist Andrew Zimbalist spanking former Red Sox manager Terry Francona for criticizing the Sox owners in his new book as being more interested in money than the game of baseball.
Zimbalist calls Francona’s narrative “as unconvincing, as it is, at points, nasty, petty, inaccurate, and unfair.” That’s not the only thing that’s unfair in this piece. Here’s how it starts:
Francona’s petty payback to Sox owners
IN “FRANCONA, the Red Sox Years,” Terry Francona, with the aid of Globe columnist Dan Shaughnessy, has given us his version of his eight years in Boston. They were very successful years for the team — two World Series victories, six trips to the playoffs. Presumably, Francona should get at least some of the credit for this success, though it is not clear how much.
The problem for Francona is that it all ended with the September swoon in 2011 and many seem to blame him. Francona, after all, reportedly had a wild year — a marital separation, a painkiller problem, and then the incident reported by Bob Hohler in the Globe of Jon Lester, John Lackey, and Josh Beckett drinking beer, eating fried chicken, and playing video games in the clubhouse during games. The inevitable, and seemingly reasonable, inference was that Francona had lost control of the team.
Wait a second. As best the hardreading staff recalls, the Boston Herald’s John Tomase broke the beer-and-chicken story.
C’mon, Globies. Credit where credit’s due.
2 Comments | Uncategorized | Tagged: Andrew Zimbalist, beer and chicken, Boston Globe, Boston Herald, Dan Shaughnessy, Francona The Red Sox Years, John Tomase, Red Sox, Terry Francona | Permalink
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December 12, 2012
So maybe the Mike Napoli signing isn’t sealed and delivered just yet.
From John Tomase’s column in today’s Boston Herald:
Catch to Mike Napoli signing?
Injury issues may put contract in jeopardy
Mike Napoli was the Red Sox [team stats]’ primary target of the offseason, and he might become their first casualty.
No one on Yawkey Way had anything to say on the matter last night, but alarm bells have been sounding ever since the one-week mark of his three-year, $39 million agreement passed without an official announcement.
Last night the estimable Ken Rosenthal of Fox Sports speculated that Napoli’s deal might have hit a snag, noting that he was supposed to be introduced at a Fenway Park [map] news conference yesterday.
Interestingly, what reportedly did happen yesterday was Napoli’s physical. Which has led to all kinds of speculation, as the Herald piece notes.
Meanwhile, crosstown at the Globe, the dead-tree edition had nothing on the Napoli deal, but the website caught up this afternoon with this piece:
Red Sox trying to close Mike Napoli deal
The Red Sox are trying to work through some issues that have prevented them from formalizing a new deal with Mike Napoli, according to a major league source, but nothing is resolved yet.
It seems like for days now the Red Sox have been on the verge of an announcing that Napoli had been signed to a three-year, $39 million deal, but none has come.
A newly acquired Red Sox player usually comes to Boston for a physical and officially signs the contract. Then, the player is introduced at a Fenway Park press conference.
Call Napoli the player to be quizzed later.
2 Comments | Uncategorized | Tagged: Boston Globe, Boston Herald, Fox Sports, John Tomase, Ken Rosenthal, Mike Napoli, Red Sox | Permalink
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