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Monday, September 20, 2004

Neyer v. Kettmann

This is odd. (via Crank)
ESPN.com columnist Rob Neyer has issued the following apology for posting a recent controversial book review on a commercial Web site:

"I messed up.

"A couple of weeks ago, I had a visceral reaction to a new book about a Yankees-Red Sox game at Fenway Park. Shortly thereafter I posted a customer review, under an assumed name, on Amazon...

[snip]

"...An enterprising baseball writer put two and two together, and suddenly my identity became a story, if not the story, which was exactly the opposite of what I'd intended. Four years ago I wrote a book about my experiences at Fenway Park, and this too became a part of the story. I realize, in retrospect, that I've got a special responsibility to both myself and ESPN, with regard to my credibility and the company's, and my "anonymous" review didn't do anybody any good..."
The book in question would appear to be Steve Kettmann's new book, "One Day at Fenway", which attempts to tie together the story of one Red Sox game from the experiences of several fans, writers, and players. Blending together many points of view to create on story is an interesting idea, but one that Kettmann apparently failed to flesh-out.

Neyer, having written a similar book several years back, had a bit of an over-reaction to Kettmann's book, and decided to post an anonymous review on Amazon. Neyer's original review was posted under the name "Ike Farrell" but has since been deleted. You can see a new, no less scathing review by Rob (under his own name this time) here (scroll to the bottom).

A perfect crime? Not quite... it wasn't long before Newsweek's Ken Davidoff exposed Neyer's fraud.

So it looks like Rob's got a bit of a journalistic ethics problem on his hands. I actually find Rob's reaction to the book quite refreshing (though the way he went about expressing it was far from respectable). At least he didn't supply one of those vapid 'slap on the back' book jacket quotes, that you know comes from a guy who didn't even read the damn thing. Having said that, I can see how alienating the beatwriters' club would be a problem for someone in Rob's profession, so perhaps it wasn't the best idea in the world.

You can see Rob's side of the story here.

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