As always I was doing my daily rounds on the Jets beat writers blogs, and last on my trek was Rich Cimini's Jet Stream blog for the daily news. I know a lot of fans have a problem with his negativity, but in general I don't mind his writing.
I'm not writing this as a Jets fan and by no means as a journalist. This is obviously a fans blog with amateur untrained enthusiasts running it rather than a paid job for professional journalists. No, I'm writing this is as a man, simple as that.
So anyway, here is a particular part of his blog that I was a little shocked by:
This person uses his web site to advance his personal agenda, and went so far as to call out another media member by name in one of Rex Ryan's news conferences. This person, coming off as a fifth grader, asked Ryan to comment on how WFAN's Joe Benigno allegedly "poisons" the minds of his listeners by invoking the "Same old Jets" refrain.
The question was out of place, an embarrassment to journalism, but this is a person who is more obsessed with who is reporting the news and how they're reporting than actually breaking his own news for his 12 or 13 subscribers. To his credit, Ryan handled the misguided question wonderfully.
I was watching the news conference, and the question seemed a little off for me. I'm not sure who this journalist is, but I think his real question although could of been worded better, was valid. Does the use of this term by the media create a negative atmosphere around the franchise.Obviously he didn't need to call out the journalist in question, but the point of the question was not to humiliate Joe Benigno, but to ask Rex if the 'same old Jets' phrase had any impact on the atmosphere.
However with Cimini being a senior journalist and long time writer for the Jets, when I read that I found it hard to fathom how someone can accuse someone of being 'a fifth grader' and then in the very next paragraph says something like 'breaking his own news for his 12 or 13 subscribers', an obvious low blow, in a post that's design was to call out another member of the media who Cimini later described as 'one particular fan masquerading as a journalist'.
After reading this immature and completely unnecessary attack on someone else, I have lost a lot of respect for Rich Cimini, who's obvious opinion of himself is quite inflated at the moment. Someone should probably introduce Cimini to what some like to call the moral high road.
Would a quick note at the bottom of a story saying that he disagreed with this particular journalist making reference to another member of the media by name of sufficed? it would of delivered the message and distance himself from the person in question. However after this blog post he has made him self look as embarrassing as the journalist he is referring to.
The bottom line at the end of the story is, if you want a respectful journalist who puts everything Jets above his own ego, read 'The Boone Docks'
Edit- Been informed that the journalist is Dan Leberfeld, so even with that knowledge I stick by the comments above. It's not about the respectability of the journalist who Cimini attacks, it's the fact that he spends time doing it. Bringing himself down.