“The Cartel” Uncovered?

In this week’s issue of the tragically hip Boston Phoenix, sports columnist Ian Donnis attempts to blow the lid off the worst kept corporate malfeasance secret in town: namely, the cozy connection between the hometown Red Sox, the city’s biggest newspaper The Boston Globe, and the influential local sports network NESN.

All three institutions, of course, are at least partially owned by The New York Times Company, principal owner of the Globe and minority owner, under the Werner-Henry-Lucchino Group, of the Sox and resultantly, of NESN. At the heart of Donnis’ argument are issues raised by journalists for The Rag who complain of an unfair advantage being given to their competitors at the Globe, who, according to Tony Mazz, Howard Bryant, et al. have much more access to the players and the front office than The Rag’s reporters do.

But there is an inherent flaw to Donnis’ argument, and it is this: everyone KNOWS that the NYT Company owns the Globe, everyone KNOWS that the Sox own NESN, and everyone with an interweb connection and an eye towards Boston KNOWS that the Globe, NESN & the Sox are linked through the Boston.com site. And one would be hard-pressed to prove, despite the prevalence of Shaunnie’s smiling mug on the Boston Globe Pre-Game Report and claims from The Rag’s reporters of exclusive leaks to Globe guys, that there is an empirical link between the paper, whose writers still take every opportunity to rip the team when they are failing, and the team, who up until last year had always given them ample opportunity to do so.

Regardless, and like every other real Sox fan out there, I will continue to read both the Globe and the Rag, enjoying the difference in tone between the slavish Gordon Edes and the incisive Michael Silverman, but noticing that somehow the stories are all talking about the same shit. Amazing.